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A Mayo Clinic podcast for laboratory professionals, physicians, and students, hosted by Justin Kreuter, M.D., assistant professor of laboratory medicine and pathology at Mayo Clinic, featuring educational topics and insightful takeaways to apply in your practice.
- This is Lab Medicine
Rounds, a curated podcast
for physicians, laboratory
professionals and students.
I'm your host, Justin Kreuter,
a transfusion medicine pathologist
and assistant professor
of Laboratory Medicine
and pathology at Mayo Clinic.
Today we're rounding with Alex
Klobassa, assistant supervisor
for Transfusion Medicine in the Department
of Laboratory Medicine and
Pathology at Mayo Clinic
to discuss nurturing our laboratories.
Thanks for joining us today, Alex.
- Yeah, thank you for having me.
Definitely excited to get your invite.
- Hey, I think you are
doing wonderful things
and I wanted to kind of bring
this forward in, in this,
this venue here with our audience
and kind of kick around some
of the ideas that you've had,
experiences that you've had
and, and what you've learned.
Maybe we can start
off with, you know, why,
why can it be a challenge to
nurture our laboratory team?
- Yeah. Ironically, I find this to be one
of the more challenging
questions that you have,
but I think there's always
just logistical things
that come up, such as making both the time
and the space for creative thinking.
I think oftentimes in the
nature of our work, you know,
the innovative ideas are
really coming from, you know,
the different problems
that we, that we face,
and then trying to make those
ideas into actual projects
and then actually see
them implement into our,
into our daily work.
You can face a lot of different
things such as, you know,
scheduling and finding both the resources
and the subject matter experts.
So I think once you find the people
who are invested in those
things, you can overcome
a lot of those barriers.
But just building those
relationships and listening,
- I hear you about kind of
paying attention to who your,
who your people are that you can tap into
about the logistics issues.
I, this really resonates
with me about how do we kind
of create time and space,
and then how do we keep track of things.
It seems like, you know, for
many of us, I flag my emails
if I need to respond to this,
but then it just kind
of gets far enough down
that I don't go back
far enough to see them.
How, how do you
keep track of these ideas, right.
You know, capture these
and if you're, maybe something
isn't right for right now.
Like we're, you know,
around the holidays people
are probably busy with that.
Maybe a good idea gets brought up.
You know, we all often talk
about putting something in the
parking lot, but how do we
not forget about the back lot?
- Man, I don't know. I
think I've started trying
to use the different teams
features that we have.
So a lot of electronic
tools and solutions.
I think the using different channels
and creating different groups,
and then Outlook calendar
is definitely my,
my magic secret wand,
because I will put things on
there a couple months from now
and then it will remind you
and I'll be like, okay, yeah,
I gotta look back at my notes
and see where we're at on this
and reach out to people and,
and get it back going off the ground.
- Mm. So with the electronic
solutions there, I'm,
I'm sensing this, you
know, organization
that you have about you.
- Yeah, definitely.
- So in,
in keeping those things
organized, I guess that's also,
you said, looking back at your notes,
how do you keep those organized?
Are those also electronic for you,
or do you have some system
of making sure you're kind of
keeping those things in order?
- I have both a OneNote that
I like to call my work diary,
and it has all different sorts of tabs
and different notes
from different meetings,
and that one's just for me,
but then also having, you know, the teams
where the groups are,
so those meeting minutes
and saving them there so everyone
can have that information.
I think there's a part of it
that's personal organization
and then there's part of it that's kind of
that team organization and,
and making sure that that information is
accessible to everyone.
- Mm, I see.
So you've been working with a couple
of different teams over the years
and have, I think, kind of
been perfecting your approach
to things and definitely see you
as a fellow lifelong learner.
Yes. What have you learned about,
about nurturing a laboratory team?
What have been some kind of key takeaways
as you look back on the
last couple of years?
- A lot. Probably too much to
cover today, but I think first
and foremost just, you know, realizing
that things don't need to be
perfect to implement something.
And oftentimes it's just
your, your first draft.
Once you get it going, it's
just, you're gonna be able
to keep building on that.
And because you bring other people in
who are excited about it,
it's just gonna keep getting better.
So learning to be okay with
being uncomfortable sometimes
and learning to be okay with
it, not not being exactly
as you planned is, is really
important, I think, to keep,
to keep things moving forward
and encouraging kind
of that creative space.
- I, I like that when you say, you know,
perfect is not necessary probably
for a good amount of our listeners, right?
The medical community, you know,
particularly in lab medicine,
you know, that that might kind
of run counter to,
seems like the ethos of,
of lab medicine of, you know,
we're always striving to,
you know, always be
meeting the patient's needs
appropriately, getting the
correct test results out.
I imagine that you've
run into some resistance
when you've tried to get and
and just like, okay,
it's this first draft.
Let's see how this goes.
How, how have you navigated that?
And you know, maybe if, you
know, maybe that's leadership
that was kind of voicing concern, maybe
that was colleagues in the
laboratory voicing concern.
How do you work through that
and get people kind of on
board with let's, let's do,
let's see how draft one looks?
- Yeah, I think first
and foremost, just reassuring people
that we will circle back to this.
You know, we can
celebrate both our success
and we can celebrate,
you know, lessons learned
and that we will actually
follow up on them.
And I think that actions kind
of speak a lot louder
than words sometimes.
So sometimes if you can
schedule a meeting, you know,
proactively for two months in advance
and call it the check-in meeting
or devote that time far out in
the future, just anticipating
that there will be things
that you can improve on
and bringing, again, bringing
that information back
and keeping the most open line
of communication that you,
you can, and just being really
honest about where it's at
and where you want it to go.
- That's brilliant about
putting that meeting in place,
because I imagine that gives
you instant credibility, right?
Like you put it, the meeting
on the books, people see
that you are going to circle back to that
and it seems like that probably
can quell a lot of things.
And then also I imagine that gets that off
of your to-do list as well. Yes.
- Well that's my reminder,
so it's a double win.
- Oh, fantastic. When you say, you know,
I guess we've kind of
been maybe beating around
the bush a little bit about
what, what you have done and,
and why we're kind of talking
and having this conversation today.
Would you mind sharing
for our audience, like
what are a couple of the
things that you have kind
of worked on over the years
in our, in our laboratories
to kind of nurture the team?
- Yeah, I think two of the
bigger things are a book club.
So I was really fortunate to be a part
of a divisional leadership
program and in that class
and through that program I
met people from all across the
division and formed
different relationships.
And at the end of it, one
of my fellow like participants
in the program reached out
and asked if I would be
interested in kind of starting
a divisional book club.
And so just sitting down
one-on-one with that person
who I was not in the same work unit as me,
but seeing both of our ideas
and how we could bring
people together once a month
to talk about leadership
beyond the program
was really fun.
And I think it's kind
of evolved over the past couple years.
So we just finished our third book
and we have about 15 to 20
participants each year that meet
once a month to discuss a
certain chapter of the reading.
We have, you know, myself
and one other facilitator currently,
and we try to provide the
questions ahead of time so
that people can kind of
start mulling over things,
but they're not all
encompassing questions.
They're just meant to get the, you know,
the conversation started.
And so again, being able
to see that from year one
to year three, there's been
things that we've changed
and there's been things
that we've kept the same.
So just, you know, continuing
to build off of those things
and getting new people involved
every single year has been
extremely rewarding.
And then I think the, the other thing
that I've recently been working on is a
simulation center project.
So that one is more
specific to my work unit,
but we were kind of
having a lot of problems
and challenges with
our emergency response.
So in the nature of our work, we need
to respond very quickly and rapidly
and that can be stressful at times.
And we learned that our hospital
has a simulation center, so
bringing together a
team within my work unit
and, you know, being able to
see how we could utilize that
to go into a creative
and safe space to practice an
emergency stress response has
been a really cool experience.
And there has been a ton of
challenges with that project
and since we've had the
right people on the team,
we've been able to overcome 'em.
- That's awesome. Let me just
give you a public shout out
for your questions in the book club are
phenomenal, you know?
Yeah. So for our listeners, Alex is,
I wish I had it in front
of me with some examples,
but these questions that
she is sharing ahead
of time are the kind of
questions where, you know,
really cau causes you to hit pause and,
and think for a bit about these things.
And then also the questions
I feel like really have the
slant of not, you know, some factual kind
of recall over what was read,
but like, how does this apply in your
life or practice?
And so I, I find it a really
interesting question set.
I think that's part of your
secret for so much success
and participation over the years.
I also imagine that's probably
one of the projects that
for our listeners is probably
very applicable for them.
And so you mentioned that, you know,
some things have stayed the same and,
and yet you've changed some things.
And I was wondering if you
wouldn't mind kind of elaborating
for our, our audience, like what,
what did you keep the same?
'cause that seemed to be just
really kind of fundamental
and then like what,
what did you change and,
and how did you go about that?
- Yeah, I think creating
those questions ahead
of time and sending them out.
I am very fortunate
to have a really great
co-facilitator with me.
So we kind of have a mini book club prior
to the book club coming up with all
of those really good questions.
So I definitely can't take
credit for all of those,
but sending those out ahead
of time really helps people.
And it's always been really great
because you see people coming
and they've not only thought
about those questions,
but they've thought about other things.
So it sparks so much more discussion
and it's really free flowing.
It's not always like, okay, this question,
now this question, it, it
creates a discussion instead
of just going through
the motions of these,
this is the content that we read.
I think that the things
that we've changed is
we've really tried to
engage people in, in the
book club in the sense that
in person is so much more
natural to have conversation,
but the first year we did the book club,
we were still going through Covid.
So trying to transition
from that hybrid format
to a fully in-person format,
you know, is challenging
because we don't wanna limit
our participants either
who maybe work offsite or remotely.
- Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. I, I
have a huge challenge with
that these, these days,
especially as like,
some meetings are in person,
other ones are, are online,
and every now and then
I, I get confused over
where I'm supposed to be.
- Yes.
- So, you know, I I,
I really appreciate kind of how,
what you've shared with us today.
I wonder if we could kind of close with,
if you don't mind sharing what is in
that back lot for you?
You know, what, what is kind
of a, a future opportunity
that kind of has been sitting
in your, your mind about
a future opportunity to
improve our lab team?
- Yeah. I think, I can't
take full credit for many
of the things that I've been involved in,
but honestly, I don't know
what the next idea is.
I think it's probably hidden
somewhere in a conversation
that hasn't been had yet
and that a bunch of people
will get excited about.
I think that some of the things
that our department is doing
as far as bringing problem
solving to the forefront
of our lab with these huddles,
I'm really excited about that.
I think that that is going
to create a lot of ideas
that we can turn into different projects
and different things that
we can involve people in.
But moving forward, just
building on the book club
and the simulation center
and then taking advantage
of the things that come out
of this frontline problem
solving approach that
we're heading towards.
- Well, Alex, I think in
your, in your answer there,
I really hear, you know, this, you know,
your strong sense of really
this servant leadership, right?
Like the next idea for our team
is not the idea that is in your head,
but the idea you bring up
that the next I great idea
for our team is in a future conversation.
Yes. I, I think that is a spot on insight
that our listeners can kind of take back
with them and think about.
Going back to the top of the interview,
you were talking about
cultivating these relationships
and how key that is.
- Yes, definitely.
- We're rounding, we've been
rounding. Let me start off.
We've been rounding
with Alex Blasa, thanks
for being here today with us, Alex.
- Yes. Thank you so much for having
me. It's been a lot of fun.
- And to all of our listeners,
thank you for joining us today.
We invite you to share your thoughts
and suggestions via email to
MCL education@mayo.edu.
If you've enjoyed this
podcast, please subscribe
and until our next rounds
together, we encourage you
to continue to connect lab medicine
and the clinical practice through
educational conversations.