John Yip: Leading with Empathy, Curiosity and Kindness
(Access show transcript) As the President and CEO of SE Health, John Yip taps into his personal values that were instilled by his family from a young age to help navigate his leadership journey.
Summary
John Yip and the team at SE Health are growing their social impact by bringing hope and happiness to different segments of society. As SE Health celebrates its 115-year anniversary, they’ve continued to stay true to their long legacy of service through leveraging powerful initiatives such as operating hospices for the homeless, investing in start-ups in the health space, running a technology company, and supporting communities across the country, including First Nations, Inuit, and Métis. Through these initiatives, SE Health keeps their vision strong by impacting how people live and age at home.
“It’s the combination of business and social mission that makes SE Health a perfect landing spot for me,” says John when explaining why his organization is so special to him.
In this exciting new episode, learn all about a few of SE Health’s main priorities and their balance between business and social impact, how being a first-generation Canadian helps shape John’s values, his practical tips for emerging leaders, how running triathlons positively impacts his life, and so much more!
Mentioned in this Episode
Transcript
Imagine you could step inside the minds of Canada's healthcare leaders, glimpse their greatest fears, strongest drivers, and what makes them tick. Welcome to Healthcare Change Makers, a podcast where we talk to leaders about the joys and challenges of driving change and working with partners to create the safest healthcare system.
Philip De Souza: Hey listeners, it's Philip.
Abi Sivakumar: And Abi.
Philip De Souza: Thank you for being a fan of our show Healthcare Change Makers, and of course, listening. It means the world to us.
Abi Sivakumar: Yeah, Philip. When we receive those thoughtful notes in our inbox, seeing how amazing guests offered up some valuable knowledge, it just reinforces the value of the hero community and what we can accomplish together.
Philip De Souza: You're absolutely right, Abi. Okay, Abi, before we get to the show, I think I'm going to switch it up and I'm going to put you on the spot. So I'm going to ask you, besides our fantastic guests from our show, what's been one or two things that have given you personally an aha moment over the past while?
Abi Sivakumar: Oh, I had no idea I'd be a guest on the show today. But if I had to narrow down a couple special moments, I'd have to say our AGM and conference that featured so many amazing talks to support a safer system. And second, it would have to be our hero cafe. For those of you not familiar, it's the hero version of a town hall, but better. This year, we had some great sessions. I really enjoyed the talk from Bruce Squires and I can't forget about the T-shirt competition. All the staff really got into that one.
Philip De Souza: Those are indeed some great examples, Abi. I would say ditto for me. And yeah, I learned so much from Bruce about children's health. And that T-shirt competition, it got the staff all happy and excited and it we'll definitely be sharing the winning T-shirts with our community. And speaking of sharing, I guess there's no harm in sharing a little plug about our HIROC LinkedIn channel. We've actually shared learnings about those two events there and of course, other stuff. So, besides hitting follow on our podcast, be sure to hit follow on our HIROC LinkedIn channel two. Okay, let's get to today's conversation, Abi. I know I always say this, but you are all indeed for a big treat today. We are chatting with John Yip. John is the President and CEO at SE Health. Our chat with him is far reaching. I don't think there's a topic we don't discuss.
Abi Sivakumar: We hear about his leadership journey, advice, and learnings that have stayed with him even to today, the positive impact that SE Health has in the healthcare ecosystem, his personal advice for emerging leaders, and we even hear about things that bring him joy outside of work. Like, did you know John has run a triathlon, or not to mention escape calamity? More on that later too.
Philip De Souza: Yes, Abi, we do have some good times chatting with John, and I think we've probably given away too much. So, let's get to it, everybody. Welcome, John, we're so delighted to have you on our show, Healthcare Change Makers Podcast. Thank you for joining us today.
John Yip: Pleasure to join. Thank you, Philip.
Philip De Souza: So John, tell our listeners a bit about yourself. How did you get to where you are today?
John Yip: Well, that's a loaded question. But maybe I'll start by saying it was unplanned and not in the works, so to speak, and as things would have it, it just kind of fell into place. And so people may not know this, but I have an undergraduate degree in marine biology.
Philip De Souza: Wow, that's interesting.
John Yip: And international development. So I did a concurrent degree and I thought I was going to be international marine lawyer working for a international organization like the UN or something like that. And somewhere along the line it changed, and I believe it was my fourth year project where I looked at the economic impact of the closure of the cod fishery in the Atlantic and the health of a seashore community. And so one would go, "Well, what's the connection with overfishing and the health of the community?" Well, guess what? No surprise, they're tied. And so when the government put a moratorium on the fishering industry, villages didn't have a form of employment. The younger members of the community left, the older members of the community stayed behind and were unemployed. There were higher prevalence of mental health issues, coronary heart failure. And so, you could see a direct correlation between the environment and health. And from there, instead of going to law school, I decided to go to the business school with a focus in health management at the DeGroote School of Business at McMaster University. And as they say, the rest is history.
Philip De Souza: Well, that does sound unplanned. That sounds actually quite interesting. Honestly, doing all our research, we didn't know that part.
John Yip: I know I'm trying to foil your research and provide new insights to this podcast to make it interesting and unplanned and unscripted like a reality audio podcast.
Philip De Souza: Well, you already got us, that's for sure. And so it sounds like you have a passion for community because you made a personal pivot in your life and did it become a lawyer and wanted to help and provide insight and do your own research, so to speak. And so, where did that drive come from for you to have that sense of a pivot?
John Yip: Yeah, I think it's again, unplanned and it's just things that interest me and the natural world. No, go figure. Marine biology, undergrad, the natural world people, humanity, the most basic things around human and social interaction really appealed to me. And so part of my business education, it was a co-op program, and my first co-op placement was at St. Michael's Hospital now Unity Health Toronto. And it's in the heart of downtown Toronto and it's in an area where it serves a lot of structurally vulnerable population.
As part of my internship, I helped create with the community medicine program, the out-of-the-cold program. And this program was a very simple concept that during cold winter months, the local church would open and hot meals and a place to stay were granted to those individuals that needed it to get out of the cold. Well, as a young naive student, I did several overnight shifts just to get a handle on people's stories, understanding like I said, humanity and why people ended up of the cold shelter.
And the stories that were shared with me were on one hand just heartbreaking, absolutely traumatic, absolutely a tragedy in the highest levels, but on the other hand also hugely inspirational. And that these individuals had a degree of hope and no one would be willing to take a chance on those individuals. And so with those experiences, I made it my personal calling to marry the elements of business and as well as the social elements. And we have a saying here at St. Elizabeth or SE Health is no margin, no mission. And so in order to achieve our social mission, you have to generate a positive financial margin. And so it makes it very interesting how to navigate that within a publicly funded healthcare system.
Philip De Souza: Very interesting. And then I can not only just hearing your voice, but you definitely lead with empathy and that story you gave about going overnight and actually immersing yourself to get a different lens of what others are going through, that's a great thing for a leader to do.
John Yip: Yeah, I think you can learn from the classroom, you can learn from your classmates, but I think the beauty of the co-op program at McMaster was being fully embedded in the program. And in this case, given where I was at, at St. Michael's Hospital, is really get embedded into programs to experience the creation of the program, how to fund it, how to implement it, and how to adjust it to better serve those individuals. And I think 30, it's almost 30 years now, I think the program's still running.
Philip De Souza: Wow, that's amazing. Because this is a leadership podcast, did you have any mentors along the way during your journey even at say, Mike's and of course you were at Kensington Health, and... Have you had any mentors that supported you and offered you advice that stuck with you?
John Yip: Many mentors from all walks of life. I've got this kitchen cabinet to this day where I call them up or hang out and grab coffee or drink or dinner every so often. Just really solicit objective, independent advice. There's no judgment with these individuals. And certainly, Malcolm Moffitt, who was my preceptor at St. Mike's, was a longtime mentor of mine and really showed me the ropes. I worked at KPMG, one of the consulting firms, and there was a managing partner there that was an expat from London, England, from the London office. They got transplanted to Toronto and he taught me how to write. He taught me how to present, he taught me how to engage with clients.
And he did it in a very short amount of time because he went back to England after three years. But we've stayed in touch over the years through the beauty of social media platforms that we can stay connected that way. Certainly my father, who was a longtime employee of IBM and introduced concepts of corporate culture and that era where he worked at IBM was very much a family oriented business, still is, but it was the IBM summer picnic or the Christmas parties, the IBM events that they held for families was eyeopening to me as a child. And it still resonates with me on how a large conglomerate like IBM can still be very much family oriented and how important it is to treat staff and all members of their family. So those are just some of the mentors that I've had along the way.
Philip De Souza: That's fantastic. And I know a lot of people look up to you, John. So what's one piece of advice you'd give to an emerging leader today in healthcare or in general?
John Yip: So, for young leaders today, I think there is an enormous pressure to perform and as a result, a lot of young leaders earn themselves. And so, the first piece of advice I would give is be yourself. Be your authentic self. Lead with empathy. Be kind. Be thoughtful. Don't worry about climb that corporate ladder, let it come to you or you create the ladder yourself and fill in the skills that you need to build in order to move through your own ladder, not someone else's ladder. And I think that way you can take control over what you need to build your skillset and competency to lead. And everyone has their own brand of how they lead, and it takes time to figure out what your personal brand is. And certainly took me a while to get there. And I think COVID was an era where before the pre-COVID area, I thought I had a leadership style, but I think going through COVID really solidified to me at least what type of leader I was and will continue to be.
Philip De Souza: That's a good point. A good crisis can definitely test our resolve and get to you on the track that you want to be on. I appreciate that and I love your advice about being yourself and leading with empathy. That's amazing. And so we haven't even asked you where you work today. So I know you work at SE Health, but why don't you tell our listeners a little bit about SE Health?
John Yip: Yeah, SE Health, it's formerly known as St. Elizabeth Healthcare. We're celebrating 115 years this year.
Philip De Souza: Wow, congratulations.
John Yip: It's a long history of legacy of service, and we were actually born out of St. Michael's Hospital, so full circle here. Four nurses took new mothers who couldn't afford nursing care and took care of their newborns and mom back at home. And that's how SE Health started. Today, we operate in four provinces or a national, not-for-profit, social enterprise. And we provide a range of services from home health to hospitals to retirement homes, assisted living, long-term care. And that's the core of our business where we service 22,000 Canadians every day.
Philip De Souza: Wow. Amazing.
John Yip: But as part of our portfolio of services, it extends beyond that. And this is where some of the social impact elements come to the forefront where we do operate a health career college, training healthcare aide and healthcare workers, personal support workers with no tuition. And this is largely to support communities, particularly indigenous communities, First Nations Inuit Metis, to build capacity in their own communities by giving them skills and training and then going back in their own communities and gaining employment and being a productive member of their community. We also operate two hospices for the homeless, one right beside St. Mike's and one in Windsor. And so, this is targeted to those individuals who are structurally vulnerable who don't need to die needlessly by a garbage can or under the bridge. And it's really unfortunate that in their last months of life that we were able to give them some dignity and die with dignity and have a good death.
And so part of those social elements needs to be offset by some of the business elements. So I mentioned our healthcare business, but we also have a technology company called FOAMed based out of Newfoundland that provides tele-triage service in three provinces as well as in 30 hospital networks and colleges in the United States. And we have a social impact venture fund that we've invested in early startups in the health space. And so some of them have been actually quite successful. And so, it's that combination of business and social mission that I mentioned earlier that makes SE Health a perfect landing spot for me. And I've been here just over two years now.
Philip De Souza: I love that how you talk about business and social mission and they can be together in harmony and especially with... You talked about the tech company and the startups. Those are very different. And some would say in healthcare having such a variety of work there together, how do they connect? And so I can see how they connect, but can you tell listeners, or for you and the team around you, do you learn from the other aspects of the business and implement learnings and other parts of the business?
John Yip: Yeah, I think we're in the middle of that transformation where we've been very opportunistic in pursuing particular lines of business in the traditional sense. So a very traditional corporate lingo there. And where we're moving to is exactly as you described. It is start to make these connections across the organization to bust down that silos and really aggregate the different services in different communities and to stack them in the way that provides even more value to the people we serve, particularly around governments. And we have a very strong advocacy for our client base around influencing policy, particularly in home care, but also in creating new segments. And so what I mean by that is in my previous role, I did run a long-term care home through COVID, and that experience taught me that our older adults deserve better. And so early on in my tenure at SE Health, there was a opportunity to acquire three small care homes just outside of Edmonton.
And these small care homes are effectively nursing homes, but these are homes that are in your backyard, they're in your neighborhood, they're not on a campus of care. They are fairly large homes that service 10 residents in a very intimate model of care that at least in our three homes, have demonstrated very, very good outcomes. And so part of our strategy then is, "Well, we also have a home care business is how do those things intersect?"
While we're hoping to build out a number of these small care homes in Alberta, the government of Alberta has been very progressive in thinking through alternatives to traditional long-term care, and particularly in rural areas where it's difficult to build and build quickly, long-term care homes. But building small care homes is a much cost effective, quicker way to do this in rural areas. And if you embed a home there, you can use that as a base to service the surrounding community with our home care business and then layer in what I call the technology dome of our technology company to provide a digital first access to the local community, but also virtual access to a physician who can oversee a cluster of these homes in rural or semi rural Alberta.
So right now, all those different service lines exist independently, but through an acquisition that we completed last year, we're able to create this service stack that is very unique and differentiated from your traditional model of care.
Philip De Souza: Oh, it's very unique. I wouldn't have heard of this type of model either. And so, since you've joined now at SE Health over the past two years, is there a project or initiative that's really brought joy to you that you're so proud of what the team has accomplished?
John Yip: Yeah, this existed prior to my arrival and I talked earlier about our health career college. So I have very few things that are set in my calendar, like there are standing items, senior team meetings and so on. But there's one thing that I've insisted that I intend. It's three or four times a year. It's the graduation ceremony from our career college and it's virtual because we have members spread across the country that take our college courses, like I said, mostly First Nations, Inuit, Metis, and the speeches of the valedictorian or how the college has changed their life trajectory to me, is absolutely inspirational. And it really hits home this idea of bringing hope and happiness and doing it in a way that can be life-changing for the individual, but also the communities that they live in.
Philip De Souza: Oh, it's amazing. I'm going to pass it over to Abi to ask you a few questions. Abi, take it over.
Abi Sivakumar: Hi, John. It's great to meet you. So, SE Health is continuing to grow their social impact in indigenous health, end of life care, and caregiver wellness and support. Why is this important to you and the team?
John Yip: We want to be able to bring hope and happiness to different segments of society. Certainly, our hospice for the Homeless Journey, Home Hospice does that. Our career college for First Nations, Inuit, Metis. And just funny enough, the email that I got just before logging onto this podcast recording is an initiative that we have launched for our staff is the ability to receive caregiver support themselves. And so the double caregiver duty, which is caregivers that provide care to clients, so our staff, may see maybe 10 or 12 individuals a day and they take care of their needs and then they go home and then they have to take care of a sick loved one when they get back home.
So their day never really ends and we don't think about supporting them. And so we just announced a new program where they can access a caregiver support counselor anytime they want, as much as they want in order to leave some of the pressures or have a sounding board that they can talk to or help seek other resources to manage their situation. And so these are the things that we are really investing in to ensure our staff who... Again, we have 8,000 staff that service 22,000 Canadians every year... Every day, sorry, is making sure we take care of our own.
Abi Sivakumar: I really appreciate that. SE Health is having a focus on these key areas that are so supportive and crucial to Canada's healthcare system. And we recently heard you speak and along with OHT event where you were on a panel about integrated care. One thing that caught our attention and that we really loved hearing about was your analogy about the dinner party. So can you tell listeners more about that? How'd you come up with that concept to connect to healthcare? And who would you invite to your dinner party, not to mention, what would you bring?
John Yip: Well, for the listeners that don't know what OHTs are or Ontario Health Teams, this is Ontario's version to regionalize the healthcare system to make it hyper-local so that local needs are addressed within the community catchment areas. Many of the Ontario health teams... There are 50 of them. Part of the beauty of what they've been able to do is bring people together and convene. And so the analogy is bringing people to the dinner table. But the challenge has been that who do you invite? What do you bring? What if you sit as someone that has a history with the individual? And so there's all these decisions that need to be made in order for OHT to thrive and deliver local care. But as people know, dinner parties take a lot of work and a lot of planning, set the menu and you got to make sure the invite list is accurate and people show up and show up on time.
Sure enough, someone spills the wine and you got to do cleaning up and will that ruin the carpet or not? And so these are the things that the analogy really speaks to some of the day-to-day events that happen within each of the 50 plus Ontario Health Teams. So if I were invited to one, and we are currently in 30 of them, who would I bring? I would bring a patient, I would bring their family, which has been done. And there are many patient advisors or patient representatives that sit at OHT tables and they just bring a lot of color to the conversation.
If you have a room full of providers, we'll talk provider talk, and that means full of acronyms and full of insider baseball, but you bring a patient and a caregiver, a family member, it becomes real. And I think that tangible experience helps shape and influence the direction of where these Ontario Health Teams would go. And I would bring... I was recently in Thunder Bay, they had this delicacy called Persian Donuts Icing. It's delicious. You look it up. So good. So, so good. And I would bring that too for dessert.
Abi Sivakumar: That sounds delicious. Well, thank you for explaining that great analogy. I feel like sometimes explaining things in a more unconventional way puts things into perspective even more. And on a different note, you recently completed the escape from Alcatraz Triathlon and you're set to complete the Ironman World Championship in New Zealand in December. So what got you into triathlons? How does this sport affect or improve your work and what's the importance of having hobbies and sports in your life both personally and professionally?
John Yip: Yeah, I've been a lifelong athlete as a child playing multiple sports, but really thriving in swimming. And I swam all the way through university and still continue to swim and at the same time, picked up running. I ran track as well, track and cross country. And so I got two of the three sports of a triathlon and there's a third sport. I picked up biking, but I've been a lifelong fan of a race that's going on right now, the tour of the frost. And so, combining swim, biking, and running, I've been doing since business school. That's where I joined the McMaster Triathlon Club and got hooked up with this community. And since then, I've done a dozen Ironman length events, a bunch of half Ironmans, and as you mentioned, a bucket list race in San Francisco, which is the escape from Alcatraz. They take you out on a ferry.
The race starts when you dive off the ferry into very cold, very, very cold water, wavy shark infested, massive currents for a two kilometer swim. And then a very, very hilly and technical bike course past Golden Gate Bridge and then a very, very terrain run, 12K run through sand dunes, beaches, staircases, sand ladders, gravel roads to complete the triathlon. So I just completed that and it's been a dream to do it and it was an adventure. And to answer your question on why I think it's healthy to have other interests outside of healthcare, and I could certainly talk and brief healthcare, which I do 24/7, but I think it's healthy to have different interests and different activities that lead to a very positive lifestyle. And it's something that I try to include my family in those activities as well.
Abi Sivakumar: Yeah, I do agree that having hobbies can be so transformative. So I appreciate you explaining the importance of it and it might inspires someone listening to create that balance in their life as well. And speaking of, I learned that you're working on a hashtag #RunEveryStreet project to run every street in the city of Toronto. So where'd you come up with this idea and how's it going?
John Yip: You guys have done your research. During COVID, actually, when COVID dropped, I usually have maybe three or four set runs from my house. And my mind was so preoccupied with what was going on and what I was going to do when I went to work that I made a wrong turn and all of a sudden I was in a completely different neighborhood and decided to just continue and roll with it and realize that you don't need to go very far to experience a venture. You can do it in your own backyard. And so, I looked it up and there was a movie by Ricky Gates, so he is a professional runner and he had done this in 2017 in San Francisco and ran every single street there. And I decided to take it on and fast forward four years, I'm still at 96% of streets completed for the city, old city of Toronto because they keep adding new streets and lane ways that this is a never ending pursuit.
But the beauty is it's not meant to be completed in my opinion, although since I started and started posting some beautiful street art and neighborhoods and experiences on Instagram and on Strava, which is a social media platform for athletes, I inspired probably another two dozen individuals, which we are all on a WhatsApp group now and I'm happy to report that four of those individuals have finished the entire city of Toronto.
So it's a close knit community. We're a bit wacky and we share notes on routes and neighborhoods and coffee houses to visit. And so for the majority of the people on that WhatsApp group, I've never met them in person. So if they were to walk by me or run by me, I wouldn't know who they are. So it's an odd endeavor, but I have to say I've gotten to know the city of Toronto very, very well. It's very diverse, it's beautiful. It has its challenges, but I think the city is a beautiful place to live, and I'm lucky to live here.
Abi Sivakumar: Wow, that's amazing. I feel like this ironically ties back into what you said before about your career. You made a turn and now you're on this whole other journey. So that's amazing. And we'll keep an eye out for any updates. Hopefully, you do reach your goal.
Philip De Souza: Before I do get into the lighting round, a couple of things, as you were speaking, John just came to my mind and one of the things is, everything you're speaking about today seems to be rooted in, I guess I would say, your own personal values. And so, I guess, hearing you today, I can hear and feel that passion. And so your personal values, did they stem from your parents or a loved one or your family? Where did that passion come from for your values?
John Yip: I'm a son of immigrants, so my parents came to Canada in the early '60s and it was very tough for them as it is for immigrants to get today to leave their home country where there was conflict and to basically root their life and start anew. And that's not easy. But my parents really instilled those values of that work ethic around the kindness as a means to integrate into Canadian society where they really believed that they were so lucky to be able to leave where they came from, which was war torn China, and where their cultural revolution was happening to come to a country like Canada that welcomed them with open arms. And so they really tried to protect me and some of the overt and microaggressions that happened, overt racism at the time, and they really said, "They don't actually mean it, but you can show forgiveness and help educate and be kind as a way to combat that."
And so, while I didn't really recognize what racism was back then, I was a kid, but certainly now that has made me more resilient, more open-minded, willing to engage and have those values that I've shared throughout this podcast. And I think also my grandmother, she opened one of the first hair salons in Chinatown, downtown Toronto. And it's not about cutting hair. What she did... She was awful actually. She was a terrible hairdresser, self-trained the bowl cut and all that. But what she did is all the Chinese old ladies would come and have tea, she would serve tea, and they would just gab, gab around the hair salon. It was a place for them to meet, a place for them to socialize in their own language. They would go out and go have dim sum together. So it just created a form of community.
And as a kid, visiting my grandmother every week, because I had to clean up the hair and tidy up and work for free, I really saw what she did. And again, being open the doors to new immigrants, welcoming them into their new country. And she was the biggest ambassador for Canada, but also for the local Chinese community, which again, we're struggling to make ends meet. But she would open her hair salon, give haircuts for free, and it was never about the money. It was all about supporting her community. So I think between those, my parents and my grandparents, I hope to pass on those same values to my own children.
Philip De Souza: It's quite fitting. You said there were community, because that's the word I had written down when hearing you talk today is all about and the various facets of your career of how community... I can tell it brings you joy, if you will.
John Yip: It does. I just got back from visiting our team in Calgary and a stampede is going on there, and so hotels are just so expensive. So we ended up staying in our seniors' residents. Talk about being embedded. It was a free room. And so I would go in and hang out with the residents, have breakfast and watch our staff engage with them. And it really filled my heart. That's really what community is about. And to see it firsthand when I was out in Calgary, it just inspires me to do more for all of our staff, all of our residents and their families that we serve. It just makes me want to do more.
Philip De Souza: Another thing that popped to my mind, another word I wrote down was curiosity. I feel that you have a great sense of curiosity just so you were describing to Abi about how you took a wrong turn and you're running and you're like, "Yeah, I guess I'll keep running and see what I find." And even with the various ways you talked about the business of SE Health and of course, the dinner party in healthcare. So where did that sense of curiosity come from for you to keep wanting to understand and learn more and ask questions?
John Yip: This feels like a therapeutic session, psychiatric session, evaluating. I actually... I think it's a great question. And I think when I was growing up, we didn't have a TV and I actually never watched TV until I went to university.
Philip De Souza: What? Never?
John Yip: Well, we had three channels, right? The RabbitEars. Now, I'm like a streaming junkie.
Philip De Souza: Catching up.
John Yip: Yeah, catching up. But when I was a kid and I wouldn't even do this to my own kids, you just left the house and came back at dinnertime. You hear stories about that. But my kids, when the kids were young, I didn't allow them to do that. But we would go out and pick up friends along the way, go to the school yard, play, pick up basketball, run to the creek, see if we could catch frogs. And basically, the world was our oyster. We had sort of a threshold of where we could go and not go. You know what I mean? So there were general rules, but other than that was keep yourself busy. And my parents were both working too, so we kind of had to fend for ourselves so you could just stay home. And I did, and I read a lot, the library, the public library.
I'm a big supporter of the public library system because I spent a lot of time there and read everything. And that still sticks with me. So I mean, reading creates that sense of curiosity. The freedom to roam the physical world is another reason. And I think the jobs that I've taken, like I started in consulting is it's not fixed. It's project based and the problems are hard, and you got to kind of be creative about how to solve those problems. And the organizations I've worked with are not your traditional sort of healthcare route or hospital base, whereas it's very structured and discipline.
There's a bit of freedom to roam and to be curious and to be intellectually stimulated by some of the things and have the ability to go down these rabbit holes to see what's down there versus avoiding them. And it's amazing. Every so often you find a diamond in the rough, so to speak, in these rabbit holes, and you go, "Wow, well geez, the next rabbit hole I find I might just go down even further." And then you just find some coal there, like just rock, nothing there, not a diamond, but you actually learn by going down these rabbit holes and then you store it all the way for something that may happen, that diamond that may happen in the future. And so, every so often those diamonds do happen.
Philip De Souza: No, I love that. And I got a new hashtag for you once you finish your run every street project you can do, keep yourself busy project and talk about how you're keeping yourself busy to share that with the community. But no, I really appreciate those. And so now, we're going to go to the lighting round and you can answer with one word, one sentence, or however long you want. So the first question is, what was your first job ever, John?
John Yip: I just told my kids this. I was 14 and I just got my bronze cross, so I worked for Scarborough Parks and Recreation, and I lifeguarded a kitty waiting pool.
Philip De Souza: Good for you. If you weren't in healthcare, John, what do you think you'd be doing today?
John Yip: I would be an international marine lawyer.
Philip De Souza: We got hints from that from the beginning. Is there a leader living or dead in any field, not just healthcare, that you've looked to for inspiration or just appreciated?
John Yip: I do admire Gandhi and his style and peaceful protests and so on, and his leadership. But please don't laugh, but I'm inspired by Oprah.
Philip De Souza: Who isn't?
John Yip: You think about her leadership journey and her personal journey intertwined, and it's not about the book club or her show or anything like that. I think what she represents for black women in America and what she's done, I think it's nothing short of exceptional.
Philip De Souza: And the fact that she's... Basically, ensures to give a voice to those who may be voiceless. That's something I appreciate of Oprah, too.
John Yip: You took the words right out of my mouth. I should interview you next for the podcast.
Philip De Souza: This is a doozy. I think you'll like this one. If we were writing a screenplay about your life, John, what would be the highlight? So the moment in the movie or the TV show where the audience would either beam with joy or perhaps they may shed a tear because you're getting emotional, what comes to mind?
John Yip: Well, I think there's two parts to that movie. One, my wife jokes that I have nine lives, and so I've used up eight of them.
Philip De Souza: Wow.
John Yip: And we can do eight podcasts on each one of those events, but we won't.
Philip De Souza: Are you going to give us a hint?
John Yip: There's some crazy stories. Here's a hint. Go on Google and Google, "John Yip. Globe and mail." And there'll be an article that comes up, I think circa 2004, 2003. That's a hint for your listeners. And then the second part of the movie is COVID. Like I mentioned earlier, such a traumatic time for many people around the world. But I think those in long-term care, the frontline staff, the residents and their families who experienced COVID during that time, it was not easy. And again, you can Google it. I actually recently did another podcast just on that issue, and there's been some articles written, so I won't repeat it here, but very, very life defining for me, and it's part of the reason why I'm at SE Health.
Philip De Souza: Oh, that's amazing to hear that you're taking that with you to create new impact in the system. My last question for you is if you were stuck on an abandoned island, I could only have three things. What three things would you bring?
John Yip: My family, a Toblerone bar, unlimited supply of Toblerone chocolate. A Kindle.
Philip De Souza: Oh, a Kindle, okay. That's smart.
John Yip: Loaded with a million books.
Philip De Souza: And before I even let you go now, the Toblerone, how does that play?
John Yip: It's my favorite chocolate bar. Who needs real food? I'll just eat Toblerone chocolate on the island. Mix it with coconut.
Philip De Souza: I love Toblerone too, but I feel like it's only... I only get it at the holiday seasons.
John Yip: Every day is a holiday on the island.
Philip De Souza: That's right. Good. I like your positive thinking. Oh, half glass full. Well, thank you so much, John, for your conversation. Abi and I really were... I know, I can't speak for Abi, but I feel so moved by the things you've mentioned and things you talked about and the sharing you did. I really appreciate it and I know our listeners will too.
John Yip: Well, thanks for inviting me.
Thank you for listening. You can hear more episodes of Healthcare Change Makers on our website, hiroc.com, and on your favorite podcasting apps. If you like what you hear, please rate us or post a review. Healthcare Change Makers is recorded by HIROC's Communications and Marketing Team and produced by Podfly Productions. Follow us on Twitter at @HIROCGROUP or email us at [email protected]. We'd love to hear from you.