I remember spending time with a cousin in Kentucky. She was several years older than me and a surgical nurse and I loved to hear her tell stories about her adventures in the OR. It seemed natural that both granddaughters would follow her into the profession, although as I later discovered, neither made it past their first year of nursing school. It turns out they're not alone. The student drop out rate among first year nursing students is as high as 50% in some programs. And two reasons often cited for this high drop out rate are stress and burnout. No one can argue that the job of nursing is stressful, but we're losing future nurses to stress before they even reach the clinical environment. How can this situation be reversed?
 
Enter Recreational Music Making (RMM). You don't need musical ability to take part in RMM. And unlike "regular" music making, RMM promotes the enjoyment and well-being of the individual participant (or group) rather than judging the performance.
 
First year nursing students at Allegany College of Maryland took part in a research study lead by Dr. Barry Bittman, a neurobiologist. They engaged in six weekly one-hour sessions of group drumming, based on the Remo HealthRHYTHMS Group Empowerment Drumming® protocol. Burn out and mood dimensions were assessed with the Maslach Burnout Inventory and the Profile of Mood States. The outcome? After six weeks, the students demonstrated a 28.1% reduction in Total Mood Disturbance and statistically significant reductions in burnout.
 
Sounds good...but how does that translate into dollars and cents? An independent research firm projected that the average nursing school could retain 2 more students per year by using the RMM protocol. This translates to a $16,800 annual savings for the typical 105-student program and $29.1 million a year for all U.S. nursing schools. That's more than $29 saved for every dollar invested.*
 
In the hospital environment, the same analysis suggests greater economic benefits. Nursing turnover now costs the average 280-nurse acute care hospital $3.8 million each year. An RMM protocol could potentially help these facilities retain 7 more nurses each year, for an average annual savings of $322,000 per hospital or more than $1.5 billion for the entire healthcare industry - a savings of $564 for every dollar invested.**

 

Recreational Music Making isn't only for the health care professions. According to an article in the New York Times, "workplace stress costs the nation more than $300 billion each year." Burnout is one of the most pervasive factors that severely limits employee effectiveness and their ability to remain on the job.  Research now confirms that RMM can successfully reverse key elements of the human stress response...which underscores the value of Recreational Music Making as a human resources initiative that can be used throughout the work force.
 
How about you? Are you ready to re-energize your workplace, reconnect people to their goals and boost your bottom line?
 
*/** - Recreational Music-making: An Integrative Group Intervention for Reducing Burnout and Improving Mood States in First Year Associate Degree Nursing Students: Insights and Economic Impact, "International Journal of Nursing Education Scholarship"

 

Jennie Ayers is a trained HealthRHYTHMS drum facilitator. 

  When we examine successful, healthy, competitive organizations, we find a culture of creativity and innovation. This isn't due to chance. Many companies have specific processes and principles that inspire a healthy, innovative culture.  For example, 3M encourages technical staff members to spend up to 15% of their time on projects of their own choosing.  Known as the "bootlegging" policy, the 15% rule has been the catalyst for some of 3M's most famous products, including  Scotch Tape and - of course - Post-it® Notes. 
For companies that don't have a "bootlegging" policy, how can they support innovation? They may want to turn to the concept of the World Café.

 

Put simply, the World Café is a way of hosting conversations to talk about things that matter. Groups of people, typically 4-5 to a group, sit at separate tables and have a conversation. They ask questions that are important to the company (or to their community, depending on their focus) such as "In what other markets might we be able to sell this product?" All the participants are encouraged to doodle or jot down key ideas on paper placemats or tablets. (Go all out and cover the tables in plain butcher paper.) After a set time (usually 20-30 minutes), one person remains at the table as the "host" and the others move on to other tables. As the participants change tables, they bring key ideas and themes to their new table; their new "host" shares key ideas and themes from the table's initial conversations.

 
After several rounds of conversation, a facilitator can initiate a whole group conversation, wherein "hosts" from the various tables share the ideas and insights of the entire group.
According to WorldCafe.com, "As a process, the World Café can evoke and make visible the collective intelligence of any group, thus increasing people's capacity for effective action in pursuit of common aims."

 

Conducting a successful Café Conversation is limited only by your imagination. Its format is flexible and adapts to many circumstances.  Experts suggest using the following guidelines, in combination, to foster collaborative dialogue, active engagement and constructive possibilities.

(1)   Set the context: "If you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there."  Clarity of the "what" and the "why" of your Café will set the foundation for success.

(2)   Create hospitable space:  As children, some of our most significant and memorable conversations were at the kitchen table. Creating a space that is warm, inviting and comfortable is easy and inexpensive. Last but not least, a hospitable space is "safe" where everyone feels free to participate.

 

(3)   Explore the questions that matter: Powerful questions that have relevance to the group's concerns will generate interest, energy, knowledge and insight. Powerful questions:

     Are simple and clear

     Are thought provoking
     Generate energy
     Focus inquiry
     Surface assumptions
     Open new possibilities
     Invite deeper reflection
     Seek what is useful

(4)   Encourage everyone's contribution: When a topic is important to them, people want to participate in the conversation. It's important to acknowledge differences and provide opportunities for involvement. Sample methods include Post-its anonymously stuck to flipcharts or using a Talking Object (i.e., an object that is passed to whomever has the floor; if you aren't holding the object, you must actively listen). Both approaches can help encourage input from thinkers to dreamers.

(5)   Connect Diverse Perspectives: Small round tables encourage conversation.  It's important to establish a process that shakes things up a bit. A series of discussion rounds where participants meet different people will facilitate a cross-pollination of ideas.

(6)   Listen for Insights: We all know the value of listening. The quality of listening will determine the success of your Café. Café conversations invite each person to express themselves authentically, and those who listen skillfully are able to easily build on what is being shared.

(7)   Share collective discoveries: Once rounds are completed, the time spent discussing the "emerging voice" or patterns will help the group focus on the essence of their work.
The World Café is proving to be an effective, growing global community of people, groups, organizations, and networks using World Café principles and processes to evoke collective intelligence and link it to effective action in pursuit of common goals.

 

Hopefully, you are already involved with World Cafes and enjoying the outcomes. If not, maybe you will be the innovator who introduces the concept to your company! Let us know if you need a facilitator.