We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Vee Faye. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Vee below.
Vee , so great to have you on the platform and excited to have you share your wisdom with our community today. Communication skills often play a powerful role in our ability to be effective and so we’d love to hear about how you developed your communication skills.
So, a little back story on how I found my purpose at 3am on an adult psychiatric unit.
My mother worked at a psychiatric facility throughout my high school years and was diagnosed with cancer upon my graduation. Post diagnosis, while undergoing chemotherapy and radiation 5 days a week, her team members were so essential to her healing process. They came by often while I was working to keep her company, and donated all of their pto hours to cover her insurance cost almost the entirety of her time away from work and it was a really long time.
One day, my mom told me that she believed that I would do amazing as a tech at the hospital because I’ve always been good at talking to people during crisis situations and having hard conversations.
So, I figured I’d give it a try.
I applied, got hired, and went through a quick orientation that consisted of mostly physical restraint training.
My first shift was a night shift that began at 7pm. I wait in my car until I see someone else in scrubs and walk in with them. The guy asks if it’s my first night and I confirm that it is. He says, “ well, it’s my first night back. I’ve been out because a patient gave me a concussion.” Okay. The elevator we took up to the unit opens and as we get off of it, a patient hiding behind the wall to the right of the elevator hops onto the elevator. The staff member that I rode up with curses and states that he forgot that we were supposed be to stand in front of the elevator until the doors closed.
So, here we are, begging a patient to come off of the elevator that doesn’t want to be in the psych unit to begin with.
We eventually persuade him off of the elevator but that was just the beginning of my eventful first shift.
The shift ended with 11 code 10’s which was a code communicating that staff intervention was necessary due to a patient harming themselves or others. That night physical intervention was applied for every code called.
During those codes, I listened to every word that was said. There were so many instances where I felt like the wording not only didn’t help but may have aggravated things. That was when I began to create a list of responses that were fail proof whether someone was coherent or not. Respect feels good whether you’re experience a psychiatric crisis or not.
I took the handbook that we were provided during orientation and created my own training that branched off of it because the only thing it was missing was the “real life” examples. The verbal tools that we could use over and over and would get us to a solution with each patient was missing. So, that is what I created.
By the end of my time with that employer, I had been promoted to verbal de-escalation trainer, crisis intervention lead with three others, and had started the trend of challenging our teams to see how many days we could make it through solving each crisis with just our words, no physical intervention. Excluding involuntary patients, who were often brought in in handcuffs, we were able to make it past 30 days without physical intervention and that was huge for me. I know that it was not all my doing, but for the “see something, say something” habit to lead to such a drastic change was monumental.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
I am ADHD personified and I live a very “flowy” lifestyle, if you will. I have one social media management client that I gather content for. So, I am a photographer, a drone operator, and social media strategist for that client. I love being able to apply my creative vision to every part of the process. It’s rare that you get to do that in the business when you’re creating for someone else’s brand.
I also, have a screenprinting business that I’ve recently doubled down on. In that business, I print for a couple of larger clients consistently but will soon hire and take that business to the next level.
In addition to those two endeavors, I also own a private paint and sip studio, named The Scene DTX located in the Design District of Dallas,Texas.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
The three most impactful qualities that I believe has impacted my journey was the constant desire to be better, the desire to learn, and remembering the importance of making those I engage with feel respected and appreciated.
Process intervention is so important because you don’t always have the privilege to hear your criticisms. So, you have to be able to look at things and say, “ this isn’t working as well as it could, this could be a better experience for the client, this is notttt giving top tier.” Then, you fix it… and you fix it again.
As long as you appear to want to learn, someone will want to teach you. Respect and appreciation definitely plays a role in this as well.
Okay, so before we go we always love to ask if you are looking for folks to partner or collaborate with?
I would love to collaborate with the other multifaceted dreamers. I have space, tools, skills, creativity and vision.
The easiest way to reach me is via phone, whether it be text or call (940)441-7494. I’ve been on a social media cleanse of my own pages (go figure) but an email will do as well. [email protected]
Contact Info:
- Website: Thescenedtx.com
Image Credits
Captured by my fiancé, Liz McPeters.
