The fastest surgeon I have ever known moved his hands slowly.

A two-time Olympic medalist rower coached me to slow down.

The most effective managers are often the ones who speak the least.

Let's learn what it means to say
"Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast." #ship30for30 When I was starting my surgical training in 1997, I already knew of the biggest tour-de-force for a general surgeon.

It's a Whipple procedure, an extensive and difficult surgery typically performed for cancer of the pancreas.

It’s a massive procedure which few surgeons perform.

About 15 years ago I performed a routine surgery which harmed my patient. The problem manifested later, they required additional surgery, and I was sued for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Instead of being scared of performing that same surgery, I relish it. I recently learned that this viewpoint is similar to the mindset evaluated by a Stanford psychologist and her colleagues who studied Navy SEAL candidates.

Their findings are completely opposite of the conventional wisdom towards stressful events.

In 1997, I was poorly prepared for the transition from med school to surgery residency.

I fell back upon a primitive approach of command and control in order to get my tasks done.

Here are tips from an FBI hostage negotiator which would have saved me years of pain. 1) FBI hostage negotiator Chris Voss says: “Life is negotiation” because
most interactions at work and home boil down to :

“I want.”

It was probably a decade or two until I realized that the approach I was using, "my way or the highway," was counterproductive and destructive.

In 1913, a Harvard Med physiologist had a hunch. Later, he would go on to invent the terms “Fight or flight response” and “hemostasis.”

And on the WWI battlefields in Europe he pioneered the treatment of shock.



But first he studied the urine of football players.
👇 So on this SuperBowl weekend, instead of sitting glued to our televisions, let’s look back to 1913.

There were many football matches played, but that year as in each year, only one was known as The Game.

Harvard-Yale

When I was in my 5 year surgery residency training, my Chairman shared with me the “Three A’s for success.”

Initially I was surprised with the sequence of the first A and the last A, but I eventually came to learn those qualities transcend all professions. #ship30for30 The 3 A’s needed for success in surgery are also the keys to succeed as a human being.



In order to achieve professional success, you're going to need to be available, affable, and able.