January Devtank Dispatches: a round up of the month
This month I've decided to give a roundup and a mini debrief to share with you all what my business and life has been like in Jan 2020.
This is a massive hat tip to the lovely Ruth Ridgeway, a friend of mine who is doing amazing work over in her corner of the interwebz (go check it out); Ruth wrote a wonderful piece which I would also urge you to read, which sums up her January, and inspired me to do the same.
TL;DR?
- January started slowly intentionally
- I launched a podcast
- I found some great new curated newsletters
- Journalling continues to rock my world
This debrief, roundup approach is one that I use every week with the teams that I lead.
I like to do a weekly, visible roundup in Slack that includes things we achieved, project status, and plans for the next week so that we can make iterations from the insights gained.
I also like to throw in a human element to celebrate our favourite moments, as I find it helps to bond teams, to bring out the fun in a project, and to celebrate moments.
It's a process that I use for myself too, both for business and for life.
On a Friday, every week, I asked myself some key questions around what's working, what's not and what I can do with that information. (HUGE hat tip here to Tara Newman, a friend and client, who uses her CEO debriefs in her BRAVE Society.
These are so useful in a community learning environment, because we all learn from each other's debriefs and insights.)
January started off for very slowly for me, intentionally.
There was an energetic sense of needing to still be in a reflective state. so I didn't rush to get into hustle mode or to, start gearing up to hit 2020 goals.
My health - as some of you might know, I live and roll with a couple of chronic health conditions which flare from time to time - had been amazing over Christmas, but dipped slightly at the start of the month.
So, I was kind to myself and I allowed myself to just go with what January was asking me to do, which was to go within, to rest, and to spend a lot of time in reflective mode.
I wrote a post on this some time ago, and the magic that happens in this space is that, of course, when we create space ideas are allowed to form - this is exactly what happened.
Whilst in this kind of hibernation stage, I set the habit of journaling every day.
I listened to a brilliant podcast from MindValley with Yanik Silver that really ignited my creativity again for journaling.
This is a habit I've had on and off, but I set myself the task of journaling every day for 33 days after listening to this podcast.
I bought myself a huge journal - an A3 size Leuchtturm1917 - and I started scribbling in it, sticking photos, and asking myself questions.
As the month progressed and I spent more time in my journal, I began to really think about how I pulled together my knowledge and my expertise around content creation, user experience, behaviour change, and all the things that I've been working with my clients on for the last couple of years.
From here, the breadcrumbs led me to create my brand new podcast, which just launched this week called the Human Connection Experience: Content that Creates Change.
I honestly believe that if I hadn't have had that space in January to unpack the last couple of years and the busy projects that I've been leading and taking part in, that this podcast would not have floated to the top of my brain in the way that it did.
I sat and listed out all the conversations I want to have on the podcast in Notion - an excellent tool that I'm using every day, both for my business and for my clients - and wrote the first few episodes.
I recorded and uploaded them and it a very soft launch way and got the podcast out into the world.
I've had several podcasts over the last few years and this time I chose to try Buzzsprout, a new podcasting platform to host the new show.
This is a really easy way to get your audio out into the world, and also to get it listed on directories like Stitcher, Apple, iTunes and Spotify (in fact, Spotify, was accepted really, really quickly.)
BuzzSprout makes it super easy to make video soundbites from a podcast, and to share your RSS feed of the podcast with other podcast platform providers.
So far in just this first week, the response to the podcast has been really positive; it feels really great to be sharing value again with a wider audience about the things that I am really passionate about.
In January I have also been delighted to carry on working with two wonderful high-performance female founders who are very much aligned with my business and my values. I'm really enjoying leading their content development behind the scenes.
What does that look like?
Well, I am currently doing things like, organising content calendars in Notion, doing research and writing up podcast episodes and blog posts, setting up processes and re-purposing workflows, liaising with their teams, creating graphics, jumping on co-working calls to unblock ideas, creating strategies and mapping out programmes.
Where there is content that creates change, I am there. (Need this in your business? Email me.)
Now that I've launched The Human Connection Experience and started off a brand new Facebook page to accompany in it, I'm also researching and starting the process of leveraging my work again - working with a group of people to help them with their content development around content that creates change.
I'm really interested in founders who perhaps don't have the budget yet to have me behind the scenes or to have me lead in projects, but would like to have backend knowledge and support with scaling their content team, with managing their content, and with creating content that has impact and human connection.
So I'm playing around with how to create some resources and a group or course format that can help people with that.
This month I delved back into a LinkedIn training that I purchased some time ago.
At the time, I was leading two huge projects and simply didn't have the time to take part in the material.
This time I've had, more space, but my thinking around LinkedIn is still very varied; I find the platform very difficult to spend a lot of time in. It's not a platform that I feel 100% aligned with, but it's interesting to go and play over there because high-performance founders are not hanging around on Facebook and Instagram necessarily every day, and it's interesting to try a different way of reaching them.
That said, what I found consistently over the last couple of years is that projects have come in constantly from referral, and the best leads for me are, of course, the ones where I've been recommended or people already know me and my and my expertise.
The LinkedIn Mastermind that I worked with has worked with lots of other people, but for me the content was really quite overwhelming and had a very busy community group. I found it very difficult to search for posts and to keep up with the pace of it; as someone who is managing client work and a family and a life, like most of us, I have found that for me that particular format hasn't worked.
But this is something to take with me as a learning point - when I create content for people, bite sized pieces really work.
We are trying to so much into our day, and it's easier to set a habit when we know it's a smaller chunk of time to put aside.
As with all things, there's always a teachable experience and a learning curve to be had from it.
Another thing that I've been really enjoying in January is writing love letters every day and sending them off to people.
This project came about when I was questioning the need to once a year have the pressure to write lots of of Christmas cards, and chose instead to set myself the project of handwriting notes to people on a daily basis and posting them off.
The impact of this just in January alone has been incredible for a number of reasons.
First of all, when you set the practise of setting aside some creative time for yourself, it's a really mindful thing to do in the evenings. When I'm handwriting a couple of cards and creating them, it's been a great way to reconnect with my creativity (side note, I discovered some research this week that handwriting actually helps your immune system - who knew?!).
Also when you spend time in gratitude, this is never a bad thing.
I'm have been making time for heart coherence meditation this month, which builds into that feeling of gratitude and love, I'm sure has fed into how I'm feeling more connected to myself and to my work.
Also, the reactions of people when they received their loved bomb letters has been lovely.
This has been a really fun thing to continue, and I will carry it on in February.
I've also been working very much with going with the flow with my work; when I make a list of tasks for the day, if I sit down to do something and it feels like an effort, then I rest for a while or mix up an activity to to get back into my flow.
When I feel in a different headspace, I can work through that task much, much faster.
Now, of course, this is working at the moment because my client work is flexible; I'm not leading teams with calls at set times, so this is something I can do whilst working in this way - but it's definitely reminded me that when you're in flow things happen much faster, much more effectively, and this is something to bring to organisations and teams that I work with as well.
That flexibility - which is one of my core values - is so important when we are aligning ourselves with ways of working.
This month I've also carried on reading curated newsletters which I really enjoy and that feed my my brain with information.
One of my favourites is Dense Discovery, which comes out on a Tuesday - (this is particularly interesting if you are excited by tech. the startup world, and UX).
The other one I discovered is Check Your Pulse, a tech and start up newsletter by Sari Azout, which is absolutely brilliant.
I set up a separate inbox purely for learning and development - again, this is a hat tip to Tara Newman - because this way I can log into that inbox and only read emails that I've chosen to receive that aid of my learning from people like Seth Godin, Ryan Holliday, and the newsletters I mention above.
This way I know that when I'm dedicating time to learning and development, I'm not also sifting through other emails that could possibly distract me.
A theme that I'm thinking about a lot this month, partly to do with my January pace and connection to self, is the fact that when we create content, whether it's journaling or creating it for other people, we really find a connection to our work and to the way that we process our thoughts.
I wrote about this and talk about it a lot with my Brilliance Ignition Process, and was reminded of it now that I'm creating a podcast again.
The more we are outputting to add value, the more we are inputting and assimilating information for our audiences, which of course increases our own knowledge base and our learning.
This month I also had calls with the designers from That Guy's House. The Unbound Press - which is an imprint of That Guy's House, is publishing my book, Brilliance Unboxed, in March.
The cover design is now in progress, and I will be excited to share them when they arrive back.
So, how has your January been?
What insights have you had from your month?
I would love to hear also what's been working for you, and how things have been in your business and in your life.
If you found this debrief useful, let me know.
I'll do another February Devtank Dispatches to see what's been milling around in my world for the next month, and to share with you my insights as business moves forward in 2020.
Wishing you a very, very happy day and a wonderful next month ahead,
Jo
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