Jenna:  Okay Phil, so a lot of physical therapists are about to start their very first job as a physical therapist.  And I want you to tell them one thing you wish you had known starting your very first job.

Phil:  The one thing I wish I would have known is that you you aren't going to feel confident, and that's okay.  And you will be able to help a lot of people. But even though you may not feel like you have the ability or skills or anything, you know so much to be able to help people, and you will get better. So use both that lack of confidence to drive yourself to be better, but don't disparage yourself, don't get down on yourself, and don't think that other people can do it better than you. Because actually what we find is that new graduates can impact people's lives more than seasoned clinicians because they care so much, they're so much more detailed, they don't go on previous biases nearly as much. How about you?

Jenna:  I would say that it's going...

We have advisors during PT school and some of us have mentors early on in the clinic. Should we continue with the mentorship process throughout our career?

Jenna:  So, Phil, why do you still have mentors, and how has that changed throughout your career? So I asked that not as like, "Why do you have mentors?" in an accusatory way. But again, so many people look to you as a mentor right now. You're very high up in the field. You do all these different things. You have a career you love. At this point, why do you have a mentor?

Phil:  Yeah, I think no matter how far along you are on the trail, there's someone who has gone farther than you.  To me, that's the big thing.  So I like to think of life as different seasons and things like that.  And certainly in your beginning years, where you don't even know where the trail is, it's essential to have a mentor for that. It's essential to have someone to kind of give you a little guidance of maybe what I like, what I...

I get asked this question all the time. “How do I get a job in professional sports?”  Recently I listened to one of the best personal accounts of how it is done on the Movement Podcast (mild language warning). It is with my friend and colleague Jon Torine.

In the first 15 minutes of the interview he describes how he was “lucky” to get an internship with one of the best strength coaches in the NFL while he was still a sophomore in college. Fast forward and Jon is the head Strength & Conditioning Coach for the Super Bowl Champion Indianapolis Colts and had the honor of working closely with the Buffalo Bills, Indianapolis Colts, Peyton Manning, Tony Dungy and many others for over a decade.

Jon tells the story of his class where on the first day, the professor (Coach Roys) asks an obscure question about a particular vitamin that no one has ever gotten right in this Coach Roys’ tenure. After they hand in their answers, the professor goes through...