Meet Rebecca Maidansky

We were lucky to catch up with Rebecca Maidansky recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Rebecca, thank you so much for opening up with us about some important, but sometimes personal topics. One that really matters to us is overcoming Imposter Syndrome because we’ve seen how so many people are held back in life because of this and so we’d really appreciate hearing about how you overcame Imposter Syndrome.
Is this something people overcome? Just kidding… kind of.

Imposter syndrome is something I’ve battled with since well before I knew there was a name for what I was feeling. When I first started Lady Bird Physical Therapy, I remember thinking that this couldn’t possibly work because I didn’t have the skillset to make it work. I knew that there was a huge need for pelvic floor PT and I knew that providing this service would allow me to significantly improve my patients’ quality of life. I even believed that I was quite good at what I did and could serve my patients exceptionally well. I just didn’t think that I could build a business around this service. I actually told my husband that all I needed was 6 months to watch it fail and then I’d move on and get a “real” job.

Two years, 3 office spaces, 4 hires and hundreds of patient later, he reminded me about the time I told him that I needed 6 months to fail. And in that moment, I chuckled but I remember thinking that I was still waiting for the ship to sink.

It wasn’t until a year or so later that I was talking to a friend about what success and failure look like. She was asking me if I really believed that Lady Bird PT could still fail. Initially my answer was yes but then she said something that sat in my head like a grain of sand and slowly started shifting my perspective. She said that even if the business had to close today, we still spent the last three years helping thousands of people in Central Texas feel confident in their bodies and empowering people worldwide via free education about pelvic health.

I wish I could say that conversation was my aha moment. It wasn’t. But I thought about her perspective for months. I realized my imposter syndrome was wrapped up in the fear of failure but that when I stopped to consider what failure meant, I no longer really believed Lady Bird PT could end up a failure.

Since shifting my focus to everyone we’ve been able to help throughout our 4 and a half year journey instead of what could happen 5 or 10 years from now, I’ve been able to shed some of the fear associated with imposter syndrome. I still struggle with the knowledge that there are folks out there that know more than me, that are better at creating front office systems or managing team dynamics. But I’ve been able to take a step back and see that I have a happy team who take amazing care of our patients and that no matter what, there’s no way Lady Bird PT could lose because we’ve already won.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
I’m a pelvic floor physical therapist, the digital media editor for the Journal of Women’s and Pelvic Health and the founder of Lady Bird Physical Therapy. Lady Bird PT is a pelvic floor practice located in Austin, TX that specializes in reproductive health and pelvic pain. We help people navigate infertility, pregnancy, birth preparation and postpartum recovery.

Our team is passionate about providing the best pelvic health care available. We maximize the time we spend one on one with our patients and block time every week to get together as a team in order to discuss difficult clinical cases, review journal articles or attend continuing education seminars.

We strive to create a space that’s welcoming, nonjudgemental and inclusive while offering personally tailored, evidence based care. We want our patients to leave each session with their PT feeling empowered and confident in their ability to to navigate this stage of life, heal and return to all the activities they love to do.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
Here are three things that have changed my life over the course of the last few years as I’ve navigated business ownership.

1. A willingness to reach out for help. I can’t overstate this enough. No one does anything on their own and reaching out for help has saved me from countless mistakes and sleepless nights.

2. Surrounding myself with people who are more experienced than I am. This is directly related to my first point, but surrounding myself with folks who have more experience than me in various walks of life and career has been game changing. I used to think this had to mean surrounding myself by people in my own field who have done what I was trying to do, but this could be anyone.

3. Accepting that sometimes, 80% is good enough. I used to place way too much weight on perfectionism. I thought it was important for everything to be beautiful before I could share it. Now I know that in most cases, 80% truly is good enough. This let’s me complete tasks and move on to focus on more important issues that truly require my attention.

As we end our chat, is there a book you can leave people with that’s been meaningful to you and your development?
I cannot recommend Radical Candor by Kim Scott enough for anyone who manages people. Building and supporting a team that felt valued and respected was one of my top priorities when Lady Bird PT was growing, but at the time that I started hiring I had only had one boss in a professional setting. I hadn’t had a chance to develop my management style and I was so worried about making mistakes that harmed my team as a new manager.

Radical Candor was the first management book that I read that felt intuitive. Kim Scott’s perspective on management is human centered and focuses on direct, honest and kind communication using a format that feels realistic in a work place. I can’t recommend this book enough!

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