A Conversation with Dr. Stephanie Call

“I am fearless when it comes to change…I don’t run from it. Change is opportunity. If you think about things as one step at a time, it’s just that next step. And then, it isn’t so scary.”

Bio

Stephanie Call, MD, is the Associate Chair for Education and a Professor of Medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, and recently started a new Internal medicine Residency Program at Mountain Area Health Education Center in North Carolina. Dr. Call is widely recognized for her work in graduate medical education, faculty/resident development in teaching, physician wellness and curriculum development/assessment. She has been awarded the Distinguished Medical Educator Award from the Association of Program Directors in Internal Medicine, the Faculty Teaching Excellence Award from the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine and the Gold Foundation Baldwin Award.

How did you discover your passion as a clinical educator?

Dr. Call was a descendant of teachers and educators. For her, entering into the practice of medicine was not high on her list of priorities. “I started my career not even sure I wanted to go into medicine,” she related, “and then found my way into medicine in my fourth year of school.”

“I always say to students not to worry if they are not 100% sure what they want to do. I changed my mind in December of my fourth year. I was applying for neurosurgery and then did some soul searching and wound up going into internal medicine right in the middle of the match season. It was a good fit.”

“Then I started my career as an HIV outcomes researcher and after wandering through a couple of different paths I found that what I really had a passion for was teaching and that my passion was about helping people find their strengths and supporting them as they grew.” Dr. Call enjoys helping people remove barriers as they acquire more knowledge, skill, and the proper attitude to become a great physician.

How do you deal with change?

“I am fearless when it comes to change. My husband likes to say I seek change. I don’t necessarily seek it, but I don’t run from it. Change is opportunity. if you think about things as one step at a time, it’s just that next step. And then there’s going to be another step after that. I also believe that none of us are on one single road that’s going in a certain direction. I do think we have to hold onto things such as our core values and our thread in life as we weed through different paths.”

“You can’t be successful if you don’t fail,” Dr. Call continued. Sometimes we make mistakes and take the wrong steps. When that happens, we must regroup and head in a different direction. In those moments, Dr. Call does not look at her actions as failures but as opportunities for growth.

How do you process decisions and evaluate new opportunities?

“I always say to people I counsel, let’s talk about my favorite questions first. What’s important to you? What are your core values? What are the characteristics of the environment that are going to enable your success professionally? What’s important to you professionally with regards to what you want to accomplish?”

“Some of my core values are serving others. Some of my really important professional goals are to make an impact in my little world. I ask, is this consistent with my personal core values? Is this consistent with my professional goals and are the characteristics of this new environment ones that enable my success or push and challenge me?”

“I’ve learned over time that one of the things I need in a professional environment is comradery. I don’t do well in a solo environment. It’s definitely not my talent set. So I should put myself in environments where I have a lot of colleagues. That’s where I’m going to be effective.”

How can we start the journey of recognizing our strengths?

“I didn’t always do this well,” Dr. Call admitted, “I was very insecure, but in my residency I was very fortunate to be in a wonderful place that fostered my development and pushed and challenged me to find out who I was. The really important person in that was my mentor. And one of the things he pushed me on was identifying core values. He is still a coach to me, my biggest critic and a father figure and a friend and a colleague.”

Dr. Call’s mentor introduced her to a world of literature where she learned from authors like Stephen Covey on the importance of good habits. One of her ongoing habits is to write down what is important to her and ask questions such as: “What are my core values? Where am I going? What’s my personal mission statement this year? How does that align with my families? What’s my family’s core values. How does that fit in with what I’m professionally doing? Where do I feel like I’m not showing up according to my core values every day or not feeling fulfilled or not needing my mission statement? Where do I have strengths? And where do I have really huge weaknesses? It’s being honest with yourself and then doing a lot of those exercises with my teams that I work with so that our groups come together around core values.”

What are some behaviors that good mentees exhibit?

“Differentiating between talent and skills is really important. One of the things I look for are people that have a lot of humility and can identify what they are good at, where they want to grow, where they need to grow. That’s a person that’s open to failing, open to trying new things, open to growth.”

“Also, there is nothing that beats hard work. I work hard and I think carefully. I love to solve problems and think through things. I also think everybody needs to think about, how do we define the word successful? We should define that word based on our personal definition of success.”

Pearls of Wisdom

1. Change and failure both present new learning opportunities. And fearlessness is the essential prerequisite for embracing change.
2. When you make a decision, ask three critical questions: How important is this for me? Does this align with my core values? Is this environment conducive to my health?
3. The role of the mentor is to identify talent, and support them. The role of the mentee is to be willing to take risks, to be fearless, and to say yes to new opportunities.