The Home Team

 “I have discovered in life that I can do anything, but I can’t do everything. No one can go it alone.”
- Robert Schuller -

August 2005.  I had just relocated to Austin Texas to run an inpatient rehab hospital for HealthSouth.  I hadn’t even unpacked, basically living out of my suitcase in an unfurnished one bedroom apartment downtown.  Alina had stayed behind in New Orleans because we had kids in school and other familial responsibilities that kept her there while I worked in Texas. Alina called and asked, “Have you been watching the weather?  There’s this hurricane in the Gulf that looks like it’s turning towards New Orleans.  It’s called ‘Katrina.’” 

Well, you know how that turned out.  What you don’t know is that Alina boarded up the house, packed up the kids & cats, important papers & photographs, loaded up the minivan and drove to Austin.  It took 21 hours (normally about 8) because the interstate was jammed with millions evacuating.  And the family was stuck in Austin for 6 weeks until the waters receded and she could take the kids back home.  I have hundreds of stories like that.

It’s Thanksgiving, a natural time to reflect on what we are each grateful for.  I am most thankful for my wife of 31 years who has made a home for our family, raised four terrific kids sometimes single-handedly, while I followed my consulting engagements across the country, often for years at a time.  Without Alina, we wouldn’t be a family, the kids wouldn’t have turned out as well as they have and I couldn’t have had the kind of exciting career I’ve enjoyed.  While I give her all the credit, she says we are a team, both of us and the kids,  each with our own responsibilities to the family and each other, each essential to the success of “Team Prehn”…I can do anything but I can’t do everything, no one can go it alone. A team.

And that’s what makes my hospital, The Bradley Center, a success:  Each one of us, acting in collaboration, toward the common goal of providing safe, compassionate, professional and efficient care for our patients.  So as you celebrate Thanksgiving with your friends and family, take a moment or two to reflect on your “Bradley family”:

•  Do you ask for help when needed from your team members? If so, why do you seek out those specific people?

• What are the values or beliefs you hold that allow you to help others when they are in need, professionally or personally?

• What can you do to create a strong team cohesiveness at your place of work?