Have You Really Found Your Why? Purpose, Wellness & Retention - Adventures in Advising

Ready to swap burnout for a brighter why? Matt and Ryan welcome back Dr. Ashley Thomas from the NACADA Executive Office. Ashley opens up about discovering your purpose, using stories to find your “why,” and how aligning it with your advising work can boost wellness, deepen student relationships, and even curb turnover. Expect goosebumps, practical tips, and a whole lot of heart. 

In this episode, you’ll hear:

• How a conference session and Simon Sinek’s framework sparked Ashley’s purpose journey.
• Why narrative inquiry reveals the themes that really drive you.
• Concrete steps to craft your purpose
• The hidden costs of advisor turnover and how purpose helps people stay.
• Simple ways supervisors can build purpose check-ins

If you’re an advisor, a supervisor, or just someone who wants work to feel more you, hit play and get inspired to live and advise on purpose.

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Transcript

Matt Markin  
Hey, and welcome back to another episode of the Adventures in Advising podcast. This is Matt Markin and my co host Ryan Scheckel might be joining us on this one, we will see. But we're bringing back a previous guest to the podcast, and that is Dr. Ashley Thomas from the NACADA Executive Office. Ashley was the last on Episode 131 with Dr. Lisa Rubin titled Ethical Issues and Academic Advising: Behind the Book. Ashley, welcome back.

Ashley Thomas  
Thanks, Matt. It's good to see you again, my friend.

Matt Markin  
Yeah. Good to see you too, and you know, so Ashley, this time around, you're back to have a chat with us about a topic that's near and dear to you, and that's discovering your why and how an individual's purpose can align with their life and their work and academic advising. So ready to dive in?

Ashley Thomas  
I am, I am. This is my heart, my passion. So I'm super excited to to chat with you today about this.

Matt Markin  
I guess the first question really is going to be, tell us about how this, you know, came about, this being like your passion?

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah. So back in 2018 I actually, before I had joined the NACADA Executive Office, I attended the annual conference in Phoenix, and during that conference, I guess I didn't realize that. I didn't know what my purpose was at the time, which is pretty common. But I attended a session at that conference where the the presenters talked about kind of this idea of purpose and alignment with your work and those types of things. And they walked everybody. So at the very beginning, they asked, you know, what if people were to ask you what your why was, or what your purpose was, what would you say? And so they said, write that down. And then they walked us through this framework that Simon Sinek has put together called finding your why. And at the end of that, we had a, not a super deep, you know, because only an hour session, but we had a deeper statement that really kind of encompass what was the most important thing to us. And I just remember thinking, wow, this is completely life changing, like I finally understand, kind of, it gave me so much insight into my own life, right? Like, why I was passionate about academic advising, but then even into, like, my relationship with my husband, why I parent my kids the way that I do, like I had so much more understanding of myself and my passions and and those types of things. So, um, so that was kind of the spark, right? And then I started wondering, well, if, if it's so insightful for me, what if we were able to help advisors understand the alignment between their own individual purpose and the work that they do, because we know that advisors stick around despite being often underpaid, under, underrepresented or recognized, misunderstood, those types of things. They still people who are passionate about this profession still continue to stick around. And so there's got to be something going on there, right? And so I started wondering about that, and if we could bring awareness to people's individual purpose and how that aligns with their work and advising, could we maybe get them to stay because there there was a significant amount of turnover in the advising profession before the pandemic, and then the pandemic obviously escalated. It right with this idea of the great resignation and so, so that's kind of the the premise behind, or the foundation, that kind of kicked off my passion for this, this research, you know.

Matt Markin  
You're talking about the great resignation and and, like, for a few years, a lot of topics related to the great resignation was like the wellness of academic advisors, the wellness of staff, but it almost seemed like the wellness part was, when it was discussed, it was kind of almost like very superficial level. But for you, it's kind of really diving in more into what that wellness is?

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah, absolutely, because there's, there's a lot of research out there that shows that there are positive implications if you understand or have awareness of your of your purpose, right? And so things like, if people understand their purpose, they tend to eat healthier, they tend to exercise more, like all of these physical and then when we think about mental and cognitive types of benefits, there's actually studies out there that show people who understand their purpose have more cognitive longevity. You know, illnesses like dementia and those types of things tend to be held off a little bit when you and so those are pretty sick. Significant, right? And that. But then when we look at the research, there was a significant gap in just literature out there about purpose in life and higher education. And so we know that people are often very passionate about what they do in higher education, but there this, you know that why doesn't wasn't necessarily there. There had been some research studies done on professions like priests, which, given that purpose, the the idea of purpose in life is founded in theology. That's a that's a that makes kind of sense, right? But then there was another study that had looked at social workers, but there was nothing in higher ed at the time that I did my research, so I really wanted to dive into, does purpose in life have anything to do with why advisors stick around?

Matt Markin  
So, now I am curious with I probably might already know the answer, but just so you could kind of explain it, what made you use a narrative inquiry when you were doing your research?

Ashley Thomas  
That's a great question. So narrative inquiry really focuses on stories, right, how? And it can be used as both a methodology, so just kind of the, really, the foundational work, you know, kind of the the lens that we look through, or it can be used as a method. I use narrative inquiries and method, and so I really focused on people's stories to help uncover and bring awareness to their their purpose. And there's a lot of research out there that shows you know, if we can look at our life stories, we can really start to think about what, what our deep seated values are, what our beliefs are. And what's really interesting is when you do that, when you look at your timeline of stories, it actually boils down, like the things that make those stories in our life meaningful boil down to like two or three themes. And so those then give us insight into actually, what our our purpose is. And so narrative inquiries just naturally fit, because it does focus on stories, right? Really bringing out the story is the data. And so it was just a natural fit to use narrative inquiry and and bring that along for along for the ride. So it worked. 

Matt Markin  
Hey, Ryan, is it working now?

Ryan Scheckel  
I don't know. Do I sound alright?

Matt Markin  
You do. You sound perfect?

Ryan Scheckel  
Well, I don't feel perfect, but I appreciate your patience with me and and letting me jump in here, despite the technical difficulties, one of the things that I was interested in looking at your dissertation, and I don't know how much you talked about the process and all that kind of stuff, but one of the things that I found interesting when any time you look At any type of inquiry published, especially and you see the structure of it, I understand the alignment of narrative inquiry and this concept of somebody's purpose in life, especially given Simonson next work around why And the way he approaches it, so I am familiar with the dissertation and the structure of it, and sort of the method, methodology of it, and in particular, really fascinated by its application to understanding what it's like to be an academic advisor.

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah, I appreciate that. First of all, I appreciate that you read it. I don't even think my family members have read it, but it, but I appreciate that. But yeah, yeah, it was, it was really just a natural fit. We all know and love Peter Higgin, and he was really instrumental and kind of making this connection between narrative, you know, narrative inquiry and academic advising. And so I got to have a lot of great conversations with him about this, and so that was really helpful. And kind of honing in what power was going to use that methodology.

Matt Markin  
It's funny, like, when you share with family and friends, and usually it's like, Oh, that's great. And then here, here it is, if you want to read it. Maybe, what if I have time,

Ashley Thomas  
Right? Which is never.

Matt Markin  
I just got busy. I plan to still on my list.

Ryan Scheckel  
Well, one of the things that I was curious about was the section on the cost of advisor turnover as an administrator myself, I think there's a real, lived experience which might be considered anecdotal. And so I wonder if you could share a little bit about looking into those ways of understanding turnover, burnout and the effects of, let's say, somebody not really living out their purpose.

Ashley Thomas  
Absolutely. Yeah, that's a great question. So like, you know, there's, there's some literature out there that we all know that there's kind of these, there's different types of costs that come with, you know, advisors turning over, right? And so we think about the hard costs, which are typically about 40% of of an of the cost that's associated with somebody leaving the organization. And so when we talk about hard costs, those are actual dollars that we lose in the process, but the other 60% is actually soft costs, or indirect costs. And so those are things like the time that it takes to recruit, hire and onboard, you know, a new employee, the time that you're taking away from other employees and their jobs to participate in that process, the lack of institutional knowledge that is leaving, or the, you know, the institutional or organizational knowledge that's leaving without employee who, who has decided to left the organization, leave the organization, And so, um, you know, there's, there's significant cost from from the organizational standpoint. But then when we think about the students and the impact on them, I know when I was an academic advisor, the number of students when I started at each of the institutions that I advised at, they had been through multiple advisors before they got to me, and when we think about the NACADA Core Competencies, the relational aspect. So that relationship between the advisor and the student is one of the most foundational pieces of advising in the profession. And so when you have an advisor that a student has built trust with and built rapport with, and they have that relationship when they leave it's broken, and they have to rebuild that with somebody else, which takes time and trust building and all of those things. And so it's not just at an organizational level that there's cost. There's Student Success costs there as well. And so yeah, it's when we think about trying to align, align people's purpose in life with their work in academic advising, both Simon Sinek and other authors have found that when people understand their why, or they understand their purpose in life, they are more satisfied in their jobs. They are go home happier there, you know, all of these things. And then there's one really significant study out there that looked at a significant population in Mexico and found that when people understood the alignment between their purpose in life and work, they actually their turnover intention was significantly different, like less. And so when we put all of that together, there's definitely indications that we should be looking at this for academic advisors. And you will have some people that are there, they're just going to leave, right? I'm at Kansas State University. We have a fourth that's very close to us. And so we have a natural turnover with the military, right? Because they're constantly moving. And so there's going to be people that that that are going to leave, regardless of what you do, but the people that want to stay, when we look at trying to align their purpose with the work that they do, there's significant indicators that say that this is a, this is a way to do that. And so I think it's important.

Matt Markin  
And so, I mean, there might be someone listening to right now that might be like that. All sounds great, but how can I do that? So I guess, what's your advice? What are ways that, let's say, academic advisors, can maybe discover and clarify that their purpose and alignment?

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah, I think that the first thing is going back to those stories, right? And thinking about those narratives, looking at a timeline of of your life and what and this is what I did with my participants in my study. I asked them, just like Simon's framework, I asked them to come up with a timeline of stories that were meaningful to them. The key piece being meaningful. They didn't know how. A lot of times, when we think of things that are meaningful, we want to add logic to that, right? And so I made it very clear with people, don't, don't add logic. Just if you've got memories that stand out to you, put those down. That's what I want to know. Don't think about it. It's a gut feeling. And so make that timeline of stories, and then one of the other key pieces to it was finding what I call an unbiased partner, so somebody that doesn't know your stories, because Matt, if you and I are best friends, then you probably know most of my stories, and you're going to, you're going to fill in gaps that that I wouldn't necessarily say, right? And so having somebody that is unbiased, that doesn't necessarily know you super well, allows them to just listen to the stories that, that, that you are telling them. And so their job and they don't. Have to be an expert. There's nothing really, you know, no requirements for that unbiased partner other than to sit and listen with an open mind. And their job is to come up with like, help you identify, not come up with because you you're the expert in your life, but help you identify what those themes are that resonate through all of those stories. And like I said earlier, it usually boils down to two or three, which is kind of mind blowing, but those two or three themes are then what actually give us insight into what is is most deeply meaningful to us, those values, those beliefs that we hold. And then what I love about Simon's framework is that he makes you put it into one concise sentence. So when we think about our purpose, a lot of people want to say, well, you know, it's this paragraph. No, it's one concise sentence, and it really forces you to boil down to what is actually really deeply meaningful to you. So that's my challenge to academic advisors. My empowering like empower you to do that work and be intentional about it, because it is pretty eye opening.

Ryan Scheckel  
So for the participants in your study, how did they describe the alignment between their purpose and the work that they were doing in academic advising?

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah, each of them were a little bit different, right? Our purpose is very unique to us, because there's only one of us ever. So when they would talk about their purpose, it was very much they started to understand that things that had happened in their lives that kind of shaped who they were. They then wanted to kind of extend that to other people. So for instance, I had one. One of my participants was incredibly she was amazing. She was a middle aged African American woman had had a significant amount of trauma in her life, and she walked through this exercise and had always looked at her past with kind of this regret, like this regret, like because of the amount of trauma that she had. You know, it was always looking back at her memories and her experiences with a negative lens, right? But by looking at it in this way. How did it shape you? How did it, how does, how does that help you interact in the world? She started to see that she was creating spaces for people that she didn't have before. So one of her most meaningful experiences was that she walked into a classroom and the instructor told her and the entire class, this is a safe space. And that stood out in her mind, because in her life, she had not had many safe spaces, and so she turned that and that was part of her purpose, and the way that she worked with students, and the things that she did outside of even higher education, she was very passionate about creating safe spaces where people could live authentically and be their true selves, because she didn't have that. And so every single one of my participants had something like that. And what was really powerful about her, because we were able to look back at her experiences with that lens. She sat there for a little bit, just kind of in silence, and she said, I have never been able to say that. I'm proud of myself, but I'm proud of myself now, because look at what I came through, and now look at what I create for other people. So it's incredibly powerful. And every single one of them had something like that. It was, you know, these deep seated values and beliefs that they had truly related back to their own experiences, whether positive or negative, in their lives.

Matt Markin  
A powerful story. And I can imagine that this, in a way, can maybe help contribute to, maybe their own resiliency, maybe the way they influence how they interact with like their students and staff supervisors?

Ashley Thomas  
Yes, 100% they a lot of them, once we came up with that very concise statement, that very clear purpose statement that just really hit him in the heart, right? They were able to, I had, I had several of them say, I'm going to write this down or put it I had one of the advisors tell me that she had something made where it was then posted in her office, where students could see it, and so they could understand what was actually the most important thing to her when they walked, when, when they walked into her office. So it was empowering for for her to to display that, but then also to look at that in those really difficult times, right, when we're doing 30 minute appointments, back to back to back for days on end, right? And you, you feel like you're and. Answering the same question for the 1,000th time, right? Or you've got that one student that just doesn't seem it just doesn't click, right? Something just doesn't click. And so in those really difficult moments, whether it's with a student, whether it's with a team member, whether it's with an institutional policy that you don't necessarily agree with, they were able to look back at that concise purpose statement and say, This is why I do what I do every day. This is why I'm passionate about what I do. And so yes, it created this resiliency, and this this grounding, almost of, you know, in those really difficult times. But they also were able to use it in ways that I wasn't necessarily expecting. They they really were able to look at that purpose statement and consider their their job and whether or not their current job aligned with that. And some of them said, yes, yeah, but I'm actually I'm absolutely doing what I should. And some of them were like, um, this. I'm not doing anything that aligns with that. So in those moments, it was actually really interesting. People were like, oh, no, what do I do now? No, I should follow my own advice, but I don't even know where to start. And so we would kind of start having some of those conversations, and that's where we get into, like, life coaching and stuff like that, right? But, yeah, so it was kind of this, like revelation of, holy crap, no, I have to do this thing. I don't know what to do, right?

Ryan Scheckel  
Whether the time that we spend, you know, diving into any of these concepts, to the extent that you have to for a dissertation, there are definitely ways of thinking about it that come out, that might be fond of misconceptions or misunderstandings, and other than how we often want to explain our life's perfect purpose, and like novel format, not as simply as whatever. Were there other misconceptions or misunderstandings that somebody might have when they think about their life's purpose?

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah, I think there's two that immediately come to mind, one I kind of had already alluded to, like, when you think about your purpose, sometimes it's not necessarily all sunshine and rainbows, right? Sometimes it's sometimes our purpose reveals itself in our darkest moments. And so, um, it was interesting when people would be like, I'm so sorry, this is not a happy story. And I'm like, No, that's actually that's means you're engaging with the process. That's what you should be doing. But the other misconception that people often have when you ask them what their purpose is, nine times out of 10, they will talk about their how or their what. And so when I did this exercise, back at that 2018 annual conference, especially people in helping professions tend to go to. Well, I like helping people right, that is our how or our what, it's not our why. And so it really takes deep internal reflection to get to that why. So that's one of the misconceptions when we think about purpose, is that it's it's deeper than what we typically think, right, it's, it's not just helping people. Helping people is the way that you live out your your purpose. There's something deeper there so that, that, I think, is the biggest misconception about purpose. We often think about the what or the how, not necessarily the individual why.

Matt Markin  
Yeah, I could see people listening to this going like, I think our advising unit or advising team should have, like, a workshop on this. And, you know, because, yeah, I mean, there's definitely those misconceptions that you're talking about. And I guess it kind of leading into the next question. It could be, what steps can a supervisor or institution level, like, what can be done to support, for a supervisor, to support their advisors, or for an institution to support their their advisors?

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah, that's, that's a great question, and that really was the crux of, like, looking into this, right? My, my first piece of advice is, it really starts with intentional time, right? So giving advisors the space and the time to really reflect, whether it's through having trainings, or whether it's, you know, having them pair up, you know, within a team, or something like that, and going through an exercise like this, so they can start uncovering what that what that purpose is, and understanding what the alignment is between their their purpose and the work that they do every day as an as an administrator, I mean, I think it would be really powerful to have some of these conversations with individual team members. If I was an administrator or a supervisor of advisors, I would, I would be doing that in my. Individual one on ones. It may not be a full on, like there's other things we're going to have to decide to discuss in the hour right when I'm connecting with my with my staff, but a quick check in not only gives them that intentional time and reminds them of grounding themselves in the in in their purpose and the work that they do, but also shows them that you deeply care about them as the individual, right? We spend a lot of time focusing on our students, which is what we're there to do, but when we talk about well being we we have to really focus on those advisors as well, and what they're doing in their day to day job. That's that's meaningful to them. The other thing that I think is really powerful in this is seeing what advisors are doing. And, you know, many advisors do a lot of different projects and things outside of just their work with students. They may be in charge of orientation, they may work with athletes. They may, you know, all of these things be on committees and things like that that are outside of the outside of the unit, intentionally asking them, what of those projects aligns with what you're most passionate about, what or or your purpose? What? What about these projects deeply, is deeply meaningful to you and and allowing them the space to do, to engage in those projects, or find those projects, or, you know, come up with things that they, you know, be innovative, be entrepreneurial, be those things. I know, there's not a lot of space and time for that sometimes, but sometimes just that, little like I said, that genuine care, or allowing them to to engage in that work is is impactful.

Ryan Scheckel  
So we've shared a couple of things about the journey the incorporating these concepts into our understandings of academic advising and and what it's like to be an advisor. But was there anything that surprised you, that you found as you move through this, whether it's somebody deciding maybe the job they're in right now isn't fitting their purpose, or whatever, is there anything else that you found noteworthy or unexpected?

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah, that's I love that question, because there were, there were a couple of things that I think, and I kind of touched on a couple of them, like people's feeling like they needed to apologize for their purpose, or, you know, their stories that they had that was really like, I that's not something I was expecting. Because for me, you know, stories are just, they're just our stories. But this, I think there's such a strong concern for how people are going to view us, that it was difficult for them to bring out some of those difficult stories. And there were, there were people that got very emotional through this process, but that was something that was so critical. That's one of the things that I one of my findings emotions were so critical in this process, because in order to understand the meaningfulness behind a particular story or a particular experience, they had to reconnect with the feelings that they felt in that process or in that experience. So we would talk about not only those feelings in that, in that that they felt at the time, but now looking back, how did, what were the feelings that they felt now? And so that was one thing, you know, just kind of this, these, these really deep feelings that came out, and the need to apologize for those feelings and those experiences. But then kind of the other thing that, and you kind of alluded to Ryan, was this like, Oh my gosh. Now, what do I do? Moment, right? Almost all of my participants had that. And so they would begin to look at their particular job and say, This doesn't align. And so now, now I feel stuck and so, or, How do I create something in this current job, if I can't move roles, how do I create something in this particular job that is going to be meaningful to me and so, so there was a lot of realization and a lot of insight that came From this experience that that they had never thought about before, which was, which was pretty, pretty amazing to witness.

Matt Markin  
Would you say, like, let's say an advisor kind of goes through some of these practical tips and advice that that that you've given in this interview. Would you advise them to kind of, every so often, revisit what they originally put as their purpose>

Ashley Thomas  
That's a great question, yes, because one of the things that I learned in this process is, you know, our our brains are so smart, but there, there's pieces of them that don't necessarily work together really well. Two of the pieces of our brain. That don't work together are the feeling part of our brain and the speaking part of our brain. They don't connect. And so when we say something that we have like a gut feeling, right? It's not our gut that's feeling anything. It's our brain trying to connect those two pieces. And so over the years, over the past six years, even with my individual purpose, we're constantly looking for a better word, right? We're when we think about that really concise statement that reflects our individual purpose. There's different words that just hit harder in the heart than than others. And so as you think about your purpose, it will constantly refine. And so mine started out pretty surface level, and over the years, in talk and having these conversations with people, or even doing this work with with my participants or with other individuals, through my through my coaching, they will say a word and I'm like, Oh my gosh, that's exactly the word that I need for my own purpose, right? So yes, I think there's a ton of value in going back and looking at the words that you're using. What are the words that better align with how you actually feel? Because when you hit those words, when you find those words, it is literally like hitting you in the heart and like, almost gives you a goose bump moment, right? Because it's like, yes, that's who I am, and that's who I want to be. So that's, yes, it's it's a constant vision process, for sure.

Ryan Scheckel  
Well, we all know the benefit of reflective practice, as well as advisors spending time thinking through not only our own experiences and how they shape our sense of purpose, but what we've learned from them and how they can affect and guide our interactions with students. I imagine there's some people who might be listening to this saying, I know some students who need this, and advisors are so, so quick to make application with their students, but I'm kind of curious what your thoughts are about taking these perspectives and maybe applying them in a more student centered approach?

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah, that's a great question, and something that I actually thought about and tried to do when I was an academic advisor, kind of starting out with this idea in mind. You know, when you think about a student that is just coming out of high school. They're 18 years old, these types of conversations are probably going to be a little more difficult, right? Because at that point in their life, yeah, they've had life experiences, some probably more than others, depending on their their background. But at this as an 18 year old, they're really just trying to figure out kind of college, right? They're just kind of navigating who they are and and how to get through the day with work and life and, you know, college and all of these things. And so you can have some of these conversations with those kind of more traditional students. I would venture to say they're probably not going to be as deep because of those factors, you know, survival first, right before deep, meaningful thoughts. But you can talk with them about kind of, some of these values and beliefs that they hold or or just starting that conversation, starting them reflecting on what, what is most important to you. And, you know, a lot of times at that age, they're probably going to say, well, I want to have a good paying job, or I want to, you know, okay, those are, those are kind of what and how, types of things. But what's the why behind that? Right, when we think about, kind of, our maybe older, non traditional students and and I would say that there are probably some some younger students that could do this as well, because everybody's very individual, they are going to be on a much deeper be able to reflect more deeply about their life and what their purpose is, and what they what they want out of of life, how they want to live. What does looking, you know, living authentically, look like for them? And so I did try and have this conversation with with a student that was kind of what I was talking about, that like 1819, year old, and she just kind of glazed over really fast. So I think that it really depends on the student is really individual, but I regardless of where they are in their kind of development, I think that it's it's easy, and it's important for us to start asking them to reflect on some of these things, because it can bring a tremendous amount of insight into, you know, who they want to be, what they want to be out of, you know, what they want to get out of life.

Matt Markin  
And as we wind down with the interview, you know one of the answers you had mentioned coaching, and we were curious to know, since the last time you were on the podcast, what's new?

Ashley Thomas  
Yeah. So I still am managing editor for NACADA. I love my work with NACADA. I get to work with people all over the world, but last month, I actually completed my first module of becoming a certified life and executive coach, and I launched my business that's elevana, coaching and consulting. I have some clients that I'm working with right now that we're trying to figure out what their purpose in life is. And then, once we get past that kind of what are their what are their energy blocks that are keeping them from living their their full, authentic self, confidently? And so I do that on an individual level. In the next month, I will actually be one of less than 50 people in the world that are certified by Simon Sinek as a y coach. And so I'm super excited about that. I'm actually going to get to meet Simon, which is going to be amazing. And so i i will be certified as a y coach towards the end of August, which I think this will already, you know, be coming out soon, and so, so, yeah, I'm, I love this work, and that's what my that's what my coaching business is.

Matt Markin  
So very cool. Well, actually, this is a fabulous interview, a lot of great tidbits, a lot of nuggets and information that I think listeners will gain from this, and congratulations on on the coach and having your clients already. Thank you so much for being on the podcast again.

Ashley Thomas  
I appreciate it, Matt, like I said, this is my passion and my heart. So I am I thank you for allowing me to come, come and visit about it.