Overview
On this page you will find the following elements related to the process of creating this Output Packet:
1) Un/learning Journal Entries and Reflections: excerpts pulled from my daily journal during this cycle, followed by an expansion of and reflection on the main insights that were surfaced.
2) Goals: a list of my goals for this OP and whether or not they were met.
3) Incorporation of Feedback: how I have used feedback from past OPs to improve my process and product. Includes a running document with key edges for growth identified by reviewers in all of my previous 14 reports at Gaia U.
4) Dissemination Efforts: how I am sharing my work with the world.
Un/learning Journal Entry - 5/19
It’s time to apply an action learning approach to building this business, doing some experiments and figuring out what works. Keep it lean, see what is emerging, and keep making adjustments to align with what the world is telling you.
Reflection:
I was able to design and implement some interesting experiments for my business during this phase. One was a live webinar I hosted through the Gaia Radio program, where I got some great feedback on the approach to learning experience design I have been developing. The other was an interactive guide (an interactive PDF) on the same subject, designed to give me an opportunity to learn more about my target clients, get more in-depth feedback on my approach, and lead into a free coaching sessions where I can explore their stories with them on an even deeper level.
This process of experimentation has lead to a lot of learning and I’ve made some tweaks to my approach and idea for my product with the feedback I have received. The pilot course to follow is an equivalent to a ‘minimum viable product’ (in Lean terms), which will be a stripped-down version of what I’m imagining for the full course. Engaging with this series of experiments has made me a far better designer of action learning experiences and entrepreneur.
For future projects and OPs, I will have a better understanding of this approach and will look to be even more strategic about designing smaller experiments within the container of ‘project’. I will look to gain a deep understanding of my potential clients and stakeholders through these experiments so that I can align my projects better with their needs.
Un/learning Journal Entries and Reflections
Un/learning Journal Entry - 5/9/17
I’m afraid. Afraid of the uncertainty, afraid of losing what I have. I’m afraid of failing and proving everyone who ever doubted me right.
What I’m learning is that this fear will never go away. I have been trying to find a way around it for a long time. I have been waiting around for a sure thing - a safe passage. But that is not the life I have chosen — in fact, that life is a myth. It doesn’t exist. And it certainly doesn’t exist for people like me that are determined to live extraordinary lives.
Reflection:
It sounds a little cliche, but I’m learning how to face my fear. It’s something that we’ve all heard our entire lives, but I can see now all the ways I have tried to avoid it and it has persistently followed me. To have this fear at my back has led to a lot of anxiety and worry. As I turn around to face it, I can feel my energy shifting in profound ways. I feel more empowered and the world feels lighter.
A couple of tools/resources that really helped me with this:
1) The book The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield (see Annotated Resources). In the book he describes this as “Resistance” — the invisible force that works to stop you from creating what you feel called to create. Pressfield offers up a powerful perspective and his focus on “going pro” — showing up every day to face the Resistance, knowing that it will always be there, and working through it — has been tremendously helpful for me.
2) A tool called Fear Setting, which comes from the philosophy of Stoicism. I was turned onto this technique watching a presentation from Tim Ferriss (author of The 4-Hour Workweek and a big inspiration of mine). Basically, fear setting involves documenting the worst-case scenarios should an attempt at something fail, then figuring out how to a) mitigate the risk of that happening and b) what you’d do if it did happen. I found the effect of this exercise to be surprisingly empowering — knowing that no matter what, I am capable of adapting, learning and moving on.
There are a couple of ways I can apply this better in future projects and OPs. One, I can approach the OP process less like an amateur and more like a pro. That is, I will stop waiting around until I’m in ‘the right mood’ to write and create content. I will approach it more like a pro — setting up a regular schedule, showing up every day and putting in the work no matter what.
I began making this transition during this OP cycle, and the result is much higher quality content, in that I rely less on getting it right the first time and more on a writing/creating process that involves more revisions. This is in line with the get it down, then get it good process that Andrew Langford emphasizes at Gaia U, and is something I’ve struggled with as a writer in the past. I put too much emphasis on the first draft, which can lead to creative blocks. This OP cycle was a bit of a mix of amateur and professional behavior - the next will be more pro.
I can also strategically design OPs to help me face my fears. I can work paying attention to what I’m afraid of most, and then turning towards it, into the design process. I can see more clearly now how I have avoided some tasks in the past (like reaching out to people and promoting myself) and have fallen back on things I find more comfort in (like doing research). This pattern has stalled out my business’ growth, and it is essential to my success that I transform it. I made some big strides in this transformation with this OP, but there is much work to be done still.
Un/learning Journal Entry - 6/7
I just read this article that argues for replacing goal-setting with system-building. It is an interesting insight. One of the author’s main points that stuck out for me is that “goals suggest that you can control things that you have no control over.” Systems allow for emergent outcomes that could never have been predicted — this is the kind of development I am interested in.
Reflection:
An example of this systems-approach is instead of focusing on the goal of turning in an OP by such-and-such date, focus on creating a system where I would work on OP-related work for a certain amount of time each day.
One cited benefit of this approach is that I can meet goals daily, which builds positive energy and confidence. Relying on long term goals, by contrast, leaves most of the satisfaction for the end and, surprisingly though I would agree, the experience of completing the goal is often underwhelming.
I think the Gaia U system accommodates this type of learning approach with its inherent flexibility. Though many goals are made during the LIPD, there is plenty of room for making changes (as I have taken quite a bit of advantage of during this phase).
The opportunity for growth is designing better systems. I have gotten pretty good at leaving room for emergence, spotting it and taking advantage of it, but I can that my daily systems have plenty of room for improvement. This ties back into the amateur vs pro insight — a pro has a system and sticks to it.
When it comes to creating OPs, I’m still pretty heavily focused on the goal of turning it in by a specific date. While I’ve gotten better at not leaving everything to the last minute with my project documentation, this pattern is still recognizable — in some ways I like the pressure of the looming deadline and I become very productive with it. The problem with this approach is that although my productivity skyrockets just before deadlines, it isn’t always high when the date is still a ways off.
My challenge is to create a system where I have some accountability and just the right amount of pressure on a daily scale, so that I can make steadier progress in my work, and build positive energy and confidence by continuously meeting smaller goals. I believe this will create more space for emergent outcomes and I will be better prepared to respond.
Goals
Despite this recent insight in systems over goals, my goals for this OP were:
- To follow the template more closely to improve the experience for reviewers
- To dig in deeper to my process
- To follow the SAM design model
- To use more of a mix of media, including videos
- To include more mind maps and design documents
- To focus more on showing my design thinking
- To incorporate the feedback from my last OP and improve my overall process
I believe all these goals were largely met for this OP.
Dissemination Efforts
I am sharing my work with the Gaia U community and beyond in the following ways:
- Hosting free webinars (did the first one during this cycle with Gaia Radio)
- Offering free downloadable resources on my website (including the interactive PDF guide I created during this cycle)
- Blogging on my website
- Highlighting projects and design processes in my new portfolio on my website
- Offering a course on my website (in development)
Incorporation of Feedback
I received a lot of great feedback from my advisor Ariane after submitting my last OP(2), including many areas where I could improve for future OPs. Unfortunately, I never received a peer review as I believe the person assigned to do this became unengaged and I never heard back from them.
I have been diligent about identifying and collecting the main edges for growth identified by reviewers for all 14 Output Packets that I have submitted at Gaia U. These edges are listed in a running document that I update after each cycle which can be seen below:
Going through the process of harvesting these insights and applying them to the next OP is very fulfilling, as I see myself improving in various ways and producing higher-quality OPs. Incorporating feedback in this way is something I believe I have continuously improved with, and it is a skill that I value highly.
Below are the edges for growth identified in my last OP, which I tried to consciously address and improve for this one:
- Map out how you use the design framework in greater detail for both OP and project work
- List the specific skill flexes you want to develop for this cycle
- Show your OP and project management systems and describe how you used them
- Focus core report more on purpose/process/interventions/description of outcomes - move project outcomes themselves to supporting evidence
- Look to highlight your design thinking used
- Look to define terms/phrases that reader may not understand
- Link resources mentioned in Commentary and Core Report to Annotated Resources section
- Use more formal structure for annotated resources
- More in-depth in Pathway Tracking about what was stated in LIPD and what changed
- Include a comment or notes about events in Participation Records
- Include screenshot of Trello board
- Refer back to previous OP’s skill flex assessment