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Episode 3: The Lunch Hour LIVE @ NAAHP 2024
578 Plays9 months ago
For this very special episode, we welcome you to learn how NAAHP CDEI has used the Empathy Mapping tool to drive change within our organization and how it can be a road map for getting a sense of how the murkiest and most difficult questions in our field and on our campuses can be understood and how that data can drive real change. Thank you in advance for your understanding with any potential issues with the audio since it was LIVE in a grand ballroom.
To review the slides along with our podcast, click here: https://uofi.box.com/s/ph1eg81eu7lco8d3ykqee0zr7znuj8ad
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Transcript
Introduction & Conference Overview
00:00:02
jrm68
All right, we are live at the 2024 NAP National Conference in beautiful Cincinnati, Ohio. In this extra special episode, we will be discussing how CDEI, which is the Committee on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion has been using the empathy mapping approach to transform our committee, the work that we do, and how we serve our incredible community.
Goals and Purpose of Empathy Mapping
00:00:25
jrm68
But most importantly, we're going to be showing you our membership, how to use this tool to drive change at your institutions in a data-driven and research-supported way. Let's get started.
00:01:00
jrm68
All right, hello, and welcome to The Lunch Hour, the official podcast of NAP's Committee on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
Meet the Hosts
00:01:09
jrm68
Each episode, we seek to educate, connect, and grow together as a community working to prepare and support tomorrow's healthcare care leaders. My name is John Moses Bronson at Penn State in beautiful State College, Pennsylvania, and I am so thrilled to be joined by my wonderful CDEI colleagues who will be introducing themselves because they have long names. Thanks, John. I'm Misty Wakuhalapoint. I am one of the people with the long and challenging names. I am at the University of Illinois, Chicago, and will be rolling off as the chair of the CDEI this year. And I am happy to turn it over to my next colleague.
00:01:49
jrm68
Hello, I'm Tani Hartman-Prokopo. I also have a long name. I'm at the University of Michigan-Dearborn, and I am co-chair elect.
00:02:01
jrm68
Greetings and salutations, everyone. I'm Zori Obato Bennett. My name has gotten longer. um I am the co-chair of NABCDI, and I come from Maryland um working at Johns Hopkins. So we are, we're gonna just keep going, right? yeah All right. All right, so what to expect. So today we want to show you again, like how the sausage is made or how we do all of this, but also particularly when it comes to the empathy mapping process. um The hope is that we have some people in the room that actually participated in some of the
00:02:41
jrm68
national and regional empathy mapping sessions. And so today we are going to walk through steps of how we navigated the tool of the empathy map um or the empathy map tool, I should say. ah We're going to go through some aspects of providing frameworks for using the empathy map as a tool for change.
Listener Engagement and Participation
00:03:03
jrm68
The other thing is is that um this podcast is an example of a byproduct of the empathy mapping process. And so we wanted to give you some insight on the accomplishments and some of the direction that was provided through this tool that NAP use, NAP CDI use. And then we also want to give um opportunities for you all to engage with the framework. So we'll have definitely as we go through aspects of the presentation,
00:03:33
jrm68
or the conversation, put your questions into the Slido and we will definitely um elaborate or or go more in depth on different steps.
00:03:47
jrm68
And so one of our keywords with the CDEI over the last seven several years has been transparent transparency. um And this time we're gonna add vulnerability. So anytime you are talking about change and especially driving change, there are always those underlying feelings of uncertainty um and the work that you as leaders or potential leaders need to put in ah that drive change. So you're feeling vulnerable. you are looking at transparency, you're you're trying to be authentic in this process, and all of those are important. So we're going to do our best to model that here for y'all today so that it doesn't just feel like, oh, they knew exactly what they were doing, um and we came out with this great thing. No, we we were really, we had no clue a lot of times when we started what our goals were going to be or where we were going to start.
00:04:39
jrm68
Okay, so we want to orient everyone
Basics and Benefits of Empathy Mapping
00:04:42
jrm68
in the room. So we're going to start from the basics of what is an empathy map. um I guess by a show of hands, since we're in the room, um how many people have heard of the empathy map period? Okay. Yes. Nice. And um this tool is hugely used in innovative spaces and design thinking. um Anybody been in spaces of design using design thinking in other spaces? Awesome. I also see some hands. So great.
00:05:10
jrm68
so Just to give some insight, um an empathy map is essentially a user experience map mapping technique that's used in innovative or design thinking spaces where you're doing some kind of creative problem solving. And so um the powerful process of the empathy map is that you're able to gain deeper understanding and knowledge of people's thoughts, feelings, their hesitations, their reservations, and things like that.
00:05:41
jrm68
And um a lot of what happens is that it is, it plays as a strategic tool to provide greater context for some kind of problem or issue or challenge you're trying to solve.
00:05:57
jrm68
um And so one of the biggest benefits that we also found of the empathy map was that it can help foster emotional intelligence, helping us understand and manage the feelings of ah individuals, groups, um or whoever it is we're trying to you know problem solve for or with. It also can hugely be impactful when you're trying to do collective action. And so by understanding people's positions, their motivations, and um their patterns, or who's invested in this particular problem, a lot of times the empathy map allows us to ask specific questions that uncovers those things.
00:06:41
jrm68
And then another aspect is encouraging perspective taking and improves our interpersonal relationships. So I think in a lot of ways it just makes us better humans, right? How do we understand people, how how can we take, go beyond just having empathy, but begin to respond helpfully and compassionately when we're trying to um innovate, build, or anything like that.
00:07:09
jrm68
All right, and so,
Steps in Empathy Mapping Process
00:07:13
jrm68
we're gonna go to step one, which you will see in a second. And um step one is the very basic of like, what is the problem you're trying to solve? Identify the challenge, identify um the the greater question, right? And a lot of times we will see throughout the process that the empathy map will unveil that sometimes the first question you ask is not actually the question um that will provide the most effective or low-hanging fruit solution for whatever it is you're trying to do. So it's okay that sometimes you start with one question and then it unveils
00:07:55
jrm68
that, oh, I think I need to ask a different question. Or the problem um is actually three levels down from the initial question that I was asking. And so we want to be able to use, identify our user or our issue so that we can then go to the next steps um and begin to ask the questions to the individuals who are invested in it. So we will actually um Make sure, okay, there it is. Okay. What is an empathy map? We can do the next one.
00:08:35
jrm68
ah We'll let the slides catch up. um And, oh, there it is. Okay, so yes, identify your question, problem, and or challenge. And so I'll just let Misty um unveil some other information. And for the folks at home, we're having a slight technical challenge so thank you to the tech team and maybe we can put in like an oopsie sound oh yeah we have one of them
00:09:03
jrm68
oops oh it's not playing
00:09:07
jrm68
probably do um
00:09:11
jrm68
ah The miracles of technology. yeah Figured it out. yeah um So when we started with the CDI, so in 2020, it was completely restructured. So there may i think have been a couple of folks who had been on the former CDI, but it was regathered and I came in as the chair and um Tony had just started and we were sort of at a point of like, okay, what do we do? I don't know. What is the goal of the CDI? What are we supposed to be doing? and what ah What do NAP members need from us? um And so we did what a lot of folks would do. We put questions in the survey that went out annually. um And we certainly got some responses, but a lot of things were on a Likert scale, and we got a handful of
00:09:58
jrm68
like written qualitative responses, but not enough to really determine what our goals should be, what our next steps should be. I certainly had had ideas, but they were based on things that I was interested in, and well, you guys are not me. So what what is... What are the interests of our membership? And that's really where the empathy mapping came out. So as we were thinking about it, Zuri said, hey, I have this tool that I've used. And we said, why not? Let's give it a try. Remember, we're living in uncertainty and we're living in ah
00:10:32
jrm68
this emotional response to not knowing what to do, this feeling of imposter syndrome, I'm supposed to be the expert on this, but I am not everyone. um And we wanted to think about things, how could we be flexible, how could we be adaptable, how do we build a structure that is um representative of the membership, that is a collaborative experience, so it's not just a handful of people deciding where things what things should be done or where things should go. um but also that could be practical in nature. ah And so it was like, all right, all of these things are a great place to start. Now what's next?
00:11:15
jrm68
Okay, which leads us to step two. So step one, identify that problem, as you heard, our problem. And then um step two is identify the stakeholders. and um One of the biggest challenges when trying to solve problems, if you haven't already experienced it in many ways, is that you often have more stakeholders in that particular challenge than you can often assess or reach, right? And so stakeholders obviously are any individuals that are have a vested interest or the solution or whatever the new um objective or the new direction will impact. and so
00:12:03
jrm68
you will have these aspects of like primary stakeholders, secondary, and then there will be additional levels. And so as you think about who is um the individual that you want to place at the center of your empathy map, as part of the problem-solving process, um the hope is that you will gain a more focused understanding.
Creating Effective Empathy Map Questions
00:12:27
jrm68
And usually when you're doing this empathy map, it might require you to separate out those stakeholders in order to have um more intimate conversations, tweaking the questions um to better, I guess, pull out um information as it pertains to their level of investment.
00:12:45
jrm68
ah The second um bullet here is just really talking about focusing on the needs um and perspectives of those vested at in every in every level, like I just said, help us prioritize those efforts. um So depending on what the question is, you may need to get um permission or support from ah and that one of your stakeholders that then impacts the other stakeholder. And so we see that a lot in like our student programming and things like that. ah
00:13:19
jrm68
I would also say that um we found, and we added it here, you don't I don't know that I've always seen it like written out, but I really think that when we identify all levels of our stakeholders, we begin to build trusting relationships with the people who will either be impacted by that change or will be part of it in partnering and collaborative efforts. So demonstrating the desire to understand others can help promote and encourage that collaboration. And so as you see here, we listed a bunch of our stakeholders, and I think Misty can kind of interject some of those people as she talks about um the vulnerability part.
00:14:01
jrm68
And I apologize, I forgot to mention because of my brain was with the tech challenges. um When we did the empathy mapping, we started broadly. We had a town hall that was open to every um NAP member. It was done over Zoom because remember we were in the middle of COVID at that point, so it was open. And we had 130 something people registered, about 96 attendees. um So a lot of our data that came out of that is coming directly from um those individuals.
00:14:36
jrm68
Now, when we went into the empathy map, we're sitting with this ninety these 96 people on Zoom, some of whom we know, some of whom we don't, um and we are up there as the experts. We theoretically know what we're doing with this empathy map, um and we are trying to explain it to folks who have never seen it before. So we're having to be open about not having the answers for CDEI or where we want to go and really needing people's input, um being honest about our thoughts and that we're going to be putting our opinions in there as well.
00:15:12
jrm68
um trying to make sure that it was a safe environment to support other people's vulnerabilities. So we did this with anonymous responses so that people could um very quickly type in their thoughts. And we actually gave folks ah less than a minute to think and respond in an an um and anonymous form um to help support that. So you couldn't read and think about what everybody else was saying. You just had to react and put your own comments in there quickly. um And then thinking about the timing. So all of this really was starting to happen in 2020 with all of the things that were going on in the world at the time and how that impacts what people are thinking and feeling and seeing and hearing during this time. So depending on what you're doing,
00:15:58
jrm68
what's going on on your campus, what's going on in the world could be impacting um your efforts and the responses that you're getting and then how your efforts outside of that or what come from that resonate. So um know that sometimes, especially if you're thinking longer term, when you start something the world can change and what you may have started may not hit in the same way and you may need to reflect and and reframe or rethink things. So there's no No perfectness. I like perfection. I had to let that go and let this be a messy process and I would encourage, as you are going through change, to keep that in mind that it is messy and you will get there.
00:16:41
jrm68
So I know we're going through these steps pretty quickly.
Iterative Refinement and Regional Adaptation
00:16:44
jrm68
It did not happen this fast. um It was over a course of many months. And so ah step three was around creating these empathy map questions. And um I know we have a lot of ah educated people who have gone through and gained their stripes and have participated in different types of research. So I would say that um based upon the description and the use of the empathy map, it is definitely a qualitative research data, um ah or qualitative research approach, and um the data in which we collected through these conversations we had um gave us a huge data set of social realities um that people were experiencing at their institution, their experiences within the organization, both at the national level and the regional level,
00:17:38
jrm68
And the hope was to design questions that helped identify um are our users or who we were serving their experiences and really starting to um unearth some of those hidden motivations. and so um In the empathy map, which we will definitely show you again, you'll see that there are four to six quadrants depending on what version of an empathy map you use. And ah it helps to um kind of use our senses ah as a way to um orient and organize the questions so that you can gain a more robust understanding of people's experiences. We don't just experience the world around us.
00:18:23
jrm68
um through the things we see in here, but also by what we say and do, what others say and do. And so we wanted to make sure that we used the empathy map to also facilitate that very holistic approach of understanding experiences.
00:18:43
jrm68
and Just so y'all know, we didn't recreate the wheel here. um So We wanted to ask the right questions. We wanted to know how do we get at what we want to know while leaving space for surprises or leaving space for people to bring in their own ideas, thoughts. um So we were like, okay, what are our goals? What do we want to learn? We don't want to make assumptions. um And we want to have things open ended. But then when you sit down and you start to write questions, it feels like every question that you're writing somehow is leading to the answer that you want to hear, not necessarily leading to. um
00:19:25
jrm68
things that that maybe are open or that we're not thinking about, and that's really what we wanted to get at. So ah with the empathy map, utilizing the questions in that ah really fit our goals. So this is the empathy map that we started with, and you can see questions about who are we empathizing with, what do they need, those were some of the things that we were, where we were coming from, and then how do we get there? um So we created our own. And this is the first empathy map that we used in that town hall in December of 2020. And we started with NAP at the center. That was what we wanted to know about. um We had think, feel, see, say, do, and hear. And then we had pains and gains.
00:20:13
jrm68
What I want you all to also take away is yes, we used this and yes, it was useful, but we modified it for the next few. So even though we started with a model, it's okay to change it. If it's not working properly or if you think the order works better in a different way, you're not stuck with one thing. Change is constantly changing and being flexible and adaptable and adjusting with that to make things fit your needs. is how we continue to improve and how we continue to get better and really get the kinds of information that we're looking for.
00:20:47
jrm68
Hey, and so after we had multiple sessions and we um again, it was an iterative process, which means we did it once we refocused our question. We did it again a couple more times. um Hopefully we had people who participated in some of the sessions um during the regional conferences where we. you know That was one, I would say, a benefit that came out of COVID for us as a committee. I think it really um allowed us to be engaged with all of the regions during their regional conferences, which did help us gain, I would say, a more um
00:21:27
jrm68
I would say less centralized understanding of what NAP was for everyone. So it was very helpful. um So that was a benefit of what seemed like a very um stressful and um grueling time when it came to, I would also say we were on the cusp of that Zoom online fatigue. So being able to engage in a different way was, I think we had really high engagement in these processes. So that was really good. And so when it came to the coding process and assembling data, um we used resources. We did not rely the committee. We're so grateful for everyone who's been on the NAPC AI committee. As you can see, these are only um a part of the team up here. of We have many sitting in the audience, and we thank you.
00:22:12
jrm68
for your continued support and being able to help participate in different aspects of all of these steps that were taken. And we also utilized um resources online. I mean, YouTube was my friend. um I definitely looked at like how do you even do qualitative research you know effectively. I read reliable sources through the CDC just about like evaluative qualitative research. um I relied on outside connections within the innovation space and the qualitative research ah space where I just had conversations with people who had experience doing qualitative research.
00:22:48
jrm68
because we wanted to make sure that we were doing this legit. Like we didn't want to just look at data and say, OK, this is what we think. We really took a scientific approach in trying to develop this. And so um as you kind of look through and hear more about what kind of data we had, definitely have that in the back of your mind. Like we didn't make this up. We we definitely did our research and um we wanted to make sure that it was aligned with data practices.
00:23:21
jrm68
So at Zuri Shared, we started our step four process, which was the coding and the and assembling of the data and the process of analyzing it.
Analyzing and Sharing Qualitative Data
00:23:33
jrm68
So we went through a process where we, first of all, even the World Good Size Committee, we had a smaller team look at the data. um One of the things that we did was we had to agree upon how we were going to look at the data, because this was different data than we were typically typically used to. First of all, it was qualitative data versus quantitative data. And as someone said on the committee, this was not data she was used to. So as Zuri indicated, she went and talked to some experts. We all did some reading. We looked at how do you do this data.
00:24:10
jrm68
So then we broke up into groups and read the different data and looked for themes, we looked for keywords, we looked for um um basically themes and keywords, and we grouped the data together. Now, on the next slide, you will see that the town hall data, again, we're going back to the town hall in December 2020, we had 132 registrants, but 96 participants. They were responding to the empathy map that focused on DEI as it pertains to NAP.
00:24:52
jrm68
And they were doing, as has been described, live input to a questionnaire to all of this think, see, feel here. So then what we did as a team is that we began to collect all of that data. On the lower left-hand side is what it looked like after we did our first initial pass, and it was extremely overwhelming. But then we slowly started to go through the theming, the key words under think, feel, hear,
00:25:35
jrm68
um What are you going to do about it, et cetera. And we began to see the common themes, the common ideas, et cetera. And in the upper right hand corner, you can see how we organized 45 pages worth of data.
00:25:56
jrm68
I just want to say I was not on the coding team and blessed them for all of that work because, oh my goodness, was it challenging. and
00:26:04
jrm68
For sure. um So we did have within, I guess, structurally, we had within the committee CDI, we broke up into some subgroups and some people reviewed um one region's data. Then we kind of made sure we had meetings where we did some comparative notes. And so what we found was that um I would say that this step five is really a product of our process and not something that um is delineated in some of the resources that you will definitely have in terms of design thinking methods and the use of empathy map. But we found that our step five really was around the fact that we had so many opportunities for refinement.
00:26:49
jrm68
um We were able to, in a non-threatening way, start conversations to gain deeper and understandings, and that's that temperature map um checking. And it, especially when we reiterated it, it became more topic focused. So we we concentrated on advocacy and cultural competency, right? And we will have um another section that kind of goes more into that. We also realized that there were areas of opportunities identified that we had not necessarily predicted or thought about. And so we were able to use our empathy mapping data to say, well, OK, this could be a unique approach to um providing resources. Right. And so it allowed us to also think about how could we raise awareness, what kind of platforms, what kind of
00:27:39
jrm68
ah resource development, again, could bring an understanding to the greater association membership um as it pertains to diversity, equity, inclusion and justice. And um as you can see, and you are a part of, it started something new too, right? um Not that podcasts didn't exist, right? It was not um that innovative, but it was like, okay, how could we use the podcast as a piece a resource um to add to raising awareness and creating more opportunities? So as you can see, these things can happen collectively and individually as well.
Implementing Data-Driven Change
00:28:22
jrm68
ah I want to give Zuri credit here because when we started this, she said in not so many new words, we have to fall in love with this problem. We can't fall in love with the solutions yet because we don't know what those are. So we have to fall in love with this problem and we have to live in this. um And so once we had this data, we also went, oh gosh, we have all of this data. But you know what? Between all of us on the CDEI, we have expertise in this field. We can take this data and we can pull it together and thread them together and create what we like to call evidence-based consciousness raising. So we're not just trying to raise people's consciousness based on our own biases or what we want, but really out of the evidence that's come out of this large group of people and all of the folks who gave their time and input things
00:29:11
jrm68
It came out of this collective hive mind, not that we think alike, but really the the collective body. um And yet at the same time, we couldn't just say, here you go folks, here's how many pages of data was it? 45 pages of data. Here's 45 pages of data, you guys go figure it out. um So with that, we wanted to create this framework to assist in this consciousness raising. We've created those resources using the stakeholders at the center, so What is valuable to members? What is valuable to associations? What are valuable to the schools that are a part of our organization? um And how can this be a growth process? um Because out of change comes the opportunity to embrace growth and development.
00:30:02
jrm68
um And so that's really where we're at. What are we starting new? What are we doing in this process? So with the temperature checking that we did, um from that first empathy mapping session, the town hall, we were able to take this back to the regional conferences. And out of that initial empathy map came two themes, cultural competency, which now a couple years later, we probably should have named or would have liked to have named cultural humility. um and advocacy, and we took those two topics to each of the regional organizations and said, okay, regional organization, in this regional empathy map, you get to choose which topic you wanna talk about. um Believe it or not, I wanna say three of the four chose cultural competency, and centrally you guys chose advocacy. um And what we found is that they were really flip sides to the same coin, so we ended up getting similar responses from those. um But out of those conversations then came
00:31:01
jrm68
a whole variety of areas of opportunities. So there were opportunities to raise awareness. So we were um able to be a part of promoting the black men and whites' coats, viewing through NAP and with the AAMC, and I don't know if any of y'all attended that, but that was a great opportunity to watch it for free and have conversation afterwards. We have taken the opportunity to develop resources, and you can use the QR code there to access some of them if you would like. We've had CDEI Corner in the advisor, We're building communities, so the experience exchanges, those that started in Denver came directly out of the empathy mapping experiences that we had, where people are like, I want a place.
00:31:40
jrm68
to find people that I can connect with. These conferences are fantastic, but how do I meet people with similar identities or backgrounds as I have? And those have continued. We started in Denver. Every single region had and experience exchanges, and then we've continued them here um in Cincinnati, and we hope to continue them moving forward. And then we're also in the process of starting something new, and this is where I get to be excited about handing over the co-chair position of CDEI because we've run through a lot of my ideas and now we get to hand it over to a new co-chair and eventually as Zuri rolls off another co-chair who will bring their own new ideas.
00:32:18
jrm68
using some of this data as we dig in, because there was so much, there are so many things that we can still keep doing. um And we're excited to keep growing and taking opportunity to get more information from our membership to keep moving and keep growing um throughout this process.
00:32:38
jrm68
All right, so when we approached this, we were thinking, OK, great. We have all this wonderful data. We're making all these wonderful changes. But we accomplished nothing if we're not bringing other people into the conversation. Yes, we are a pretty sizable committee, comparatively, but we are not the entire membership. And so the next step was really bringing people across the membership into this conversation to talk about what did we learn? What are we doing with this? And so we started this process of really sharing back out what we learned. It's so frustrating when you take a survey, when you participate in research, and you never learn about the results, what was learned. And so this very session slash podcast
00:33:24
jrm68
is a direct effort to bring you back into the conversations that we're having because we feel that that is important, that transparency matters. We want you to know that your responses, that your emotional labor, that your intellectual contributions matter and that they're making a difference in our membership. So one, thank you. You guys are great. ah But so we did it in
Sharing Results and Engaging the Community
00:33:48
jrm68
a number of ways. So we have done presentations and poster sessions at the last few conferences, um which has been a really incredible opportunity to sort of meet with smaller groups of our members to have conversations about where we're driving, who's in the seat, who's ah backseat driving, and who's like holding on for dear life from the back hood. Can that be me next year? I mean, hey, there's room.
00:34:17
jrm68
And so um we've also published a final analysis in the advisor, which can live in perpetuity and generations of future healthcare advisors can go and really learn about this really important process that we did, how we did it, what we learned, and why it has been so impactful at driving innovation and change within our membership. Before John gets started on this slide, um it is our poster from the ah Denver conference. This is his baby. He is the reason that this is as amazing as it is. So I want to make sure that we give him the credit that is due there. Oh my gosh, thank you so much. um So in the kind of conversation about how we were going to present this data, we had done collectively as as a
00:35:06
jrm68
you know As a committee, we have done a lot of work of like cleaning, organizing, putting all of our little ducklings out ah in a row. like They had herded like so many cats, very angry feral cats. Meow. Right? And so when we get got to the point of presenting it back, it's like, well, yes, we wanted to feel organized, but we don't want to lose the beauty of the chaos that all of this information came from. and so We weren't committed to having like a super organized like little box of information here and a little box of information here. We wanted to represent the messiness of this process and that sort of drove the design, but it also helped folks understand that we've like, we put our arms around a very large tangled ball of yarn and we made a sweater um for the knitters in the room. I think Kate Vicala Connolly is still here, so.
00:36:03
jrm68
big ups to Kate. And so this was our our attempt at doing that. And so the QR code that's on here brings you to also a presentation with an obscene amount of resources. And we broadly share this with members because those resources were membership driven. And we feel that as a membership that is extremely collegial, that we want to continue that collegiality and put those resources back in the hands of the people that provided them in the first place. So if any of you are here and you want to be like, oh my gosh, these resources sound great, please, please, please go here. I share these resources all the time with students who are looking to build and develop these competency sets.
00:36:46
jrm68
And so we are here to also address a little bit of the elephant in the room, which is a lot of this work is very charged and it can be very intimidating for individuals who aren't You know, for those of us that have like maybe higher ed administration backgrounds, like we take entire classes on these topics, right? And so I'm more conversant in a lot of the language and the framework. How many of you come from a STEM background and probably never had a DEI class, right? It's many of the people in this room. and so
00:37:21
jrm68
we We want to acknowledge that this can be quite messy and feel very intimidating and feel like, well, how do I say the right things? And we do want to make it clear that it's okay to give yourself some grace in this process, that therere that will never nobody can do say exactly the right things with the data. But the very first thing that's really important in this process is that you're communicating Not communicating your thoughts and feelings, you are representing the truth of the story being told from the data. And that's an important thing. right We are intentionally trying to pull our biases out of this process, um but with some very important caveats. right We want to be conveying the sentiments sentiments of the group and what came from this exercise. right Again, we have a lot of hopes and dreams for the organization. That doesn't mean that they can necessarily be the reality first thing out of the gate.
00:38:15
jrm68
And so that was an important part of this process is just sort of like surrendering to the data that we receive instead of hoping to get the data we were hoping for. We want to present the challenges that arise out of the process. it's It is messy. We don't want to hide that there were challenges. It's part of the process, and that's OK. These are big challenges to get your arms around. The best design surveys can never get your arms around a situation. This is an attempt to get your arms around a larger portion of this big problem. And again, we want what we're saying to reflect that the diversity of stakeholders. You're seeing that we're sort of circling back around to some of the stuff that we talked about at the beginning.
Real-World Applications and Personal Stories
00:39:02
jrm68
Ooh, we're right back around, right? We're talking about our stakeholders again. And now that we have our arms around this, we're solution oriented. It's great. So I grew up in the South and um
00:39:14
jrm68
sometimes our sayings are a little direct. My mom's favorite was, don't show me the roadkill if you're not also going to bring a shovel, which is to say, like don't show me a problem if you haven't thought about some solutions that we can work towards. And um I have always brought that approach in my work. It's great to say, yo, dog, this ain't it. But it's also a process of saying, but why don't we start thinking about this? So make sure we bring that shovel. And it's important in educational research like this to be very clear about what these things, the data that you're actually getting means. And so we're not talking about the member experience because the membership experience is like a universal thing. And as all of you are, I think are intimately aware, all of your experiences as members in this organization, is inherently different. Because of the institutions that you work at, because of the lived experiences that you have, your experience is is valid and it's it's necessary. And so when we present this data, we're talking about membership experiences as opposed to a singular experience, because it's impossible to identify that in a meaningful, constructive way.
00:40:39
jrm68
And John said all the right things. Sure. I always think I am saying the wrong thing and putting my foot in the mouths my mouth as I am stumbling over my words right now, so I appreciate your articulateness with that. um But we also want to give y'all a chance if you have questions. um Your handout walks you through essentially the first three steps of starting with an empathy mapping process. um And we've kind of laid out the next a few steps here. But we also want to open it up to our Slido and questions that y'all may have. So hello, Anonymous. Also, hi, Muffy. Hey, girl. Also, part of our problem is that the transcript translated your bias to bikes.
00:41:27
jrm68
Yes. So, but you have biases and bikes and bikes. Yeah, but okay. So if you have questions in particular to the steps, and or thoughts, definitely slide them into here. We would love to um incorporate some of that into the podcast and having additional thoughts and feelings. um But one thing I will just say kind of to this step,
00:41:58
jrm68
um these We were not necessarily married to these steps in the beginning. Honestly, the steps didn't really become fully clear until the end, and this is more of a reflective process than it is that we had all of the steps identified.
Emotional Aspects and Normalizing Vulnerability
00:42:13
jrm68
A lot of the point fives of every step were some of the emotional responses we were having to, like you said, the vulnerability part, which I think in the problem solving space. I've been in other spaces within um you know um impact entrepreneurship and things like that. And i I found that the emotional responses you're having usually happen maybe in some like intimate conversations between your team members. But I think we wanted to make it a and an aspect of this presentation to normalize the feeling of
00:42:51
jrm68
just disarray and just confusion sometimes. So um definitely um use us as a resource at NAPCDI. We will be um continuing to pick away at the data sets that we have, providing new opportunities for feedback and engaging with the membership at all levels, from the leadership to the membership at every, um I guess, different circles of membership because we have different types of membership. And so we look to continue utilizing this as a tool to um be a catalyst of change for for the organization. Right. We do have our first question. So what suggests and ah there was I think some auto correct got a little bit rude. So I'm going to make some guesswork about what
00:43:38
jrm68
the word lemming was supposed to be. um So what suggestions do you have about starting the conversation to begin this process on our campuses within our institutions? And if that's not correct, please send another one. So I think this ties into a follow-up to Zuri's kind comment that I was going to make, which is you can start these conversations even at small levels. So if you are wondering what a particular group of students needs, if you have a class and and you're thinking about what is this specific class need. But I've also used it with my upper administration. So I'm on an advising leadership council across the University of Illinois Chicago. um And there have been things that have come up there that it's like, oh, we have these big needs. We don't know where to start. And in that committee, I've said, hey, I have this great tool that we could use.
00:44:32
jrm68
to gather information from people. And so we've been able to start there. And I know you've used it in different ways. Yeah, um I would say, I mean, I've used it personally, just trying to organize. I use myself as a user when I'm trying to like function through life events. But um I think I used empathy mapping definitely through wedding planning, I would say. it was oh But um I would say at my institution, indirectly, I think because I got so comfortable with utilizing empathy mapping, that I actually when we see um very similar questions come in about a process that we have,
00:45:12
jrm68
um particularly when it comes to the somewhat dreaded committee letter season. um A lot of times if one student asks a question, you're like, oh, maybe they didn't read. um And then if like five students and 10 students is like, okay, maybe this is us, right? We're not clear somewhere, maybe. And so I kind of informally through some of those questions and like, okay, they're not seeing the information. um They heard from a friend, so there's a chat happening somewhere else. What else is happening in that in that group? And so sometimes when I talk to students one-on-one and drop ins,
00:45:44
jrm68
I will intentionally ask like where are you where else are you using getting this information from? So I'm kind of using the empathy map to kind of grab information from different students who I'm seeing in a particular, um through a particular section of the of the academic year or timeline.
Advice for Initiating DEI Conversations
00:46:01
jrm68
And then that often influences, okay, I think as we approach the next cycle, we need to think about timing or we need to think about how we're gonna communicate this information because when one student has an issue versus 100 students have an issue, then I'm thinking that we need to have a little bit more focused, intentful listening and perspective taking of what these students are experiencing, not just from our offices, but in the context of their experience here. So I've used it in that way. And that's been a very informal, they don't know that I have my empathy map, but sometimes I have like just notes going like, okay, students are seeing this, they're hearing this.
00:46:39
jrm68
And I'll keep things like that to inform the perspectives when I share in meetings and things like that. And I'm going to, I Brainwave. I'm going to do my own sound effects. I mean, hey. um So whenever we're at a conference, I often hear people asking, do you do committee letters? Should we start doing combat committee letters? should we In committee committee letters, you could do an empathy map about, do we continue? Do we start? Do we keep? Do we stop committee letters? So think about your stakeholders. You've got students, you've got administrators, you've got faculty, you've got your pre-health advising team. All of those could be groups that you can do an empathy map with. You start with who are we empathizing with? Maybe we're empathizing with the faculty or we're empathizing.
00:47:23
jrm68
empathizing with the people who have to write the letters. And then you go through the sections. What are they hearing about committee letters? What are they seeing about committee letters? What do they feel about them? What are they saying? And then you, after you go through that data, you think about what are the pains of doing them? What are the gains of doing them? And that may help just bring a totally different perspective to should we consider ah continuing starting stopping this time intensive process when we don't know what the...
00:47:54
jrm68
benefits or trade-offs of doing so are, maybe you end up with at the same spot, but it may give you some perspective on the needs of that broader stakeholder community in a way that you're not asking, like, should we do committee letters? That's not your leading question. You're getting at sort of all of it and getting more of that open-ended feedback.
00:48:20
jrm68
Great idea. All right, so our next question is pretty quick. They're asking for the QR code for the presentation again, because it's so content rich, they'd like to be able to review it again later. And I'm going to mark that one as red. We had another great question. So are there any plans to share or teach the rest of us on how to do the qualitative work of this process? Please, with three question marks. Tawny Janet Hart, she's not here, but I'd love to throw her in the ring there. yeah Oh, you can use this mic, Tawna. You could have said stayed sitting.
00:48:58
jrm68
um I'd be happy to talk to anyone. I learned some qualitative analysis work during my graduate work, and then I worked with Janet on it. I taught her, so and then that we were the leads on this. um But you can also look it up in the scholarly work on how to do this and kind of teach yourself, but I'd be happy to work with you on it.
00:49:21
jrm68
YouTube is great. Um, it sometimes doesn't go super in depth, but at least put you into, we try not to go down the rabbit hole. Um, I also was like, I'm not, I just can't, this is like doctoral level sometimes. Um, and so, um, with being able to balance though, wanting it to be Tani was great using her, her training and relying on, um, additional resources I can, leverage myself in the committee as a way to just show you the method to our madness. But I think that qualitative processes have been um put into different spaces, AI likely.
00:50:05
jrm68
as well could probably even give you some um initial steps. And I will say that um even just taking like non um what i would ah know I would say like innovative space, so in design thinking, they also have some inserted methods for understanding or understanding your data and things like that. So that's been a really great, I think the slide where we put um the quote, the interaction group, um It was early on the steps, but they're a good group and they have tons of resources too. um Just about design, think there it is.
00:50:42
jrm68
the Interaction Design Foundation. They have a lot of um cool resources about understanding the empathy mapping process and the utilization of data as well. So um definitely reach out. um We could probably go endless with the resource development when it comes to it. And so um if that's a project that we're going to put a plug for NAPCDI in the future. If you would like to volunteer in things, we can get that written out as well. so Okay, so there is a question about how we sort of handled sort of like legislative requirements and ethical advising responsibilities when like wrestling this very angry bear, which that's a big question. Yeah, I mean, I think the legislative when we were doing this really was specific to Michigan and California and a handful of other states and the world has changed again,
00:51:42
jrm68
It's that piece of circumstances lifetime can change. um I am in Illinois, we are a blue state. We are not worried about DEI going away. I understand for some of y'all in Florida, Texas, other places where even talking about DEI or putting any sort of diversity initiative effort in can be dangerous. You might want to think about how do I broaden the title? How do I think about this topic? Because the goal is not to get just a small number of responses or a small number of people involved.
00:52:26
jrm68
um So any voice can add information and ideas and input. um And you then comb through that and see what is actionable, what is useful to you and act on that. So it's not necessarily specific to students of color or um a particular population unless you have the ability to work with that population freely in the states in which you're located.
Broadening DEI Discussions and Conclusion
00:52:55
jrm68
I hope that answers that question.
00:52:59
jrm68
All right, we have time for one more because we are the lunch hour podcast and we are very strict about keeping this to under an hour. All right, so the last question is, ah do you have experience with using and the empathy map tool when it comes to discussing competencies with advisees and how has this helped them?
00:53:23
jrm68
No, no. um So, um I would say not directly, and I could definitely see, um i at Hopkins I do an intersession course that's about self authorship and understanding their why. And I do, because design thinking, the derivative is also life design. And the Stanford Life Design Lab has this whole design thinking perspective in helping students navigate their career and personal development. And I have interjected
00:53:56
jrm68
many principles from that. And so they do think of themselves as the user and whether or not they can communicate their intentions and their desires in a way that um persuades and solidifies their why medicine when they're in their application process. So in that way, I have, I would say, taken elements of um it, but I would say more using the design, um life design methods from the Stanford lab. So if you're interested in seeing how design thinking and empathy mapping has been incorporated in student development and career exploration, the Life Design Lab, Stanford Life Design Lab is a great way to do that. All right. So ah the last thing that we're going to do is we're going to bring up the slide that has the QR code. If you want to join this, for those of us joining virtually, we'll put a lovely little link to the presentation slides.
00:54:51
jrm68
ah One last comment that came through on Slido was, please do not forget to talk to your campus institutional research offices. There may be a staff member there with expertise in qualitative research that their whole job is to help you wrestle the bear. So yes, please utilize those resources as well. ah Again, here's the QR code and That's what we really have. So we want to thank everyone across the membership for either attending live or for tuning in for another episode of The Lunch Hour. And we encourage you to keep striving for a more inclusive and just health professions community. Until next time.