Britt Berrett: "Leading Change by Changing the Way You Lead”

Morgan Jones
They say everything is bigger in Texas, and Britt Barrett was a hospital administrator at a very large 898 bed hospital. He is also the author of The New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller "Patients Come Second." The concept of the book may seem counterintuitive, but it is really quite simple and makes a lot of sense. In order to best care for patients, nurses, physicians and all hospital employees must first be engaged, understanding their purpose and empowered to lead. Where did this idea come from, though? Well, it all began with an accident when Britt was a young boy.

Britt Barrett is the former president of Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, Texas. He is now director of the health care administration program at the University of Texas at Dallas and he and his wife, Lori, are the parents of three children.

This is "All In," an LDS Living podcast where we ask the question, "What does it really mean to be all in the Gospel of Jesus Christ?" I'm Morgan Jones, and I'm honored to have Britt Barrett on the line with me today. Brit, welcome.

Britt Barrett
Well, thank you for the invitation. It's a delight to be with you.

Morgan Jones
Well, I have been looking forward to this interview. I feel like I should give listeners a little bit of background. We received an email from someone who works with you in the Dallas temple, is that right Britt?

Britt Barrett
He actually shared with me about the podcast. And I've become a fan and I just love them, so he and I talk about them on a regular basis. So, Morgan, I gotta thank you for doing this. This is amazing. The interviews that you're conducting are absolutely awesome. So thank you.

Morgan Jones
Thank you. Well, it is such a treat for me to have any part in this podcast. And it really—I was just telling somebody this morning that I feel like it's helped me more than it's probably helped anybody else. And so I just feel blessed to get to do it.

Britt, you have been—you've worked in healthcare, and that is kind of your background. You were a healthcare administrator, a hospital administrator in a huge hospital in Dallas, is that right?

Britt Barrett
That's right. That's right. My career has been in healthcare and, you know, it began early in life. But I became a hospital president at an early age and had some unbelievable experiences, things that have changed my life.

Morgan Jones
Well, I'm excited to talk a little bit about some of those experiences today, but I kind of want to start from the beginning if that's okay. We're going to take it way back. On another podcast that I listened to with you, you talked about how there were two experiences in your life that led to your desire to work in healthcare. One when you were very young, you were involved as a 15-year-old in a fire. And two, you served a mission in Peru, and that those two things are kind of what set the stage for your career in healthcare. Can we start there and you kind of share with us what was the situation with the fire and how were you saved?

Britt Barrett
Yeah, I was in a horrible fire and 20% of my body was burned. And they rushed me to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, Washington, and it absolutely saved my life. And as I reflect back, I get a little emotional because those that have dealt with fires know that it can be a very, extremely painful recovery, and it was. And as I reflect back on that, actually, I don't recall the pain. What I do recall are the amazing men and women who saved my life. These caregivers that were orchestrating pretty complicated care, and they just loved me. And they did that which they were called to do in life. And I thought about that a lot, you know, it was at a pivotal time in my life. That same time after the burn and after my recovery, I had my patriarchal blessing given and it said that I would go into healthcare and become a doctor, actually, it was quite specific. And it worried me because I don't like blood. I don't like the clinical stuff, I'm not good at it. But I kind of have a business mind and I thought, "Well, what am I to do?" This is what the Lord has said my calling should be and so, it was a tough time. Later, I served a mission in Peru, and if any of us have lived in a third world country, it is sobering to see some of the standards of the communities. And the people are just wonderful, the Peruvian people are just some of the most Christlike people I've ever met in my life. And on occasion, we would travel through some of the most destitute places, but through hospitals as well to give blessings. And I'd watch people reaching out to these two young missionaries, begging for help and begging for care and blessings. And I returned home, went to BYU and I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do in life. How could I combine all these experiences into a profession? And I attended—I was at the Marriott business school and had a lecturer come and speak, a guy by the name of Mark Howard, an icon in healthcare. And he talked about healthcare administration. He talked about orchestrating the care behind the scenes, not in front, not with the stethoscope and the scrubs and the accolades, but behind the scenes, quietly, reverently and purposefully making things happen. And you know, it was Morgan, an "aha" moment for me. And I thought "That's where I'm to go." And so I earned a degree in finance, went to Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, did my graduate work there, and my career just absolutely took off.

Morgan Jones
Wow, that's amazing. So I want to go back a little bit. When you were involved in this fire, how did the fire start and how were you taken to medical care? And then secondly, what was it about the way that those people, those medical professionals, the way that they cared for you, what was it about them that made an impression on you?

Britt Barrett
Well, if you want to know, I don't tell that very often, but it was stupid. I was trying to light a barbecue and throwing gas on it, dumb. And it just exploded.

Morgan Jones
But you were 15.

Britt Barrett
I was 15, it was a Sunday afternoon and I just caught on fire. And I raced through the house, my father grabbed me and threw me in the shower, threw me in the back of the station wagon drove to—we lived in a small little town in Washington at that time. They did not have a burn unit, they were going to wait for the helicopter—in those days it was going to take a couple of hours for a helicopter to get there. So my dad had them dope me up, put me in the back of the car, my mother cradled me under her arms and we drove to Harbor View. As I pulled in, I still remember they opened the back of the station wagon, people jumped out and just rushed me in to give me the care I needed. And they were so kind and caring, it was just touching. So the memory I have of that is basically those nurses and those physicians talking to me and asking me, you know, where was the pain? How could they treat it, coordinating together the care. And it's an experience that I don't want to repeat, but it's an experience that changed my life.

Morgan Jones
So interesting how that happens. So fast forward, and you get a job at a hospital early on in your career as a young CEO, and you share some—you've talked about this experience and how you found that you kind of had to turn around this hospital. Could you share some principles that are most helpful in making improvements in any organization, healthcare or not, as a leader that you learned from that experience? And if you need to tell any background on that, that's totally fine.

Britt Barrett
Okay. Well, thanks. I kind of got my emotions under control there. So thank you for the pause, I got a little emotional. You know, when you think back on life experiences, rarely do we pause and ponder and consider what happened, and it brings back this overwhelming emotion. I think that's okay, I absolutely think that's okay. It puts an exclamation point on the road that you've traveled.

So, you know, I finished graduate work, went and moved out to California, became a CEO of a hospital first with Sister Saint Joseph and then Sharp Health Care in San Diego. And a buddy calls me up says, "Hey, I've got this hospital in Dallas, Texas. Will you come run it?" And I was so excited, I was so young, I was so thrilled that I was getting such a large responsibility. It was a hospital, about 400 beds, it had revenue in about the 700 million range. So it was a big operation, about 2000 employees. I arrived and you know, it's interesting, Morgan, something was wrong. I walked through the hospital, and they were grumpy and there was no eye contact. And I love wandering through the hospital and talking with people. It's just one of the great joys of my life, and to hear what they're doing and how they're doing. So I brought in a team, I said, "You know what, there's something wrong here. Can you survey our employees?" And it was the Gallup organization and so they came in and surveyed our employees, and they came back and said, "We've got bad news for you. This is what we define as a toxic work environment. People hate working here." And I'm reflecting on this and I'm thinking, "You've got to be kidding me." But I had been the fourth CEO in four years, there had been a huge turnover. Equipment was broken, they had about a 30% vacancy rate. So every third shift, they had to hire someone, an agency nurse or ask people to work extra overtime. And it was not what I had envisioned and what I had experienced.

So I gathered the executive team together and we had some very deliberate and purposeful conversations. We asked, "Where do we want to go? What do we want to be?" And I will admit, I stole so many ideas from the church. I looked at this church structure—if you think about our faith, you know, it was a small group of a couple of dozen people in a small little farmhouse that has scaled up to 16 million people worldwide. I'm just intrigued. It has to be divinely guided. And so some of the tenets in that faith, I felt were applicable. So the creation of councils. I went to the leaders there were about 40 or 50 managers and directors and I said, "How often are you connecting with the people that work for you?" You know, the night shift, weekend shift, we had managers who we really hadn't talked to them and in months. And so I said, "Okay. Once a month, you are going to personally connect with every person that works for you." Does that sound familiar at all? We're going to create study sessions where we're going to study leadership. And we're going to have regular meetings, book clubs. So we introduced a whole number of initiatives. One of the most important takeaways, important efforts was to ask, why were we here? What was our purpose? Why was this hospital created? Why are we here? And where are we going to take this hospital into the future? Once again, total plagiarism, but it was such a powerful tool. And within three years, the Dallas Business Journal selected us as the first hospital ever to be the best place to work in the entire Dallas Fort Worth area. And one of the top 50 Best Places to Work in the state of Texas. We were the first hospital in this North Texas area to receive the Magnet Certification in nursing. This is the highest accolade a nursing service can receive. We received the state Baldrige Award. Our financials became the best in the entire company, our quality measures were superior. I mean, everything started to click. And I learned a lot of lessons in that experience that have carried me through the rest of my career. So, you know, in retrospect, I probably should have asked how bad was it before I took the job, but boy did I experience great when I worked there.

Morgan Jones
So I'm curious, Britt, when you have, as a leader, you mentioned councils as an example, and kind of touching base monthly with your employees, which seems like a no brainer, but when it's not happening, that's revolutionary. As a leader, what are some of the things that you have to do to make sure that your employees needs—those under you from top-down—their needs are being met? What are some of the things that you found to be key in doing that?

Britt Barrett
Okay, so I write the dissertation on leadership theory and I write the dissertation on best practices on leading an organization. And they're applicable in a hospital, they're applicable in a retail institution, they're applicable in the church. And the very first one was find your purpose, find your meaning, find the organization's purpose, find the organization's meaning. And we rolled out 10 different chapters of focus that great organizations have great leaders pursue. And there's plenty written on leadership, but very little on healthcare leadership. Healthcare is very purpose-driven. There's meaning behind what we do, And if you don't understand why you got into healthcare, you probably will eventually leave. And I think that's true in life. I listened to some of the other podcasts that you have, you can feel that purpose and meaning. Who was the photographer? He gave a really good one.

Morgan Jones
Chris Burkard. He's amazing.

Britt Barrett
Yeah, he's talking about this calling in life and this purpose and meaning, you know? And I hate to say it, Morgan, but when you do your podcast, I'm talking to you on the radio, because I listened to it on my drive in, it's a conversation. But I was so inspired by what he has said and what others have said about this calling in life. If we can figure out why we're here, our purpose and meaning, more than just to have a physical body, more than to just experience the experiences of this life, but to do something, it creates that energy, that passion, that bandwidth, that amazing things can occur. And so that's, you know, that's one big takeaway on leadership when individuals are called and assume a responsibility that's seemingly outside their scope, they ask themselves, and should ask themselves, "What's the calling? Why me, why now? And what gift do I have to give in this area?" And that's what I've found running these hospitals.

Once we understand the purpose and meaning, then we can launch into some other challenges. And there are a number of other things that great organizations do. They hire for fit, not for skill. So find the right people. I have one chapter in my book that's been very popular. And it's an interesting story. The title is "No Whiners, No Losers, No Jerks." And I found that there are some people that are working on teams, they're just whiners. They're just, "How's your day?" "Oh, man, this place is horrible," you know? And they find great joy in being able to complain. And I just don't think there's a place for them. You share with them, you coach them, inspire them, or you fire them.

Morgan Jones
Right.

Britt Barrett
And that's really resonated because a whiner can really suck the lifeblood out of an organization, can suck the lifeblood out of a team. And so the parallel of that is, find the winners, the doers, and the goofs. Find the people that are just willing to go and do and have fun. Great organizations have created this culture, just engagement.

Morgan Jones
I love what that you brought up Chris Burkard. I think one thing that's been super interesting to me about doing this podcast and interviewing all of these different people who have different backgrounds and different careers and different missions, things that they feel like they were driven to do. You look at it, and I think healthcare is one where it's kind of obvious, it seems to be obvious what drives people to healthcare. I have always been impressed by nurses and doctors and everyone who contributes to trying to save people. But I've realized through this podcast that so many things, people feel led to them. So whether it's being a photographer, or whether it's being a journalist, in my case, it's like we feel drawn to the mission that God has for us to fulfill. But if we forget that, if we lose sight of why we're here in the first place, that's when things start to get a little bit fuzzy.

Britt Barrett
Oh, there's no question about it. I recall, when the stock market crashed—I got a degree in finance, and this is back in the late 80s. All my buddies who had gone into finance and Wall Street were losing their jobs left and right. And they were just, I mean, their objective was to make money. And I think that's hollow. And once you figure out what your calling is in life, it can be powerful. And then, you know, I think there's a great phrase that says, "Effort without purpose is chaos. Effort with purpose is passion." So, you know, people get stressed, they get overwhelmed because they don't really understand the purpose. But if you understand your purpose, then that converts to passion and great and amazing things happen. And I don't mean to keep on coming back to your podcast, but you have story after story after story of men and women who are in some of the most different spaces, I mean, and they're fulfilling that passion. And so it's inspiring to hear. It's inspiring to know that there are people in healthcare that are doing amazing things. And I could tell you stories of 50 of them that are changing the face of healthcare and how we deliver it today. That to me is a calling of life. I mean, that really is.

Morgan Jones
Yeah, and I think it's important to touch on Britt, coming back to your point about the desire to make money solely for the idea of making money can be hollow. But I think on the flip side, it's important to remember that desiring to make money if you want to use it for good things, is not hollow. So I had dinner not too long ago with a friend and her husband. And he's been very successful in his career, and I just said, "How have you been able to be so successful?" And he said, "Well, I think that I told Heavenly Father I wanted to be successful to serve Him. I want to be used by Him, whatever that looks like." And so in his case, like making money enabled him to be more useful to God. And I think that if that's the motivation, then that desire to have money is not bad. But it's just all about where our motivation lies.

Britt Barrett
Well, that's true. My father was in the lumber industry in Canada and ran five mills and at one point was the largest producer of shingle cedar shakes. I mean, kind of a small little tidbit. But he said, "All the funds that I've earned are sacred. They're consecrated. So when we look at these funds, we carefully use those as sacred funds." And that's how he lived his life and was an amazing—my mom and dad were amazing people that consecrated all those resources to the building up the kingdom. And I'll never forget that now.

I think that's true. I think once we figure out our purpose in life, we can feel the passion and we can move forward and it's in any industry, it's in any role, in any calling in life. You know, Southwest Airlines is based out here in Dallas. And I listened to Herb speak years ago, and he talked about the role and responsibility of connecting people. And creating a tool so that families could reconnect. And I thought, you know, "If I'm working for Southwest Airlines, that's a pretty inspiring message. I like that." You just gotta find it. You just gotta find it.

Morgan Jones
So I want to ask a couple more questions about healthcare before we kind of transition a little bit. First, what have you learned, Britt, about serving others as a result of your time in the healthcare industry?

Britt Barrett
Well, I think as it relates to healthcare specifically, people get into the profession because they have a servant's heart and they want to care for others that are in their most desperate time of need. And those people are inspiring, but everyone plays a different role in that. It's kind of like an orchestra, someone is on the cello, someone is on the the the drums, someone is behind the scenes making sure all the equipment is in place. It's this orchestration of a symphony that's imperative. And to respect and appreciate and honor all those different roles is important. So if I'm sitting in the CEO suite, I recognize that everyone on that team plays an important role. There are things that a CEO needs to do and must do and is assigned to do, and other roles that others do, that they can and must do. And to honor and respect that is important, more than that, it's imperative. You think about that and in a ward structure as well. My wife serves in the primary. I can't think of anything more exciting, honestly. And I can't think of anything more fearful. She had me one week help teach the five and six-year-olds. I was clueless, they had a co-teacher and he did the lesson—Brother Beck—he was amazing. I just didn't know how to do it. But there are men and women who have different roles and responsibilities in healthcare and roles and responsibilities in church callings—in every industry. And to respect and honor that, I think that's an important effort on our part, just to figure it out. And that's what I saw at Harbor View. I saw these men and women orchestrating my care behind the scenes that saved my life. And I honor them by my effort in becoming a more effective healthcare manager or administrator.

Morgan Jones
Yeah. What have you learned, Britt, over the course of your career, about the ability of God to heal?

Britt Barrett
You know, I've shared this—I've done a lot of lecturing and speaking on healthcare leadership. And what I'm clear on are my values: God, family, and then my job is very, very low on that priority list. God and family. And in delivering healthcare, I reaffirm the divine direction that we can receive in our role and responsibility. We can receive divine direction and any big, important decision was made prayerfully on my knees asking, "Is this the direction to take?" And I will say it gave me a lot of comfort and confidence. So we're planning a new program. We're planning a capital investment. We're planning a new billing system or the introduction of electronic health records. All of those things, when confirmed that they are purposeful and right, give me confidence and gave me confidence in moving forward. So once I felt like, "Okay, this is the right decision." And I didn't need an angel, I didn't need an apparition, all I needed is this sweet comfort that I'd done all my homework, I'd asked all the right questions, time to move forward. Then I never looked back. I never second-guessed myself. I felt like this was the right thing to do.

I find that in job changes as well. When I came to Dallas, I looked at my wife after, you know, receiving this report from the Gallup organization and I said, "What did we do?" We moved from San Diego, California, beautiful weather, to Dallas, Texas—and at that time, I think it was 100 degrees in August. And I've got a toxic work environment. But I knew that I was directed to go to this place and do what I did. And, I did the same when I moved from this one organization to Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, a 900-bed hospital, 3500 employees, I was Executive Vice President for the integrated healthcare system, Texas Health Resources. And it was hard and it was exhausting. And there were days when, you know, moments of doubt would creep in to say, "What what am I doing?" And because I received that confirmation, I knew that I had prayerfully considered this decision, I moved forward without any angst or concern, I've just moved forward. And when it was time for me to retire once again, I worked hard. But at 51, I really felt inspired to come to teach here at the University of Texas. And that was a big decision. And a lot of people in the industry were quite shocked and thought, "Oh, he'll be back, he'll be back." And I thought, "No, no, I've been called to prepare the next generation of healthcare leaders." And so I sit in my office and I teach in the classroom and I work with kids because it's divinely directed. And that's a good place to be and it's comforting and it's helped me weather so there are some really difficult challenges.

Morgan Jones
It's fascinating to me that that is where your mind goes in relation to healing. That's a form of healing, that like feeling confidence, and seeing things turn around, even in an organization—it reminds me, I think there's a question by, I want to say it's President Oaks, I could be wrong. But it talks about when the Lord lays his hands on a family, it lives. When He lays his hands on a marriage, it lives. And I think that you, what you just described is showing that God can heal and help many different aspects of our lives.

Britt Barrett
I like that. I like that a lot. And I've felt that influence so many times. I believe our Heavenly Father wants his creations, us, to find comfort. And if the healthcare delivery system can be flawless, and it can be caring, and it can be embracing, I think that's what he would want us to do. And so, in my role, my small area of responsibility well, doctors do doctor things that nurses do nurses things and pharmacists do pharmacist things. I do administrative things and together, we bless lives. So, it's a good feeling.

Morgan Jones
What about, Britt—I imagine you were president of this huge hospital. And I imagine that sometimes you probably felt pretty spread thin in regard to fulfilling your work responsibilities, your family responsibilities, and your church responsibilities, not in that order. How did you find balance in that and what would be your advice to someone who may be struggling to find that balance?

Britt Barrett
See, I'm the wrong person to ask that question because I always say, you know, it's just like jello. There's always room for more, you know, there's always room for you eat more jello. I mean, I recall I was running the hospital and our daughter was starting her freshman year and I want to make sure she had a really strong spiritual foundation, not only from what we taught in the home and experiences that she had but really the structure. So I actually volunteered to teach early morning seminary. And that went on for 10 years. So I would get up. And remember the beauty of the sunrises? I never saw the sunrise, I never saw it for 10 years, I was, you know, we had 6 am seminary. And so I would teach from six to seven. Later on, I taught the six to seven, and then the seven to eight o'clock classes.

Morgan Jones
So it's dark when you went in and light when you came out. I can relate. I was also an early morning seminary student.

Britt Barrett
And, I mean, those are God's warriors, going to early morning seminary. I mean, that's no small effort. But I just kept on assuming or was accepting responsibilities and I took a break for the Ph.D. So that was a break in that regimen. But as soon as the dissertation was completed and published, I went back to teaching. So 10 full years of teaching seminary were some of the greatest experiences, the growth experiences of my life. And I don't have good advice, I just spread myself thin and the Lord just fills in the difference. And, you know, I serve in the Dallas temple, and anyone that has served knows that it's a lot of work, I mean, it's service. And I really struggled with memorizing and for some reason I can speak in large groups of people, but if you ask me to remember your name or your phone number, I've got to write it down. And it was really, really, really hard. And I just kept at it, I just kept at it and it's been a tremendous blessing to just keep at it. A good friend, he's from Vancouver, Canada, where I grew up, he talks about the commitment that you need that you have to be purposeful and intentional. But you just got to keep on slugging away. And that's, I guess what I've done. I've just kept on accepting roles and responsibilities and directed to do that. And when I'm at capacity, I don't know if I've reached my capacity because Heavenly Father always fills in the gaps. So as I was trying to learn all the roles and responsibilities of serving in the temple, He just kept on helping me and giving me comfort when I was a little discouraged because I wasn't doing all that could be done. He just filled in the gaps and I think that's a truth. I think that's—I just think you just keep doing.

Morgan Jones
Yeah, I can vouch for what you said about temple work. I worked in the Salt Lake temple last year and I was so amazed by how much work it actually is. That like when we talk about someone taking a temple shift, we're not talking about just like sitting and smiling. You're like working the whole time.

Britt Barrett
Wasn't that surprising? Because when we visit the temple, it's such a beautiful, peaceful experience. And you figure all those things happen behind the scenes flawlessly, but if you're serving in the temple, you put your track shoes on because you're moving. At least the men I work with have become some of my dearest friends. I just love them, they are amazing. I dropped the average age about 40 years.

Morgan Jones
Image what I did for the average age, Britt.

Britt Barrett
Well you know right now, missionaries that are either preparing to leave or have recently returned are able to serve and they are so better prepared, having experienced the covenants in a way that's powerful and purposeful and meaningful. But they add to that experience, I bet they just adored having you work with them side by side. I think that would have been a great experience.

Morgan Jones
It's such a treat and I think that's the thing that's so neat is to see these people, many of them who are retired, and they don't quit. They don't just go off and ride off into the sunset, they then go and work in the temple and I'm like, "We're getting our steps in ladies," you know?

Britt Barrett
One of them said to me, he said—he's from Gilmer Texas, "Brother Barrett, I'd rather wear out than rust out." And they're five or six of them that come in a van every Tuesday, and they drive from an hour and a half, almost two hours every Tuesday, and they serve so faithfully. And they jumped in the jump in the van and they head back to Gilmer after the time is served and they are wearing out, they are not rusting out, guaranteed.

Morgan Jones
Amazing. I love that. I want to come back—so I have one last question before we get to our final question. And I want to go back to something that you said that I actually didn't know about you, which is that you grew up in Vancouver, Canada. I don't imagine there are probably a lot of members of the Church in that part of Canada. Am I right about that?

Britt Barrett
That's true. In Vancouver, there's a stake. My dad served as the Stake President in let's see, that must have been '74 to '76 or some somewhere in there, in that time period. And there still remains just one stake in that part of the vineyard.

Morgan Jones
Do you—when you said that it just made me wonder, do you feel like you are always had a love for the gospel, Britt, or was there something, was there a point where it like clicked for you? I grew up in a part of the country, in a part of the United States where there aren't very many members of the church. And so I just am always curious about how a love for the gospel grows when you feel kind of disconnected from large bodies of saints.

Britt Barrett
That's a great question. And here's my takeaway. My takeaway was the Gospel of Jesus Christ helped me make decisions in life. God's intent is not trying to catch you or to penalize you or punish you. You know you look at the law of chastity, He's not—I can't imagine He really cares about some of the mechanics of that. What He's saying is, "Live a life pure and clean and simple and you will find joy. And those that don't, that violate those tenets, it catches up with them and it can be quite devastating. But live life as I've revealed to you, and you will find joy and happiness." And I've found that in every aspect of my life, so growing up, yeah there are plenty of pressures on the word of wisdom and law of chastity, but I just kind of hung to that. I just hung to that belief that God knows better. And, you know, looking back, oh my goodness, thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. At every turn, I look at the idea of service, or even something as simple as giving and tithing and fast offerings. You know, we've done research that proves statistically that those that are charitable, are more successful financially. I mean, there's actual research on that. But the tenets of our faith are so powerful and so true, that as I was growing up, I just clung to them and they help me. And at every turn, it helped me understand what my next step would be. You know, right now, the spirit of Elijah is strong the hearts of the children turning to their fathers and their fathers to their children. I have some grandchildren and you'll know what that's all about. It's one of the greatest joys of my life as my heart turns to our grandchildren. I've got wonderful nieces and nephews, I just adore them. And they know that crazy uncle Britt absolutely loves them and my hearts are turned to them and hopefully, their hearts are turned to their parents. And so the tenets of our faith, wherever we are, whether it's in downtown Sandy, Utah, or it's in that West Vancouver, British Columbia, the truths help us navigate through life and that's kind of what I've hung to and it's proven to be very powerful my life.

Morgan Jones
Yeah. I had a friend send me a text—it's probably been a couple of years ago. And she said that she and her boyfriend at the time, now her husband, had been having a conversation about all the different aspects of the gospel that we don't even think about that bless our lives. So she said, you know, learning to give talks in church, learning to work with other people in callings—a whole list she had come up with that just are not the typical things that you think of. Some of which you mentioned, which is what made me think of this. And then I just saw a post the other day where a woman was saying that because of the gospel when you are talking about donating organs, you are able, she referred to it as "You check all the right boxes" in terms of your health. And so I just think there are so many different things that we don't even, we just do them without realizing how much they're blessing us. But I believe, like you said, God takes care of us through the gospel. And I'm super grateful for that.

Britt Barrett
I've got to share this one experience, and I apologize for doing this.

Morgan Jones
No, no.

Britt Barrett
So I'm teaching undergrads right now, right? And I have 500 in our program and my office is located right in the student traffic area. And I will have two or three or four or five students pop into my office on a daily basis. It's inspiring to hear their stories but also disheartening because they don't have a bishop that loves them, or maybe ministering brothers or sisters, or maybe a young men's or young women's president who gives them counsel and advice. They're all on their own. And so you look at the structure of this church, we have all these rich resources that help the youth navigate through the questions of life. So they'll pop into my office and say, "Hey, Dr. Barrett, you know, what's the scoop?" And I'll look at them and I'm going, "I wish I could send some ministering brothers over to your house to help you navigate through these challenges. I wish you had a young women's president who cared about, you know how you're living your life and could embrace you." So not only the theology and the tenets of the faith but the structure of the Church is powerful. And it really is a differentiator. And for parents to try and navigate through this life without those resources, good luck, it's tough. That, to me, is like a great takeaway as well.

Morgan Jones
I love that. Thank you for sharing that. Our last question and you've listened to the podcast so you know what's coming, but what does it mean to you, Britt, to be all in the Gospel of Jesus Christ?

Britt Barrett
First of all, love this question. And second of all, love, love the answers. And as I was reflecting on this after the invitation to participate, I believe being "all in" means you're willing to change. It means that you're willing to become different, that you're willing to become purposeful, intentional, to become more Christlike. You know, we claim we're Christians, you know, how dare you not call us Christians. Okay, well if you claim to be a Christian, that means that you will become Christlike and that means you and I, we have got to change. And you know that's one thing I'm so grateful for my wife, she's the sweetest person in the world. And we're a lot alike and a lot different. She is quiet and kind and loving and I am loud and brash and obnoxious. And I have learned that I have to become more like her, which are Christlike attributes. So I spend more time listening, and I spend more time considering savior attributes that are powerful and they are changing. I think at the moment we say, "That's just the way I am, you know, that's just who I am." I think that's when we stop becoming Christlike. And I think that's what it means to be all in. Because it's hard to change. It's hard to put away some of those attributes that you've grown up with that have become part of who you are. I think being all in means you become more and different and Christlike.

Morgan Jones
Thank you. That's a wonderful answer and I've never thought of it that way. And that's what I love about hearing everyone's answers to that question is, everyone is different. And that's powerful. So thank you so much, Britt, thank you for giving of your time and for sharing your insights with us.

Britt Barrett
My pleasure.

Morgan Jones
A huge thank you to Britt Barrett for joining us on today's episode. You can find Britt's book "Patients Come Second," on Amazon. Thank you for listening and we'll be with you again next week.