Leading from the Heart, with Abbie Hain

In this conversation, Abbie and I cover several topics related to leadership and healthcare. Abbie talks about the importance of heart-centered leadership, which involves prioritizing the needs of the people you lead, listening to their experiences, and leading with empathy and compassion. Abbie shares her experience of burning out as a leader and realising that heart-centered connection was missing. She shares about her spiritual awakening in Scotland, and how it inspired her PhD research, which focused on the effect of mistakes in healthcare and the need for self-compassion. 

This conversation highlights the importance of balancing heart-centered thinking with scientific rigor, being authentic, and being courageous in showing oneself completely. It also emphasizes the need for psychological safety in healthcare and being self-compassionate in caring for oneself and one's team. 

The leadership lessons include the importance of embracing one's natural leadership style and being connected to the sacred. 

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Transcript

Claire

My guest today is Abbie Hayne. Abbie lives on the gorgeous island of Maine in beautiful British Columbia on the west coast of Canada. She has been a nurse since she was 19. She started with hands-on nursing and moved into work involving system safety. Recently, she completed her PhD research on the psychological safety needs of health professionals in Canada. Abbie, I'm delighted to have you on this Podcast Welcome .

Abbie

Hi, Claire. I'm delighted to be here with you.  

Claire

As you know, , this podcast  explores how women lead from within. I often use that expression - and for me, it means that there's a way in which some women are able to bring their emotional and spiritual intelligence in service of their leadership, and when that happens, something different is able to come through. And that's something is what I'm interested in exploring with you. Do you want to say something about that? What does that evoke to you? 

Abbie

Yeah, it resonates with me. Definitely resonates with me.  I have never seen myself , in leadership positions when I first started in my world, sort of entering into the world , of healthcare and nursing. I didn't see myself where I am now, that's for sure.  

But I do know that I was always moving with a heart-centered approach, in things that I did. Believe me, I've gotten it wrong many times.  But I think, always from the forefront and I think that's probably why I was attracted to being a nurse, it's been about human connection for me. . . 

Claire

So tell me more about what you mean by a heart-centered leadership. 

Abbie

Yeah. There's always a need for logic and analysis and good business acumen and, all these kinds of things, leading. But for me, it was always about the other human being, in front of me and who they were. What was happening for them and what was their experience and what experience were they bringing? And just , the sheer privilege , of getting to know another human in front of you, you know?

I don't want to paint a Pollyanna picture. Please believe me. I, I've gotten it wrong. I was, you know, I got a role as a senior director in a national organization and oh boy did that go to my head. And, I thought, I've got to get it right. And I looked around me at society and what you're supposed to do, as a leader and a director in charge of the situation and I was going to try and fight for a good budget and a big team and going to have these fabulous projects. And, I lost sight , of that heart-centered way of being. And I was hard on the people that worked for me. Yeah. 

Claire

Was this your first role in leader?

Abbie

Yes, in a, in a very formal way. I had done, I had leadership in hospitals. I did a lot of education, which was really fun, bringing in very new people to that profession. Super enjoyable. But this was the first formal. Senior director reporting to a C E O. working with the board, I was in charge of the board governance and, you know, all the formal pieces, you know, I had budget.

Claire

Yeah. Help me understand. You said you tried to fit into an image of leadership that you assumed was being asked from you. And how did you shift to the heart centered leadership that you mentioned  earlier? 

Abbie

Yeah. Um,  well, definitely I was having effect on a few people on the team and I knew my leadership was having an effect. I was pushing them way too hard. We were all excited about the work and the projects and people wanted to pour time and energy, but I was not caring for people properly. I was being demanding, and… 

Claire

Which is not your nature. 

Abbie

No. Yeah, . Exactly. 

Claire

So what effect was it having on you? I mean, obviously it was having an effect on others, but what effect was it having on you to  leave against your nature in some ways? 

Abbie

Sure. Yeah. I think Claire, I honestly, I burned out. I absolutely got to a place where I remember, I would-be all-over Canada, traveling everywhere and international too. And I remember going down, I was down another hotel hallway, in fact, to a point where after this job I wasn't really sure if I wanted to stay in hotels anymore. I was traveling so much, and I just thought, this is not it. This is not it, and I, believe me, the work was amazing. People, the team, all of it was incredible. But wow, what a learning. And you know, I had looked back a little bit and I went back to my nursing. I thought of the connections with patients and families and what's really real in life. And I had done a study in my master's on nurse presence and being present as a human to nurses, between nurses and patients.

I didn't know what it was. Knew it was there, and then I started to study it, and that was the terminology that was used, but it was just that heart-centered connection. So I actually did leave the position and, you know, I did it at the height of my game. We, a new C E O came on board and she was a woman and she was phenomenal.

And I thought, oh my gosh, she could be an amazing mentor. And, she really did offer that mentorship and she was excited to start to work with me. And I decided to. Because I just thought, okay, I've learned a lot here and I could have given it more time.

Claire

Right. So in some ways, but in a way you didn't see another way of leading within that position, or did you?

Abbie

The CEO that came on board. She was doing it. She absolutely was.

Claire

What was she doing?  

Abbie

When she introduced herself to the team, she, I always remember this. She talked about being in a choir, first thing. She said, I love to sing and I'm in a choir. And that got me right away. It wasn't about where she'd been, what she'd done, and, you know, projects that had been achieved. It was heart-centered right away. 

Claire

So she showed you there was a different way?

Abbie

Very much so. She's an incredible leader and she's done incredible things nationally in Canada. And I knew that it was just time for me to go, I'd been in this position and I quite frankly, my health was not great, and I knew that I just needed to stop and get out of that environment and just return to actually not even look at a new way of being. It was returning to what I knew before, you know. So yeah, it was a challenging, difficult time. That's why, believe it or not, I jumped into a PhD. I thought that might be a good place to go.   

Claire

So this was the time when you decided to start your Phd ? From that period of burnout , of descent. 

Abbie

Exactly. 

Claire

Were you looking for the medicine that you needed in that particular time? 

Abbie

Yes. And truly, I do believe there's a lot of people do, especially going into a PhD, my time in life. So, I would've been 50 years old. I do believe that quite a few 50-year-olds doing PhDs are looking for more than completing a degree. Right. And, I knew I needed to take the time and the vast space to really feel into my becoming quite frankly. And  that's what it was. I started off in that machine mode, very efficient on the coursework. I was getting amazing grades, getting huge scholarships and grants.

And then, I started to realize, the exploration, was more than simply the materials in the program. It was much bigger than that, and I had an amazing year. I had such a soulful one of the years in my program. I had such a soulful spiritual year. I went to the island of Iona in Scotland, which is a very sacred place.

I went to a conference for the PhD stuff in Glasgow. And then I said, that's it. I'm off, I'm going to this island, and off I went. And, it's the island where Brigid’s well is, it’s there. And, I went to the well, at sunrise and did a ceremony, gathered some sacred water. Took it home and made little bottles, 35 little bottles, and I took a year to give very special people, these little bottles, of holy water from Brigid’s well. And that was a real ritual for me to just really solidify that that heart-centered human connection is what it really, really is. And then I started to infuse that into my work.

Claire

Yeah. How beautiful. So, let me try and rewind a little bit to make sure that I understand. You have that natural heart-centered way of connecting with others and that very nurturing and caring nature that is so recognizable in you. and that is probably what took you into nursing at 19. And for as long as you did that hands-on working, that was there, and the challenge arrived when you had to step into leadership roles. You somehow, went against your nature, or didn't know how to bring that with you in your leadership. That was the challenge for you? 

Abbie

Hmm. Yes. Yes.

Claire

And that makes so much sense. Often women come into leadership with assumptions and ideas about how to be a leader. And it seems like you went against your nature long enough to actually burn out and there was this fairy, this role model that came to you at this time to show you, hey, there's a different way.

And you were gracious enough to leave the space for her to do what she knew how to do already. And that took you into your own journey and that was necessary for you to go back to the source. To go back to your heart, to actually reclaim what was yours. Is that an accurate summary? 

Abbie

I would say it is very accurate, Claire, and the funny thing that you mentioned, which I absolutely love, is that you said there was this fairy that came, you used the word fairy and I need to tell you, which is absolutely gorgeous. I was going to mention it and I thought, no, it's a little crazy. This C E O that came, she had fairies all over her office.

Claire

She sounded like a fairy, when you told me about her, I mean, what else would she be? She came into your life while you were having a burnout. She showed you there was another way and graciously took over. And you graciously opened the space for her because you recognized her at some level. 

Abbie

Yeah. Isn't that fun, yeah. And I remember thinking, you know, like we were, there was three women, senior directors and we're like, she's got fairies in her office. She's the C E O, she has fairies. Yeah. That's really cool. 

Claire

I love that. Mm-hmm. And so, you had a spiritual awakening or an earth awakening in Scotland. You finished your PhD.  How did that change the last years that you were on that PhD? 

Abbie

As you mentioned, it's about a reclaiming, you know, it really was a reclaiming. And, um, , sometimes when I look back on the writing, I thought, oh my gosh, what on earth is going on here? So I was lucky to have fabulous, so fabulous mentors in my program. And they let me wander. They let me wander where I needed to wander. And so, a lot of the writing was very soulful.

It was, I chose the methodology of phenomenology, which is lived experience, and it's a type of methodology that encourages the poetic and so, poetic grading and poetic thinking. And, I had beautiful participants and the methodology requires you have a really, a deep relationship with your participants. So, it all came to fruition around this connectivity to human experience. 

And so I think one of the things, that I was able to bring to the work was courage. Courage to really show myself completely, show myself in the writing and in the work. And I would say for sure, It could have taken me away from rigor and I was a sense of, you know, it's still a scientific method.

And so here again, I was facing this notion of, heart-centered and yet balancing it out with logic analysis, the lines and the circles. And again, I drifted over now into the other. Isn't interesting, as I talk about this, isn't life amazing? And so, I drifted into, probably too much heart-centered focus in the writing and did I stay with the rigor? Maybe not. 

So, maybe not , in certain areas. And so, I went through a real challenge defending the PhD. I really did. I was challenged at the PhD defense for sure. And my mentors were shocked and they were completely devastated, upset. They thought this was really unfair because they put you forward, when you're ready, right.

And so, I went through another grind. Another grind. Facing the balance. Yeah. So here we are and you know, heart centered's good, , being authentic is good, but you still need rigor. You still need the scientific method. You still need to have the evidence.

And there's all other pieces to it. There were personality things as well, but I had to readjust my writing and to tighten it up and to clean it up. And there we are and I defended it.  And finished. Yeah. So, it wasn't easy. 

Claire

Amazing. And the topic of your PhD, tell me more about that because have a sense it's very much related to what you went through personally. 

Abbie

Yeah. And so that, that basically the study was to understand the effect of going through a serious mistake in working in healthcare, while giving patient care, in a group of health professionals. And the focus was on how does one grow through, that kind of experience? And so, the psychological safety aspect is, you know, sort of some of the professional requirements around being able to speak about mistakes and how we're not there yet in the health professions. 

There's a whole sort of ethos around perfectionism and our colleges train us to be perfect practitioners, and really, we can't get it wrong because the stakes are so high and polarizing that debate.

Of course, you know, anybody training or teaching does talk about mistakes, but any health professional will tell you if you make a mistake that causes patient harm, that's the most devastating thing you could do. And so how can you possibly grow from this? So, the whole idea of heart-centered, in relation to that work is, is in being self-compassionate, heart-centered, in caring for yourself when you go through something like that as a health professional and not blaming and shaming.

And then heart-centered in your patient's experience and the family's experience and apology and all of the things around caring for families through something like that. So that was the work and feeling safe, psychologically safe. 

Claire

Takes a lot of courage to actually even bring up that topic. Do you see the awakening experience that you had in Scotland, do you see that as a turning point in how you managed your energy and how you took on the next iteration , of your work and life?Did that change everything or was this gradual?

Abbie

Yeah. It wasn't related singularly to that experience, but it was about, very much about being reconnected to that flow, to the flow, of something sacred in our human experience. that knowing that that would need for the rest of my life, it doesn't just happen, that we need that in our lives. We need the connection to the sacred.

It is absolutely essential. In fact, we can't live without it. Cannot. 

Claire

Yeah. Because when you talked about the first years when you started your PhD,  you said I was getting the good grades, I was pushing, so you were actually repeating a certain way that probably would've taken you to burn out again, since that was the pattern. 

Abbie

That's right. 

Claire

I'm wondering what shifted? You said it was not a singular event. What else happened, which put you on that different path where the sacred became an absolute need for you? 

Abbie

Yeah, a huge part, Claire, was finding community, to share that sameness. Around that recognition. I found a beautiful nature-based sacred community near the town I lived in. And so we would go and celebrate different events throughout the year, and just being with people who were also seeking to have some way to ritualize, and to bring in a sacred, through practice into their lives. It's not to say this wasn't happening before for me, as a kid, I grew up in Scotland, so there was a lot of that sort of thing in our world. To be in nature. But was about building in practices. So, I did it pursue a yoga teacher training. And so building in some practices that brought this to the forefront for me, rather than relying on it just randomly arriving I built in ways of being that would bring it to me. Almost like I can see a plug being plugged into a wall or something, you know, like a plug into the circuit. Y

Claire

Yeah. Yeah. So that's beautiful what you're saying because, practices and community are really the two legs of an embodied, heart-centered leadership. So tell me more about  this new role that you are stepping into now, and the leadership that you are envisioning now from this new place. 

Abbie

So it's exciting how it works. But I'm going to be starting a research project that's looking at the effects of Covid for health providers in British Columbia. And so, it's a huge honor. It is a fellowship, and that's a two-year project, so I'm very nervous about being able to do a really good job. But I would hazard a guess that I won the scholarship cause I just kind of showed up as me, you know, I'm 56 and I'm very passionate about supporting health professionals, like from my heart, deeply, deeply, deeply from my heart.

Because I know that world and it is not easy. And I would imagine, the people that have brought me on board for the project, they're looking for that, the authentic connection to the issue. Yes. Scientific rigor. Yes. Good scholarship. And yes, having an eye on the price as far as being done in two years and having a completed, solid, robust, rigorous project. From the Heart.

And, it feels great because it feels like I'm showing up 100% fully me authentically. There's no division from me at home between me at work. I just fully stand in myself now. Yeah. So, I'm looking forward to it. I am worried about burnout. I really am. Practices have to be built in and health practices as well as connection to the divine connection, and a spiritual life.

Claire

Yeah. Yeah. And a connection to a community. Yeah. I think that's a very good place to end   today, Abbie, It's so very inspiring to feel that there's no gap between who you are inside and what's yours to do on the outside, that you can truly give your gift.

And yes, of course , there are structures. And, you can fully trust that your gifts are needed, and you are doing what is yours to do. Thank you so much for being here today. 

Abbie

Thanks, Claire. And best wishes to any women that are listening and, and are following you and are involved with you just keep doing the good work.