Episode 8: Burnout, Boundaries, and Behavioral Health: A New Workplace Survival Guide
How to Lead and Live Through Stress Using Behavioral Health Techniques
Doing the hard work to create systems = a well workplace
Summary
In this episode of Hard at Work, Ellen sits down with Dr. Kira Mauseth—disaster psychologist, resilience expert, and workplace behavioral health consultant—to talk about what it really takes to survive and thrive in today’s chaotic work environments.
They dig into what behavioral health actually means (hint: it’s more than mental health), how leaders can show up better for their teams, and why active listening, transparency, and emotional adaptability are essential tools—not soft skills. Kira also breaks down her four-ingredient model of real resilience (connection, adaptability, purpose, and hope), and shares powerful, practical ways to help people bounce back without bypassing what’s hard.
Whether you’re managing a team, navigating burnout, or trying to claw back a little peace in your work life, this episode offers science-backed advice that actually meets you where you are.
Takeaways
Burnout is a math problem.
When there’s more energy going out than coming in—and not enough positive reinforcement—you’re headed for trouble. And when you're in stress response, you can’t absorb praise or support.
Feelings aren’t a liability—they’re a signal.
We have to create space for emotional processing at work, because humans don't leave their feelings at the door. Ignoring them makes things worse—for individuals and for teams.
Leaders need to model what they expect.
Sending late-night emails and then telling your team to “set boundaries” sends mixed messages. Behavior speaks louder than policy.
True resilience is made of four things.
Connection, adaptability, purpose, and hope. If any one of those is missing, we don’t bounce back—we burn out.
Not all self-care is restorative.
Some downtime is just avoidance. Kira helps us understand the difference between escape behaviors and truly replenishing ones—and why restorative micro-moments matter.
Notable Quotes
“We need to stop pretending people can function in crisis without acknowledging the crisis.”
• “Your team doesn’t do what you say—they do what you show.”
• “Resilience isn’t about pushing through. It’s about recovering well.”
• “If you’re not absorbing the good stuff at work, you’ll burn out even faster.”
• “Hope lives on the dark side of the tree. It’s quiet, but it’s there.”
Chapters
0:00 – Meet Dr. Kira Mauseth
2:00 – What behavioral health means at work
5:00 – Transparency vs. toxic positivity in leadership
8:00 – Why your team mirrors your behavior
10:00 – The myth of 24/7 availability
14:00 – Rethinking resilience: four core ingredients
17:00 – Adaptability, from volcanic plants to flat tires
21:00 – Emotional adaptability and crisis response
26:00 – Disaster cascades and workplace stress
30:00 – Leading through layoffs and uncertainty
34:00 – How burnout really works
36:00 – Restorative vs. avoidant behaviors
40:00 – The weirdest thing on Kira’s self-care list
43:00 – Five languages of appreciation at work
46:00 – Final thoughts on what really helps people stay
Resources
Learn more about Kira Mauseth’s work at: astrumhealthllc.org
• Connect with Kira on LinkedIn
• Free Download: Boundaries at Work Toolkit
Keywords
burnout recovery, behavioral health at work, emotional adaptability, workplace resilience, disaster psychology, boundaries at work, burnout signs, women leaders, transparency in leadership, active listening, healthy work culture, stress management, resilience at work
Transcript
Hi everybody. So great to see you all, hear you all, be here with you all. I'm super excited to have my friend, Dr. Kira Mauseth on the podcast today. And we're going to get into some stuff about resilience and behavioral health and the workplace and all of these fun topics. So Kira, welcome.
Kira Mauseth (00:21.922)
Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to chat with you about this stuff.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (00:26.368)
I know, me too. So easy start. Tell me a little bit, tell us all a little bit about yourself and what you do.
Kira Mauseth (00:35.022)
Okay, I have a lot of hats that I wear. So a couple different things. a teaching professor at Seattle U. I've been there for about 17 years. I am a clinical psychologist. So I have a private practice here in Snohomish County. And I just see a couple folks now. I don't do that for a big part of my work. I am a disaster psychologist primarily right now. So I do a lot of consultation and response work with agencies and organizations and school districts and all kinds of people recovering and managing through critical incidents, emergencies, crises, and disasters. And I do a lot of training workshops, talks, and things around those sorts of themes when it comes to moving through and navigating difficult times and resilience and recovery from traumatic events and that kind of thing.
A lot of different hats, a of different roles, but I would say my professional work mostly is a synthesis of the clinical piece and the teaching piece and the disaster response piece.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (01:42.51)
It's so interesting that the things that you need to be resilient in a disaster response are kind of the same things in some ways that you need to be resilient in your workplace, theoretically, which can feel like a disaster.
Kira Mauseth (01:52.876)
Yes. Well, there are lot of disasters in workplaces.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (01:58.634)
I know, totally. So speaking of which, when we think about behavioral health, hopefully more and more people are realizing that it should be part of all of our vocabulary and lives and workplaces because we are people who work. But when you think about it, define behavioral health in the context of a workplace. What do you talk about there?
Kira Mauseth (02:21.176)
Sure, that's a great question actually. So I think the first thing is to understand the difference between mental health and behavioral health because they get conflated a lot. And generally behavioral health is just a bigger umbrella. So mental health is included underneath the umbrella of behavioral health, but it also includes substance use. So from a technical definition, behavioral health is all the things that are substance use and mental health oriented. And mental health is just a little bit more specific than that.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (02:26.914)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (02:47.49)
When it comes to workplace behavioral health, what that really means functionally is, you know, the extent to which someone is able to function appropriately, effectively engage in good communication with colleagues and peers or patients or clients. And, you know, coping techniques, communication styles, and that sort of insight and awareness around what's going on with them. Like, do they need some support, something extra? Are they going through something right now? So.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (03:11.992)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (03:17.216)
It shows up in a lot of different ways. I also talked to folks about it in terms of leadership models and leading teams and groups from the perspective of best practices in behavioral health, because there are some tactics that are fairly simple. Just because they're simple doesn't mean they're easy to do. But things that leadership can keep in mind when it comes to supporting the behavioral health of people on their teams. So generally, mental well-being can include physical well-being too and the conversation certainly needs to include you know elements of resilience and burnout and that kind of thing as well.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (03:54.282)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, I want to get into resilience in a little bit because that word is so, it's very fraught for me, but I think the way that you define it is really wonderful. But going back to what you were saying, okay, I'm a leader in listening to this. What are those few simple but not easy things I might be able to do or should do in the workplace to make it healthier for everyone?
Kira Mauseth (04:13.75)
Yeah. So, this is something that actually was just talking to somebody about. So some tactics around best leader practices include more transparency than you might be comfortable with, especially around bad news. So it's sort of this, incorrect assumption that when you don't know what's going to happen or when it could be a number of bad things that could happen that you just play it close to the vest and you don't tell people anything.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (04:27.458)
Hmm.
Oof.
Kira Mauseth (04:41.838)
And there's actually research to show that you engender more cohesion amongst your team members and with your working group when you do say as a leader, I don't know. I don't know what's going to happen. It could be this, it could be this, it could be this. The odds are this, or I don't have that information. But being more transparent around not just the bad news, but what you know and don't know is a little bit counterintuitive from traditional leadership practices. And I think the pandemic is in part what changed a lot of that. That it was more helpful to be transparent about what you actually don't know than to pretend you do and then have to change course later on. That is not great, as you might guess, for a workplace co-worker. Yes.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (05:13.932)
So interesting.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (05:23.444)
And that is what so many people do. It's, you know, cause you're afraid of being wrong and in the systems that we work in, you're not supposed to look weak in any way. And that is a sort of admission of weakness, right? In some, mean, so I love that. And you see, do you see that results with people who are willing to be that transparent?
Kira Mauseth (05:45.228)
Yeah, well, mean, transparency is a, it's not a switch that you flip, right? It's a very nuanced kind of a thing. And I'm not in any manner suggesting turning the workplace into a group therapy session. Like there are limits around appropriateness and boundaries for that kind of thing. But I do think that if we're serious about promoting behavioral health in the workplace, that most leaders need to do more active listening.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (06:00.002)
Sure.
Kira Mauseth (06:11.042)
Like active listening is something that you can do in five or 10 minutes. It does not require a license. Like it is something, it's a skill that all people can do and have. And it's probably the only thing that is the five star review. Like do this all the time because it's the most useful thing that one person can do to support another person because it doesn't require you fixing a situation that you can't possibly fix anyway.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (06:11.082)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (06:37.43)
And if you're talking about workplace boundaries and a leader who wants to support their team, you know, they're not, the leader is not going to go home with you and have a chat with, know, whoever's bothering you or whatever those situations are. There's boundaries around that, but what you can do is validate and you can attempt to understand. And that's really the crux of active listening. yeah, two leadership takeaways, I think in my work are one is really those tactics around being a little bit more transparent and engaging in more active listening and also you know walking the talk, walking the walk, I'm not sure he would say it lots of different ways, but people don't do what they're shown. They do what they're, I'm sorry, they don't do what they're told. They do what they're shown. So what you model as a leader, like if you're serious about behavioral health, you have to also not send emails at two o'clock in the morning or at least play like a delayed send on your email if you're working at two, right? You got to represent in your behavior the priorities that you are espousing to uphold.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (07:20.27)
Yeah. Yep.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (07:26.754)
Amen.
Kira Mauseth (07:37.356)
Those three.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (07:37.55)
That's such a good point. Those are amazing. such a good point. When I was a newer leader, I was working late because I felt like I had to, and I had a lot going on, and I think I was down a staff member. And so I sent a bunch of emails at night thinking my staff wouldn't see them until the next day. And then a new staff member was replying to me at 11 PM in a role that had no business being on email at 11 PM. They should not have been worrying about it. And so I realized that.
Kira Mauseth (07:56.878)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (08:07.564)
that if I you know like they're gonna get scared if they see my name show up I'm now that person that if I show up in your inbox you're gonna want to do something about it so that helped me a lot yeah
Kira Mauseth (08:14.626)
Yeah. Yeah. Even if you tell them, don't respond. Even if you say, don't respond to emails after time at night, but you still do it, the implicit expectation is that they should too. Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (08:26.946)
Yeah, because they see you still doing that and all of the leadership usually is doing that. I think it's more harmful than anything because you're just perpetuating that cycle that, I have to be working nights and weekends and all the time in order to get ahead.
Kira Mauseth (08:37.742)
100 % yeah.
Kira Mauseth (08:47.288)
Yeah, you're perpetuating the boundaryless work cycle of on and less on, right? And I try to convert work culture into three buckets, right? On, on call, if that's part of your role, and only if that's part of your role, and the magical off bucket, which we seem to be lacking the off bucket rather than on and less on, which is like the permanent cultural thing. Did you see that? God, it was like a meme that happened a couple of years ago.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (08:53.332)
On and less on. I like that.
Kira Mauseth (09:16.888)
But it was like an out of office reply in Europe is like, I'm backpacking for the summer, I'll catch you in September. And an out of office reply in the United States says, I'm having kidney surgery on my lunch break, but you can still reach me on my cell phone. Right.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (09:28.846)
It's so true. It's so true.
Kira Mauseth (09:32.012)
And everybody laughs, everybody laughs and then we're like, like there's that gringy like, and also, yes, it's funny, but it's also true and it's a problem. so it's like collectively agreeing to have some boundaries around when we respond and as leaders, like when we, you know, represent the expectation of response is huge to that.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (09:35.342)
Ugh.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (09:40.14)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (09:52.342)
It's so huge. That's so funny. I literally was on a bed waiting for an emergency appendectomy, emailing everybody at work on morphine. So God knows what I was doing, but I was emailing like the marketing team and all, I was going to be gone for two weeks and I needed everybody to know. And it's like five in the morning. It was bananas. Maybe it was the morphine making me do it, but I felt like I had to, I couldn't just not show up. And what's interesting in that too, is I think there's ego in that, right? Like,
Kira Mauseth (10:07.618)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (10:15.928)
Let it go.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (10:20.898)
I'm so important. There's an interesting play on that, or it maybe feels good to be needed in some way. Like, all these people still need me. Yeah, I'm getting Teams messages after hours, but they need me. I don't know. I think there's a little something in there to explore.
Kira Mauseth (10:22.584)
Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (10:35.982)
100 % yes. It's identity, it's around purpose. So purpose is one of those four ingredients of resilience, right? And if you are, if it is being reinforced for you that you are needed all the time, it is a challenging ask to get people to embrace an alternative whereby they sort of have to accept by definition that the work will continue without them.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (10:39.758)
Mm-hmm.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (11:00.962)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (11:01.358)
You have to let go of like, know what, the need is always going to be there. The asks are always going to be there. The work's going to keep going on. I can play an important role in this, but actually, like, if I step back and when I take breaks and when I'm gone, it's not the end of the world. The system keeps rolling. Well, that's a little bit of a challenging thing to accept, I think, for a lot of us, but it kind of shines a light in my, in the clinical sense on maybe your sense of purpose is oriented towards what
Ellen Whitlock Baker (11:16.93)
Mm-mm.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (11:22.082)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (11:30.196)
other people think is important rather than what you personally think is important. Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (11:35.174)
Ugh, that's painful, because it's true. It's so true. It's like, especially when work is your identity, which we perpetuate. yeah. Yeah. Oof. I want to get into resilience. Tell me a little about resilience. Were you saying four buckets, four ingredients?
Kira Mauseth (11:43.512)
Yeah, do all the time. You conflate it all the time. Like who you are is what you do rather than who you are as a person.
Kira Mauseth (11:55.618)
Okay.
Kira Mauseth (11:59.032)
Four ingredients, four ingredients. So when I'm teaching this concept internationally with disaster response, we use the example of a tree, like the metaphor of a tree, because everybody knows what that is. We've tried to use other metaphors that did not translate cross-culturally, which was interesting. But a tree is good. So we have connection, which are the roots of the tree. And those are your people, your community, your...
It could be a faith group. could be an online recreation sports league. mean, it doesn't matter like gaming, whatever. It's your people, right? Family, friends, colleagues. And they give you nourishment, just like the roots of a tree. They give you stability. They provide a foundation for you and feed you. And then the trunk of the tree is adaptability. And arguably, in my opinion, adaptability, I think, is one of the most important ingredients. I think as humans, we need to learn how to adapt, and it's essential to survival in a lot of ways. When I talk about adaptability, I use the example of the ohia. Did I mention this to you? Because I know you're from Hawaii. So the ohia, the ohia lehua is a bush tree shrub that grows. You might have heard of it. You probably know it. It grows in the volcanic eruption zones in the islands of Hawaii. And it's the only plant that survives in an active eruption because it has learned how to tell when the oxygen around, sorry, when the air goes from carbon dioxide to sulfur dioxide because of an eruption. And I'm not a botanist, so I don't want to run afoul of the botany community out there. But the plant basically like, can tell when the air has changed and it stops breathing. It holds its breath until the air clears and it's getting carbon dioxide again, and then it does its plant thing and survives. And there are so many pictures of this that you can find of the ohia being the only living plant in a completely barren and desolate landscape of an eruption because it has figured out how to adapt and everything else doesn't. Everything else just does regular plant life as usual and doesn't survive. So in my mind, the ohia has become this representation of the essential nature of adaptability in our collective resilience.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (13:57.23)
Hmm.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (14:06.371)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (14:12.846)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (14:14.638)
And we're tired of it, right? We're tired of that word resilience. We're tired of the idea of having to adapt constantly. It's exhausting.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (14:18.818)
Yes.
Yeah. No, that's what like when I think of resilience and I want to get to all four, but like this, like I think of grit and having to put up with something even though it sucks and, you know, showing like wearing armor and not showing your, your upset or anything like that. For some reason that that word has come to mean that for me. And I know that's not what it is, but it feels like it's sort of been appropriated that way. Maybe it is the COVID that did it for us. I don't know, but.
Kira Mauseth (14:47.704)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (14:50.527)
Do you see people understanding it sort of incorrectly and having to sort of teach them through it? I mean, not correct or incorrect, but just in that sort of more negative light.
Kira Mauseth (14:58.486)
Yeah, I agree that it can't like, I've been doing work on resilience for 15 years and nobody really paid attention to it until the pandemic and everybody, it was like, all of a sudden this was a thing. And so the word became overused, right? And misappropriated in a lot of ways. But I think that what switches it from a piece thing you have to put on like a suit of armor into a set of ingredients is the personal adaptation of it. Like making the four ingredients mean something to you, being able to measure them and saying like, how is my sense of purpose? How is my sense of adaptability? How is my sense of connection? Like, what do I need more of, right? Making it personal. I feel the same way about the word self-care that you do about resilience. I cannot stand that term as a working mom. I want nothing to do with it. Self-care feels like something on my to-do list that is never gonna get done.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (15:46.293)
Interesting.
100%. Yeah. and it's selfish too, Kira. Like you can't, not supposed to do that.
Kira Mauseth (15:54.7)
And it always gets shuffled to the week's list for the next week. just can't do that. Right. So, I mean, you, yeah, you can feel however you feel and it's, you know, I get that totally. just, I don't know. I've been talking about it for a long time. So I really have broken it into these chunks, but I hear what you're saying. And you know, cliches, things that get overused, it's just, you know, people are going to use it for their own, their own devices.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (16:24.172)
And, but I love how you say making it personal. It makes a ton of sense. So it's just gonna mean what it means to you through your lenses. So I love that. Okay, so we have the roots, our connection. We have adaptability, which is the trunk. What's next?
Kira Mauseth (16:30.508)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (16:37.816)
Well, yep. The purpose is the fruit of the tree. So your sense of purpose is what you're doing, what you're producing, what you're growing, what you're contributing to that matters to you. And purpose is the confluence of meaning and goals. So it's setting goals, it's having the steps on the path available, but it's also knowing where you're headed. And you can't have purpose in this sense without both. So just setting goals for yourself means nothing unless you know why, right? Unless the why matters.
Kira Mauseth (17:07.638)
And just having a lot of things that you're doing that are really important to you, but without goals to get there, makes you go in circles. it, it's so it's goals and meaning in this nice little blend. and then the fourth ingredient is, is the moss on the north side of the tree, which is certainly relevant here in the Northwest. that's hope. Hope thrives where it's dark and cold on the north side of the tree. And the moss is always there and it's usually not something we're paying attention to. Hope is just kind of hanging out.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (17:22.83)
Mm-hmm.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (17:29.94)
oooo
Kira Mauseth (17:37.054)
But when things are really bleak, and especially in the context of disaster and crisis recovery, that's when hope is even maybe the most important, or when things are uncertain. So hope is the final ingredient.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (17:46.262)
Mm-hmm. It's there. You may not feel it right away, but it's there on the tree. I love that. So walk me through how you would use that in, like you're talking to a group of people, how would you get them to understand how to use that at work?
Kira Mauseth (17:53.74)
Yep. Yep. Yep.
Kira Mauseth (18:08.21)
I basically talk about, examples for how to evaluate where you are, not necessarily like an instrument, although there are those. but like, you know, give a definition and then talk about how do you feel like your personal sense of adaptability is? what does it look like? Be a little bit more descriptive. There are a couple of different kinds of everything. Like there's multiple kinds of hope. There's a couple of different kinds of adaptability. So I give examples of that. Like.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (18:15.917)
Hmm.
Kira Mauseth (18:36.258)
Dispositional adaptability, think is one of the most important pieces. And that is the idea where stuff happens, like stuff goes wrong and dispositional adaptability is like, yeah, you know, shit just hit the fan. And now what, what am I going to do? So it's that, it's that problem solving model where you realize things are bad. You acknowledge it. don't try to sugar coat it or pretend it's not, but you say, okay, this is just bad. And now what are my options? What are my resources? And what am I going to do first? It's like that.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (18:51.608)
Yep, yep, yep.
Kira Mauseth (19:06.104)
problem solving, step by step approach. I gotta tell you this story. I got a flat tire for the first time in years. I teach a class on disasters and I was teaching my class at Seattle U about how important it is to know like how to change a tire and like, you read a map and like all the, whatever. And then that night after I taught that class, I got the first flat tire I've gotten in years, right? It was just totally coincidental. And
Ellen Whitlock Baker (19:31.03)
I love that.
Kira Mauseth (19:36.074)
I called home and I talked to my husband and my older son was on the phone and he said, mom, are you safe? And I was like, yeah, I'm okay. And he goes, good, what are your options? And I was like, I feel like if my, he was eight at the time, if my eight year old can get to this problem solving model, speaking of, he's lurking outside the door right now, but if he can get to that problem solving model, there's hope for us. So yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (19:45.866)
I love it.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (20:03.084)
I love that.
Kira Mauseth (20:05.964)
Yeah, dispositional adaptability is accepting the thing that happened and then figuring out what to do next. I can give you multiple examples,
Ellen Whitlock Baker (20:11.252)
What is, yeah, no, I love that. that's the mode you often go in in a crisis, because the house is flooding and you have to take care of it. And what's next? What are some other kinds of adaptability?
Kira Mauseth (20:29.438)
Emotional adaptability is when you vary your emotion. Whoa, sorry. That was super loud. Emotional adaptability is when you vary your emotional response to someone else based on them and the circumstances that you're in. it's being, especially, this is a good leadership sort of concept too. It's where you sort of are thoughtful about the neurological state that you're in. Like how activated are you limbically? Are you feeling threatened? Are you.
Kira Mauseth (20:59.272)
scared, are you upset, angry, and how activated are they? And then you vary your emotional approach to them based on whatever the answer is to those questions. you adaptability in that sense is, I'm going to choose to speak slowly and calmly and approach with some de-escalation techniques in mind. Or we're just going to like, hey, let's go have like, have a chit chat and like bring more energy to this space. Like it's being really intentional and thoughtful about the emotional approach to another person.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (21:29.186)
That's so interesting because like, we talk often about how none of us ever really had a leadership training program for the most part. You you're just sort of like, now you're, you were good at your job. Now you're manager. Good luck. But my guess is, is that emotional adaptability is not taught in a lot of them. And it should be because, you know, what you're saying about active listening and, you know, this emotional adaptability or it's, it's all about
Kira Mauseth (21:37.742)
no, trial by fire. Yes, that's trial by fire.
Kira Mauseth (21:49.262)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (21:59.683)
at least what I'm hearing, centering the other person in, you know, whatever it is that's happening as opposed to yourself. Because, please.
Kira Mauseth (22:07.628)
Yes, I've got one more for you-you'll appreciate this, same son. This was years ago. We came home on Christmas Eve and we've been gone for like two or three days to find out that before we had left he had turned our refrigerator off.
Don't tell, do you hear him? Oh my, don't tell her.
This is a good, it's a great story. It's And so everything was rotten. Everything was melted. It was disgusting. And the hubs was angry. Like his reaction, his immediate response was mad. And I went into problem solving mode. I'm like, look, four o'clock on Christmas Eve, we've got nothing for the next, however many family meals we're supposed to have. Somebody's got to go to the store. Let's make a list. And he looks at me and this is that emotional adaptability.
He looks at me goes, I just need to be mad for a second. And so I was like, got it, peace. Okay, so I went one way, he went the other. Whatever that is, his mad thing. And then after a few minutes, right? So it's not like getting mad is the problem, it's what you do with it. And he was able to identify, he just needed to just be upset for a minute and then we made a list and now we have fish on Christmas Eve. That's our mission.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (23:18.082)
Congrats. That's such a good, I mean, well done for him because it takes practice, I'm learning, to identify when you have been triggered into that stress response and knowing enough to say, time out, I gotta go deal with myself for a little bit. And I was talking about this with one of my...
Kira Mauseth (23:39.608)
Yeah. Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (23:43.7)
Other guest, Kyle, and we were talking about how it can be really awkward, especially if you're an introvert, to like leave in the middle of a meeting or a conversation at work when it's something that has triggered you. And so I don't know what your advice would be for folks who are worried about that, you know, who know that that's probably they should leave the room if they're feeling super upset about something or, or however it has made them feel angry but they don't know how.
Kira Mauseth (24:15.15)
I would say that, especially again from that leadership role, one of the most valuable things you can do is establish a process through modeling, right? Where it's sort of a collective agreement, like, okay, and this is not when you're mad. You don't do this when you're upset. You do this at a regular huddle, team huddle. You're like, all right, we're going to establish a new routine. So we're talking about really intense stuff. There's going to be things that piss people off and make everybody upset. And I, speaking from the leadership position, I'm going to...
Ellen Whitlock Baker (24:33.521)
I love that.
Kira Mauseth (24:43.622)
give myself permission to step away if I need to for a few minutes. And I would like to establish that right now that I expect any of us to do that. It is a far better alternative to take the time and space you need and then to reengage with the team and no questions asked. Just click, you know, click leave on the zoom or just to physically step out of the room and, and say it right. You're verbally describing it and then model it if you need to. And then all of a sudden you've created a cultural shift rather than just having to do the thing.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (25:10.978)
That's genius.
Kira Mauseth (25:13.196)
without setting the stage ahead of time. So it can be something that's introduced in that way.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (25:19.83)
That's so amazing. It's so simple. And yet I never have thought of that ever in my workplaces. You know what I mean? And maybe that's just me. Maybe more people have. like.
Kira Mauseth (25:27.694)
Yeah. Well, mean, no, I have found like the simplest stuff is often we can over complicate this like we all do for sure. So.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (25:33.932)
Yeah, it really is.
So if you're a leader and you're listening, I'm hearing center the other person, active listening, try to read the room, read your own room, set processes. And when you said process, I was like, god, because sometimes you think of a process and it's like.
Kira Mauseth (25:48.824)
Yeah. Emotional adaptability. Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (25:59.402)
Here's the form you have to fill out at the incident report form after you, it's like, no, not that kind of process. It's as simple as saying, it's okay to step away anytime you need to, no questions asked, please do. Take care of yourself.
Kira Mauseth (26:01.144)
Really? Yeah. No. steps. Two steps. Yeah.
Yeah, here's the agreement, the collective agreement. This is what we're going to do. Two things, boom, boom, boom. That's it. Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (26:16.536)
Wouldn't that make workplaces so much better if people actually did that? Let's do it more.
Kira Mauseth (26:21.664)
It would be, and it would, it would cut down on, misunderstandings and confusion because we do not make good decisions when we are in limbic system response mode. Like we don't, we don't appropriately consider consequences. don't think creatively. We cannot problem solve as well because that part of our brain isn't the part that's, on stage. So it would be so much more effective really. And I do think leaders right now, especially have an opportunity.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (26:25.613)
Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (26:48.398)
I mean, there is no shortage of things to be emotionally responsive to. So we have an opportunity right now to practice this stuff and get some cultural sort of baselines in place that just work forever. No need to wait.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (26:52.238)
Totally.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (27:01.772)
Mm-hmm.
I love that. Yeah, it is a tough time right now. like, we're in like 17 different crises right now. We're doing this in April of 2025. know, not only, oh, tell me all about it. Cause we're in a disaster cascade. both like, for me personally, there's all sorts of disaster happening that's not even related to the world. And sometimes, yeah, oh yes. Yeah. What did you say? Collective? Elective.
Kira Mauseth (27:12.866)
It's called a disaster cascade, Ellen. It's called a disaster cascade.
Kira Mauseth (27:29.23)
Collective disasters? Oh, well, I mean, there's personal stuff for sure for everybody. But then there's this collective, like a disaster, large scale disaster is something that's going to affect at least a community or larger. And you're right. don't even know. I don't even know how many we would actually count. But definition wise, yeah, a disaster cascade is when you have more than one large scale incident that affects a group of people or population of people.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (27:35.885)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (27:50.318)
Cascade.
Kira Mauseth (27:58.798)
on the heels or sort of within the recovery time from the first incident. So usually that recovery zone is 18 to 24 months, like for a big fire or big flood or earthquake or something, right? And what I mean by that is that if you give people on average, average, average, so this is take this with a grain of salt, but generally people are going to recover to their baseline level of behavioral health functioning after a large scale incident disaster in about 18 to 24 months, generally.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (28:28.333)
Wow.
Kira Mauseth (28:29.832)
if we don't get swammyed by another large scale incident. And I'll be honest with you, it is hard to tell what would qualify now because it just seems like there is so much stuff. And with COVID, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (28:34.018)
Mm-hmm
Ellen Whitlock Baker (28:40.79)
Yeah. It's like, was it COVID? Or was it other stuff? There was a lot happening. But COVID was such a disruptor in a lot of ways. I'm sure that's a big recovery.
Kira Mauseth (28:54.306)
Well, the original in March of 2020 was the original. then in the fall, I mean, this is like total flashback, but each the big variants like the Delta variant was another, another impact. then Omicron was the third. So COVID had three distinct impact times in disaster science, at least.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (29:03.534)
All right.
Great.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (29:11.416)
Yeah. And it was like just when you thought you were getting better and know, things were returning to normal, then Omicron comes along and you're like, ugh. Yeah. Okay, so I'm a leader of a team. It's right now. It's maybe I'm working at a nonprofit or a sector of, what'd you say? Overworked and underpaid, but also working in the sectors that are,
Kira Mauseth (29:15.863)
Yes.
And now your kids can't get up to school. Yeah. Yep. Yep.
Kira Mauseth (29:33.248)
Overworked underpaid.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (29:40.674)
functioning a lot right now and are getting cut. Maybe I'm a healthcare worker, maybe these people who are more about giving. What do I say to my poor team that's not gonna get paid anymore and may even have all their professional development money is gonna get cut. it's sort of a dire landscape, but I can't change any of that as the leader I am. So what would you do?
Kira Mauseth (30:06.439)
You would be honest about that because there's going to be a lot of speculation around what's going to happen and so you say what you don't know and you say what the options may be that you're not sure of and then you then you focus on asking questions because because what people need in order to work through that are going to be different right and so you don't you focus less I would say in that precarious position of the unknown on what to say versus
Ellen Whitlock Baker (30:16.675)
Mm-hmm.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (30:25.251)
Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (30:34.158)
what to ask. And it could be getting them to start thinking about, if their position goes away tomorrow, have they considered what their options might be? Like that problem solving model applied in a different way. What are the resources? Do you know people in other sectors? When you think of your sense of purpose, are there other ways that you could meet your sense of purpose in terms of things that have meaning for you that are not this job? Like getting them to think, you know what I mean by that? Like just
Ellen Whitlock Baker (30:37.101)
Love that.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (30:59.683)
Wow.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (31:03.438)
Absolutely do and how genius is that but how taboo is it like, know, we don't we don't ever do that. We don't Talk about what's next for people, you know, we're I mean, hopefully I guess I
Kira Mauseth (31:16.184)
Well, but how likely are they to stay there in that position when they feel valued and cared for, even if there's nothing you can do, they're way more likely to stay and work hard and contribute in a positive way because they love that environment. Right. Then if you just avoid those questions completely, I don't know. I mean, we're good at avoiding everything, but that is not. What's crazy to me is that so much of this stuff might be taboo, but it's actually not useful. Like the way, the traditional ways of doing things are not good.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (31:19.018)
Exactly.
Exactly.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (31:29.112)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (31:46.126)
They're not good for the bottom line. They're not good for the people. They're not good for the culture. They're just not. But we still do them. And I say, I think of that. Like, let's start doing stuff that actually is helpful for everyone.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (31:48.194)
Amen.
Yeah, 100%.
Yeah, indeed. Yes, that's what we're doing here on this podcast. My mom is listening, so my one listener will, no, I'm just kidding. No, I think about that all the time because I left my last job because I was so burned out. I was crispy.
Kira Mauseth (32:00.206)
Okay, it's working here, It's working with us. All right, cool.
Excellent.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (32:19.168)
I knew every sign, every symptom. I could tell you when it started, I knew it was happening. And yet it just kept, I didn't stop it. And I couldn't do a lot to stop it, you know, in my position. But as workplaces, we know what causes burnout. It's being overworked, it's not being respected, it's not being listened to, you know, we could name them. And yet we continue to do it, you know? And I don't know why.
Kira Mauseth (32:28.759)
Right. Right.
Kira Mauseth (32:44.046)
Well, so I mean, there's logistics, right? There's like, you got to pay the rent somehow. So there's a lot of reasons people stay in jobs that they're not happy with for if it's practical. But the way that I conceptualize burnout from a clinical psychology lens is that it's a, and you know how good I am at math. So there's a of math issue, but it is a math bottom line and that you have burnout is the result when you have more energy going out into your work.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (32:47.426)
Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yep.
Well, yeah, that for sure.
Kira Mauseth (33:12.94)
and not enough coming back. So you're not replenishing yourself. you're getting, it's too much outflow and not enough input. So what do you have control over? Well, again, clinically speaking, how are you refilling yourself? Is it at work? That's something called compassion rewards, right? Which is the opposite of compassion fatigue. It's like the stuff that you get rewarded for. Here's the irony is that when your brain is operating limbicly, you actually aren't able to process compassion rewards.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (33:15.148)
Ooh.
Love that.
Kira Mauseth (33:42.732)
because you don't attend to them. So when someone says on your team, hey, thank you so much. really appreciate your hard work on that thing, but you're in threat response. It is like water off a duck's back. It's like, okay, yeah, next. you're waiting for the next bad thing to happen and you don't sit and internalize, I did good. Like I am at this. I am good at this job or I help someone and that feels good. And so if you don't internalize those positive things, guess what? More outflow and not enough.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (33:42.924)
Really?
Kira Mauseth (34:10.498)
The good stuff isn't being internalized, which means that you have to find a way outside of the job role to fill up your energy back. If it's not happening at work where you might be in a threat response. So like, what are you doing in your off time? And then the question that I usually ask to folks is, how much time do you spend in your off time? Remember that mythical off bucket, but how much time do you spend in activities that are escape and avoidance oriented versus restoration and recovery oriented?
Ellen Whitlock Baker (34:15.926)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (34:41.27)
And nobody usually answers. don't ever, people don't raise their hands, right? But I don't blame them because we usually conflate the two. We usually, but we also think I'm doing something for good for me. And it's just avoidance and escape. We usually just, they're the same. But the, the, technical answer, right? Is that if you're getting something out of it, no matter what it is, it can be whatever, right? can, video games, you know, I'm not throwing them under the bus at all. Video games are really good for some people.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (34:44.908)
Hahaha
Ellen Whitlock Baker (34:48.447)
escape.
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (34:56.878)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (35:10.798)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (35:11.468)
Because if you're connecting with a group online, you're playing with friends, you're getting some social connection out of that, that's very restorative and very positive. For other people, it is a total escape and avoidance. So it's not the activity that's the issue, it's how you're using it and what it does for you. So part of the process is to get people to think about the fact that we've all got 24 hours in the day, what are you doing with the hours that you're not at work? What are you doing that is helpful for you? Because it doesn't have to be hard work.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (35:21.315)
Mm-hmm.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (35:26.232)
Yep. Yep.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (35:34.061)
Right.
Kira Mauseth (35:41.677)
Right?
Ellen Whitlock Baker (35:41.738)
No, but it can feel like adding another thing. Like had a client who was telling me she had a medical incident because she was so stressed. And I was like, my gosh, so what are you doing to take care of yourself? And she was like, I'm going to start. Because she was telling me she had back-to-back meetings all day and events at night, and she has three kids. And she was like, I'm going to start waking up at 430 AM and going to the gym.
Kira Mauseth (35:49.826)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (36:07.886)
Ugh.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (36:09.858)
I absolutely understood why she said that because I probably would have said the same thing in that state, you know, when my brain was in that state too, but it's just adding another thing on your plate. like, especially, and you and I are both working moms, like when I get home is often when then everybody else needs me. And so then I attend to all of their needs. And then I, especially when I was working, I found myself curling up in bed with a really.
Kira Mauseth (36:16.216)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (36:37.56)
crappy romance novel, which was my escape because I was like, I can't take any more inputs today. I'm gonna go here. So when you're in that mode, which so many of us are just because busy is a thing, what are some ways you can like turn that off or how do you claw that time out for yourself?
Kira Mauseth (36:42.914)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (36:55.852)
Yeah. I mean, I think the trick with how, with getting started, it's sort of like establishing good boundaries in that they're harder to establish than maintain. So you want to build them first and practice this in the smallest way. You build a boundary wall one brick at a time. So with the co with active coping choices, which is really what we're talking about here, like doing things that are intentionally and health healthy for us. Active coping choices need to be things that take one minute.
minutes, five minutes. Like if everything on your coping plan takes an hour you're never going to use your plan or at least I'm not going to use mine. I don't know about you. But that it starts with that. It starts with something that gives you a little bit of sense of peace or something you can get something positive out of that's helpful for you for two minutes. That's it. And it can be as simple as a sticky note right or you know I have a color-coded excel spreadsheet but whatever.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (37:26.026)
Hmm
Ellen Whitlock Baker (37:32.973)
No.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (37:48.568)
Mm-hmm.
Of course you do.
Kira Mauseth (37:54.926)
Yeah, I work with a lot of first responders and I had a fire chief be like, listen, we're not doing color coded Excel spreadsheets. You're going to get a sticky note. And I'm like, that's fine. I don't care. Whatever works for you, right? It can be like whatever format. It's like, it's a, it should be a list of stuff that gives you positive body chemicals or that refills your cup in some way that is not like, I am never going to put lunges on my coping plan. Like, no, but you know what I mean? Like it shouldn't feel like.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (38:01.267)
Ha ha.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (38:18.574)
No. Somebody might, but not me. Yeah. Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (38:23.078)
If they want to and if that's good for them, nothing on the list should feel onerous. It should all be stuff that you want to do. Then that's how you get started.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (38:31.884)
you want to do, but you don't feel so drained that you fall into it. think that's the, cause for me for a while I was like, well, reading is my activity, but no, it really wasn't. I was just shut down. So I think that's really helpful to consider that. And we always think it has to be an hour or a half hour or like, it's definitely that I have to go to the gym or go on a walk or, know, like it is always that because.
Kira Mauseth (38:42.53)
zoning out. Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (38:55.758)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (38:58.23)
our culture tells us that's what we're supposed to be doing. I mean, you watch these reels. I'm ashamed of watching all the Instagram reels I do, but they're all these like, my five to nine before my nine to five. I don't know if you've ever seen any of those. Don't, but it's these women and often they're like moms and it shows what they do from a vlog of what they do from five to nine in the morning. And it's like, wake up at 4 a.m. and drink my green juice and go and work out for an hour.
Kira Mauseth (39:10.996)
I love you.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (39:27.34)
And it just makes you feel terrible about yourself. So I don't know why I watch them, but also I kind of laugh at them because I'm like, who does that?
Kira Mauseth (39:30.147)
Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (39:35.035)
Just those people. That's it.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (39:36.448)
Yeah, or it's fake, because it's on Instagram. you know what, if you can't, like, no judgment. If that is for you and that's your routine, like, I love you for it, like, do it. But that's the point. And this has come up multiple times in this conversation, which is, what is it for you? Yeah, it's like, that is the filter. Does it work for you or not?
Kira Mauseth (39:44.664)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (39:55.116)
Yeah, right. And you should never have anything on there that like journaling. That is great for some people. I don't do it. It doesn't work for me. I don't like it, but I know people who love it. Right? So great. Only put stuff, only make, you know, only do stuff that's helpful for you. Yeah. There has to be a filter.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (40:01.602)
Yeah, I don't.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (40:11.308)
What's the weirdest thing on your list that you're willing to share?
Kira Mauseth (40:14.91)
well, this is not, I mean, it's not super weird, but I have a good colleague and a good friend and we have the same highly inappropriate and bad sense of humor. and we even like, we have a mug that we got together that said, forget sugar and spice. full of sarcasm and profanity. And that's basically like, it's sort of like my motto. So she and I, share memes, highly inappropriate and funny memes. I, I will, my, you know, it takes seven seconds to send a text message on average. Right. So.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (40:23.986)
you
Ellen Whitlock Baker (40:39.734)
Nice.
Kira Mauseth (40:44.512)
I shoot her a bunch of inappropriate funny memes. She does the same. we like a couple of times a week, we'll just do that. And then that's my connection also with her. it's, it humor is so good. It's good oxytocin. You got some good, good chemicals happening. Cause it's a good, good vibe. So that's, I mean, it's not super crazy, but works for me.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (40:53.656)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (41:01.922)
I love that.
No, but what a smart thing. Like again, I would never have said that's, I don't want to use the self-care word, but I would never have said that's a restorative thing because you're on your phone and you're not supposed to be on your phone when you're restoring yourself and you're supposed to be, know, journaling in a pool of water. It's that, ooh, good point.
Kira Mauseth (41:16.952)
depends on what you're using your phone for. Yes. And I would, I mean, I just said earlier, like, it's not the activity, but honestly, doom scrolling on social media, I would sort of generalize and say, that's not good. It's just, mean, there's, there's data on that. Right. So there's lots of apps that are really good for people in terms of mental growth and like calm and head space, like things that there's free versions and not free versions. And there's lots of good stuff that you can use on your phone.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (41:40.098)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (41:45.346)
But doom scrolling on social media, when half of it's AI anyway, is not one of those things. I will just generalize. So yeah. Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (41:49.29)
Mm-hmm. Mm-mm. Mm-mm. No, but we get into it. I love that I have a friend who she's afraid of dolls. So I just find the creepiest doll pictures of like, you know, horror dolls and send them to her. She sends back another one. We have this really good one of a Renesmee doll, you know, from Twilight. That's the child from Twilight. There was...
Kira Mauseth (42:03.731)
you folk. Yeah. That's great.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (42:18.134)
A friend of mine went to Forks and there was a window display and they had this baby doll that was supposed to be for Nesme and it had a bottle full of blood and we just, every once in while I just send it to her and she just cracks up because she's like, it's so bad, but we love it. So I love that. It's just those little things. And if you are, I've been thinking about as a leader, making sure that you can.
Kira Mauseth (42:23.758)
You're so good.
Kira Mauseth (42:27.52)
my god.
Kira Mauseth (42:31.843)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (42:43.054)
put a post-it on someone's desk. You can do a little thing to give somebody that oxytocin and it means the world. That's all it takes. Not all, but...
Kira Mauseth (42:44.91)
Yes.
Kira Mauseth (42:53.112)
Yeah. Do you know the, you know, the five love languages? So you know, the workplace version, the five languages of appreciation. So it's the same thing. I mean, it's the only one that's different is like the physical touch because, know, for all this reason. Yeah. so there's the five languages of appreciation. speaking of like, you just reminded me when you said the sticky notes, you can have your team do that test or whatever. There's lots of free versions of it online.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (42:57.197)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (43:01.195)
No.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (43:06.478)
Don't do that.
Kira Mauseth (43:21.902)
And then they put a sticky note on the edge of their monitor that says what type of appreciation they like. So as a leader, then you can tell this person wants to see their name in an email. This person wants me to just check in with them and spend a little time. This person maybe would want a cup of coffee or a cookie, right? Like there's gifts, there's time, there's, it's the same concept as the five love languages, but it's really helpful for managers to know how their people prefer to be appreciated because it
Ellen Whitlock Baker (43:26.84)
Mm-hmm.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (43:31.138)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (43:35.736)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (43:44.578)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (43:51.53)
It is way more potent when it's appropriate for them, rather than just everybody gets a cookie and people are like, I don't, that's not important to me. Right? Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (43:55.021)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (44:00.628)
I'm gluten free. Yeah. I think that's so good because I was answering, have this ask me anything about work that you feel like you can't ask at work form that people have been filling out and sending in. And the question I was looking at this morning was someone whose boss never ever did any appreciation or like acknowledged their hard work and they were like knocking it out of the park. And as I was thinking about it, I did remember
You have to know how your team likes to be recognized because for me, I would hate that. I would want to be recognized, not necessarily publicly, but I would definitely want my leader to be like, hey, you did a really good job with that. Thank you so much. Like, that's all I need. But there are some people who even that like feel you need to do it in a different format because that would feel really awkward. And you can simply ask them when they start, how do you like to be recognized? It can be that easy. But I love the idea of the love languages.
Kira Mauseth (44:56.322)
Yes. Yeah. Yeah. It could be something right with all the forms at the beginning, right? Okay.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (45:02.794)
Yes, do an intake form. A friend of mine does that and it's the smartest thing I've ever seen. She asks what their favorite food is, when their birthday is, how they like to be recognized, a couple of other really important, like favorite TV show or something. And her team was so cohesive because of that. It really makes a difference.
Kira Mauseth (45:20.066)
I would ask, I would add to that, like, you'd have to explain what it is. Maybe if people don't recognize it, but you know the difference between high context and low context cultural communication? So high context is when you, when it's considered rude from a cultural lens to go directly to an issue. And low context is where I'm from, that's my background. And so like with Jensen and I, like, if I'm struggling with something,
Ellen Whitlock Baker (45:31.094)
No.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (45:39.861)
Kira Mauseth (45:47.374)
he can say, do you want me to just listen to you right now, or do you want me to help you solve that problem? Like, it's super direct. I don't find that rude. I find it helpful because, I mean, like, I just need you to listen. And he's like, OK. But in the workplace, that cultural communication piece, like, you can still get to the answer. But people, in terms of their familiarity and their background, might not be as comfortable with a direct approach, which is called low context, right? You just go right to the thing.
Kira Mauseth (46:14.218)
and they might be coming from a high context background. So that question is a great, another piece of information. We're like, how comfortable are you with direct communication? And maybe there's some prefacing about that, but I think with all of the cultural blending that there is and people coming from all kinds of different family backgrounds, it's important to.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (46:18.84)
That's great.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (46:24.632)
Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (46:34.976)
Yeah, I mean, we were talking about this in our earlier episode about what trauma you're bringing to work with you and how we each have, you know, that iceberg drawing, we each have this whole iceberg underneath of things that we, like our identities, everything intersectionality, and some of those things are visible and some of those things aren't visible. And that's where you have to treat.
everybody on your team like a different person. And we want them all to be the same because it's a lot easier to buy everybody cookies or to praise everybody in the same way. You know, it really is. And and it gets perpetuated in these workplaces when you are still like even the leader is overworked. And so you don't feel like you have time to sit down and actually have that conversation with your team about how they like to be recognized, which is just an awful feeling. So I hope that
Kira Mauseth (47:02.402)
Yeah, that's right.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (47:28.427)
take away from this conversation these simple things that you can do that aren't necessarily huge time sucks but that will make all the difference in the world.
Kira Mauseth (47:34.104)
Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (47:37.676)
Yeah. And I would, you know, back to what you were saying earlier, who is it better for? It's actually better for everyone, including the company to have people be happier in their, in their team and be, they're much more effective and they're going to stay longer and they're not going to get burnt out. So it's really, there's no losing to that. If the process can be implemented, you know, at any point, really the culture change to, to really promote these behavioral health concepts.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (47:42.798)
Everyone. Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (47:51.01)
course. Yeah.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (47:58.659)
Yeah.
Yeah.
I love it. I love it. I love it. So much good stuff. Thank you so much. I have a final question for you before, well, first before my final question. Where can people find you? you have a LinkedIn webpage?
Kira Mauseth (48:17.538)
I do. Yes. I'm on LinkedIn. Just with Kira Mauseth. You can find me there. My website for my consulting and talk stuff is astrumhealthllc.org. A-S-T-R-U-M health and then LLC Astrum Health. And yeah, my email is drkira@astrumhealthllc.org. So fairly easy. You can Google. Yeah, I am Google. That's so weird.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (48:37.078)
Nice, I'll put those in the show notes too. Yeah, you're Googleable. But the fun question, which I'm trying to ask everyone because I like to show that we all have multi sides to us, many sides to us. So if you had to give a TED talk on something totally unrelated to your work, what would it be and why?
Kira Mauseth (48:49.26)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kira Mauseth (48:55.438)
God. Unrelated to my work.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (48:58.915)
Mm-hmm.
Kira Mauseth (49:01.39)
That is a great question. Unrelated to work. That is the unrelated. I'm obviously stuck on the unrelated to work part because everything comes into like psychology. I don't know. What would it be? Probably something about travel, probably something like international travel and cultural. have a, you know, I did you know my degree was in anthropology?
Ellen Whitlock Baker (49:27.84)
Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Kira Mauseth (49:29.73)
So it would be probably something around cultural experiences and travel. Yeah, some for work and some for not.
Ellen Whitlock Baker (49:35.756)
I love that. And you've done a lot of that. And a lot of some for work. Yeah, and you've been to some really tough zones after big disasters. And my gosh, look at all that we've learned. So thank you, Kira. I hope you have a great day. Thank you everyone for listening and we will see you soon.
Kira Mauseth (49:57.454)
Thanks so much.
Dr. Kira Mauseth is a Teaching Professor at Seattle University, a practicing clinical psychologist in Washington State, and affiliate faculty at the SMART center at University of Washington. She served as a co-lead for the Behavioral Health Strike Team for the WA State Department of Health throughout the COVID response, and owns Astrum Health, LLC, through which she consults with organizations, educational groups and state agencies about disaster preparedness and resilience building within local communities. She is part of the mental health work group for the Pediatric Pandemic Network.
Dr. Mauseth has provided training to community groups and professionals both regionally and abroad as the co-developer of the Health Support Team© program. Her work and research focus on disaster behavioral health, resilience, and recovery from trauma as well as small and large-scale critical incident response and preparation for organizations. She has worked abroad extensively with disaster survivors and refugees and has trained first responders and health care workers throughout Puget Sound the United States, and currently serves in the adult mental health clinical seat on Washington State’s Disaster Medical Advisory Committee (DMAC). She is the author of the text “Why Therapy Works: The Psychology of Change”.
