email #1 conscious tradeoffs aka decisions
This blog is the first email I sent to my newsletter subscribers on January 17th, 2023. I plan to release a lot of my emails as blogs a few weeks after sending to subscribers. So if you don’t want your inbox cluttered, feel free to check back here for future newsletters.
january 17, 2023: conscious tradeoffs
Thanks again for signing up for my biweekly newsletter. I’m thinking a lot about tradeoffs to start 2023 – let’s jump right in.
“The disregard of tradeoffs and opportunity costs play out again. We try to do everything and end up accomplishing nothing,” an excerpt from Tradeoffs: The Currency of Decision-Making. Last year I found out the hard way that learning involves a tradeoff between time, money, and risk.
leadership [plus biz + healthcare]
My mantra for 2023 is “kindness and clarity.” Do your best to set clear expectations and communicate with kindness. What does this have to do with tradeoffs? Well, any time you’re growing or changing, the organization’s expectations and goals have to shift. Here are a few of the changes I’m thinking about:
Layoffs + opportunities: Mindpath Health, one of the Southeast's largest behavioral health providers, recently announced significant layoffs, including cuts to their addictions and TMS programs. We at Advaita Integrated Medicine and Green Hill Recovery are in a position to absorb providers, patients, and administrative staff from Mindpath – or are we? Margin of safety is the name of the game for me. It sounds like Mindpath struggled mightly with the same revenue cycle management issues that plagued us last year, just at a 1000x larger scale. Just because an opportunity presents itself doesn’t mean we should take it. What hidden costs are there? Would seizing this opportunity overburden our existing infrastructure? Am I willing to trade stability for growth (again)?
State Health Plan (SHP): After forty-four years, Blue Cross Blue Shield North Carolina (BCNC) lost the contract to provide state employees with health insurance to Aetna. A few thoughts and questions I’m pondering regarding this decision. (1) Will Aetna be able to build out a network across NC by 2025? (2) Will Aetna match the rates BCNC paid to providers for the SHP? (3) Will Aetna have to change its behavioral health reimbursement rates to build a sufficient network? (4) If BCNC loses the SHP contract, what will happen to its reimbursement rates? The legislature has stressed the need for transparency in the contracting process between NC and the insurance companies bidding for the SHP. However, this is only half of the story. The legislature should mandate contract transparency from insurance companies to provider organizations.
life
In our society, women, more often men, face tradeoffs between professional pursuits and family life. Maybe it’s biology, perhaps it’s cultural conditioning, and likely it’s a combination. Going through the Fair Play Life cards with my wife was an eye-opening experience. Now I’m more conscious about who is trading time, money, and external pursuits to have a well-functioning household.
contemplative path
If you walk along the contemplative path for long enough, you’ll discover that there’s a big difference between self-improvement and self-realization, or awakening. The self-improvement project is one of relative progress – you seek to become more knowledgeable, improve your character, or increase your status relative to your former self. Self-realization, on the other hand, eventually dispels the notion that you are a separate entity. “You” realize that “you” aren’t who you thought you were to begin with. Lasting self-realization inherently must end the self-improvement project. It’s a bit heady, isn’t it? If realization interests you, read more here.
currently reading
The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel
The Almanack of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson
A Theory of Everything by Ken Wilber
currently writing
the good, the bad, and the ugly of private pay treatment: a candid look at the field of high-end mental health and substance use treatment (read the first post, the good stuff)
proposed mental health reforms: how smart regulations can increase the quality of behavioral healthcare
build in the open: why I’m (over) sharing professional trials and tribulations
Alrighty, well if you made it this far, I appreciate you sharing your time and attention with me. If you have any thoughts, questions, or feedback, send me an email at hello@trippj.com.
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