
Recognizing Fear
12/05/22 • 34 min
Welcome to Difficult Conversations. Today, we have Liz Poret-Christ hosting along with Dr. Orsini. A few weeks ago, when Liz was scrolling through Facebook, she came across the PELOTON Cancer Warriors page and saw a post by Gina Jacobson. Her thoughts about battling cancer, mixed with a bit of dark humor, and a lot of honesty made Liz realize that she would be a great guest on this podcast. So, joining us today is Gina Jacobson. For the past twenty-seven years, Gina has worked in a broad range of roles with the Publicis Group, including overseeing media at Starcom and creative development at Leo Burnett. Her official title at Starcom is Chief Growth Officer, but she thinks of herself as a “Chief Potential Officer.” She’s known for her critical strategic thinking, digging into her client’s businesses, and has a passion for building and nurturing teams who deliver engaging, strategic work. Gina was diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer in 2018, and has outlived her prognosis by several years, and intends to keep living a joyful and purposeful life, helping others realize their full potential. Get ready to hear Gina’s story and be inspired!
Gina shares her background story and how she got to where she is today with her career. We learn how her leadership style and philosophy of “recognizing fear” started, and she goes in depth how her philosophy deepened after her cancer diagnosis. Gina tells us about the breakdown she had at a conference in front of her whole leadership team and reveals how having cancer changed her philosophy of leadership, how she views the world, her job, and how being more vulnerable helped her and her co-workers. We hear the story about the four oncologists Gina interviewed and how their communication affected her ability to envision a successful path forward. She explains how each of the conversations went, and how she ultimately chose the one that communicated with her in a way that she felt this physician was her advocate and one that she could trust. With the great connection she had with this physician, she makes a point that the positive attitude certainly made for an easier journey and a more tolerable journey. Gina describes her cancer journey as a “masterclass in fear” and shares her message to everyone. We hear about her blog and a post she wrote about telling the kids, and specifically one with her son, and his response that felt like a knife in the gut for a mother to hear. We end with Gina telling us the type of conversation she finds most challenging and the strategies she’s developed to get better at having those difficult conversations. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hit the subscribe on your favorite podcast platform.
Hosts:
Liz Poret-Christ
Dr. Anthony Orsini
Guest:
Gina Jacobson
For More Information:
Difficult Conversations Podcast
Resources
Welcome to Difficult Conversations. Today, we have Liz Poret-Christ hosting along with Dr. Orsini. A few weeks ago, when Liz was scrolling through Facebook, she came across the PELOTON Cancer Warriors page and saw a post by Gina Jacobson. Her thoughts about battling cancer, mixed with a bit of dark humor, and a lot of honesty made Liz realize that she would be a great guest on this podcast. So, joining us today is Gina Jacobson. For the past twenty-seven years, Gina has worked in a broad range of roles with the Publicis Group, including overseeing media at Starcom and creative development at Leo Burnett. Her official title at Starcom is Chief Growth Officer, but she thinks of herself as a “Chief Potential Officer.” She’s known for her critical strategic thinking, digging into her client’s businesses, and has a passion for building and nurturing teams who deliver engaging, strategic work. Gina was diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer in 2018, and has outlived her prognosis by several years, and intends to keep living a joyful and purposeful life, helping others realize their full potential. Get ready to hear Gina’s story and be inspired!
Gina shares her background story and how she got to where she is today with her career. We learn how her leadership style and philosophy of “recognizing fear” started, and she goes in depth how her philosophy deepened after her cancer diagnosis. Gina tells us about the breakdown she had at a conference in front of her whole leadership team and reveals how having cancer changed her philosophy of leadership, how she views the world, her job, and how being more vulnerable helped her and her co-workers. We hear the story about the four oncologists Gina interviewed and how their communication affected her ability to envision a successful path forward. She explains how each of the conversations went, and how she ultimately chose the one that communicated with her in a way that she felt this physician was her advocate and one that she could trust. With the great connection she had with this physician, she makes a point that the positive attitude certainly made for an easier journey and a more tolerable journey. Gina describes her cancer journey as a “masterclass in fear” and shares her message to everyone. We hear about her blog and a post she wrote about telling the kids, and specifically one with her son, and his response that felt like a knife in the gut for a mother to hear. We end with Gina telling us the type of conversation she finds most challenging and the strategies she’s developed to get better at having those difficult conversations. If you enjoyed this podcast, please hit the subscribe on your favorite podcast platform.
Hosts:
Liz Poret-Christ
Dr. Anthony Orsini
Guest:
Gina Jacobson
For More Information:
Difficult Conversations Podcast
Resources
Previous Episode

There's a Snake on My Head
Welcome to Difficult Conversations with Dr. Anthony Orsini. My guest today, is Mindy Spigel. Mindy has dedicated her career to improving healthcare and helping patients get over their fears of the system. She has a master’s degree in nursing, has worked in both inpatient and outpatient settings, and has taught in both academic and clinical fields. Her passion is helping people create meaningful connections as a leader and team member while providing the best care. She enjoys helping leaders build strong teams in exceptional work environments. It’s her desire to alleviate fears, build trust, and create an exceptional experience for all. Mindy has been honored to have presented at numerous national, state, and local conferences, she recently published a research study on the “Fears of Parents When Their Child is a Patient, and she just released her first book, There’s a Snake on My Head! Strategies for Alleviating Fear and Anxiety in Healthcare, which we are going to be talking about today.
Mindy tells us about her journey and what gave her a passion for patient experience. She expresses why she’s been a very big advocate for shared decision making and asking the team how can we make this work? We hear about the inspiration behind the title of her book, There’s a Snake on My Head! Strategies For Alleviating Fear and Anxiety in Healthcare. Dr. . Mindy and Dr Orsini discuss why it is such a big mistake when hospitals try to t way to improve patient experience is treating hospitals like hotels. She tells us about things she learned in her research about what people are afraid of. In her book, Mindy talks about Five Relieving Strategies, and the first one is build a relationship. It’s about finding commonality, and Dr. Orsini talks about how we could find commonality in just about everyone. Mindy explains her second strategy which is, choose your words carefully. She shares an aha moment story. In part two of her book, Mindy talks about how healthcare team members are people too and she explains more about this. Also, we find out what prompted Mindy to write her book, what she hopes will understand after reading the book. Mindy talks about what she is currently doing and her hopes for the coming months in her career. We end with Mindy telling us the most difficult type of conversation she’s had, and advice on how she navigated through it.
Host:
Dr. Anthony Orsini
Guest:
Mindy Spigel
For More Information:
Difficult Conversations Podcast
Resources Mentioned:
Next Episode

Making an Impact with Ryan Estis
Welcome to Difficult Conversations with Dr. Anthony Orsini. Today our guest is Mr. Ryan Estis, who is a globally recognized sales and leadership expert, speaker and author. Ryan has been advising clients on navigating change, improving performance, influencing culture, and accelerating growth. He’s a Founding Partner of ImpactEleven, where he’s helping define and shape a community that’s influencing culture and shaping the future of both personal and professional growth. In this episode, we talk about Ryan’s story and how he went from a rockstar rising sales professional to becoming one of the top keynote speakers in the industry. As a speaker, Ryan is known for his innovative ideas on leading change, improving sales effectiveness, and preparing for the future of work. He’s been recognized as one of “the best keynote speakers ever heard” by Meetings & Conventions magazine. His works and writings have been featured in Forbes, Fast Company, and Entrepreneur Magazines,. His book Prepare for Impact, coming later this year, offers a playbook for individuals to capture opportunity, accelerate growth, and leading into the future. As always, the promise on this show will be to inspire you and teach you how important communication is in medicine, business, and in everyday life.
Ryan shares his story about hearing a speaker that changed the perspective of his career and inspired him to follow his passion to teach and coach. We hear the path Ryan took to master the craft of speaking. Preparing for a keynote takes a lot of work, and we’ll find out about the hundreds of hours of preparation, perfecting the delivery, and bringing the energy into a conference. We hear how Dr. Orsini met Ryan and how he helped him bring his speaking skills to another level. Ryan tells us about how the word “community” kept coming up in his life, and this is what led to the creation of ImpactEleven, a place where people can be inspired to share, teach, and spread their message to the world. Dr. Orsini explains how attending the ImpactEleven Bootcamp had such an influence on him. We’ll find out about how bootcamp started and the meaning behind Ryan’s mantra, We’re better together! Liz shares the experience she had learning about ImpactEleven’s operating principle called, “Give generously, don’t keep score.” Ryan tells us about the importance of storytelling? He shares with us how a story about a cup of coffee changed his life.
Hosts:
Anthony Orsini
Liz Poret-Christ
Guest:
Ryan Estis
For More Information:
Difficult Conversations Podcast
Resources
Ryan Estis & Associates YouTube
A Cup of Coffee Changed My Life-Ryan Estis-Goalcast (YouTube)
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