Stories, Flash Mobs and Community Matters

I’m in Denver this week at the “Community Matters” conference from the Orton Family Foundation.

This is a new network for me: town planners, small town advocates, and people who care about the heart and soul of their community. I’m engrossed in getting to know their work and them. The intellect and attention to detail of the planning perspective melded with the recognition of the power of relationship, connection, passion and emotion is a powerful mix. In fact “powerful” is a word I’ve been hearing a lot.

For some reason, many of the people I have conversed with are also paying attention to transitions – to their own, their organizations and their communities. I’m quite taken by this pattern and wonder why it has show up so vividly for me here, at this conference, at this time. Something to think about.

My roles here are delightfully diverse, even if the switch ups make me dizzy here in the “mile high” city. Tuesday I facilitated an all day workshop on “Online Media and Your Neighbors.” We were two town planners, a journalist and online neighborhood community facilitator, a deep thinker on communities for elders and the differently abled, and a community organization “jill of all trades.” We learned with and from each other about how online tools can be of value (or be avoided) for local communities. I am now thinking more about the intersection of technology in elder communities — mmmm!

Yesterday I did small scale graphic recording for the opening plenary, large scale graphic recording for for the session on “The Power of Stories” (Image above) facilitated by my dear friend and conspirator, Barbara Ganley. Tim Merriman, Holli Andrews and Josh Schachte (how could you not love a man who loves pie!) were terrific – telling real stories about the real power of stories. There are two other panels from the graphic on questions and tips for storytelling that you might find valuable here and here.

But it doesn’t stop there. Then I facilitated two 30-minute “Tool Flash Mobs” – one on Twitter and one on YouTube – to provide a brief introduction and practice with social media. In the Twitter session one woman talked about a very unusual Twitter adoption challenge. Her puppet, Suzie, needed an account. So I invited the two of them for a quick peer-to-peer consult later in the day. Talk about mind-blowing. More on that later…

In the YouTube session I decided to go out on a limb (as usual) and suggest that we not only learn about online video in a half hour, but to actually make, upload and view one. Yup, we did it. Take a peek:

The takeaway for me from the two flash mob sessions were:

  • When introducing a social media tool in a community context, think about the inflow and outflow aspects. Inflow: listening, learning, getting ideas, bringing diversity into a local community. Outflow: sharing knowledge, disseminating information, publicizing community events, helping the world see (and perhaps validate) good community work that may not be perceived as so important because it is so “everyday” for the community itself.
  • Think small, time-delimited experiments with measurable outputs so that we can think strategically about what “social media” work we want to add to our lives, and what value can accrue to our communities.
  • Remind ourselves we all don’t have to learn and work with everytool. In fact, imagine what it would be like if we ALL tweeted! NOOOOO!

Those sessions all continued informally so when I looked up it was after 5:30 and I ran off to a dinner with friends. ZOOM! Had a great dinner/conversation then walked back, did a little prep and crashed.

So here I am today – a graphic recording of Chip Heath’s keynote! WOW, I’ve been practicing drawing elephants. Tomorrow I record Frances Moore Lappe, so lots of excitement, plus one more Flash Mob and pinch-hit moderating a panel. Off and running!

Many Voices

I have about a half billion partially edited blog posts. But life has changed a lot for me since becoming a grandmother and now having the honor of spending afternoons with my grandbaby and I have not prioritized writing. I actually have more time for reflection on walks, while laying on the floor with the baby and such. But now work consumes the mornings, with the tyranny of the to do list.

I still take “breaks” by looking at my Twitter feed and came across this very useful article, 3 Unique ways to record, edit, and publish your audio :: 10,000 Words :: where journalism and technology meet. There are a bunch of projects where people will be doing short audios and videos and I appreciate useful posts like this one.

Then, at the bottom, there was an embedded YouTube video that struck me to the core and actually reassured me that my silence is fine. There is a lot of great stuff filling the electrons. Take a look at this.

The blog post author, Mark S. Luckie (what a GREAT name!) , wrote:

If you’re looking for inspiration for your collaborative audio projects, check out the video below of a choral piece constructed from 250 individual performances. For this unique project, each person seen in the clip submitted a video of themselves voicing a part of the composition “Lux Aurumque,” composed by Eric Whitacre. The individual videos were then edited together and the stunning result was uploaded to YouTube.

Collaboration and crowdsourcing… the future of audio is here.

In our networked world, we have many voices. We don’t all have to ‘talk’ at the same time. But look what happens when we sing “together!”

Many voices. Powerful. Thanks, Mark, for bringing this into my life today. I experienced something beautiful and was also able to let go of the “non blogging” nagging, guilt!

P.S. See also this terrific post by Mark which puts a great reframe on Personal Branding.

P.S.S. Another great collaborative song video

Questions: a thread through current work

Life has been a whirlwind of work. Keynote and workshops for the Girl Scouts of America Leadership and Development Conference,  iterative design work on a bunch of client projects, from planning to post-event evaluation, a large global e-consultation followed by a large face to face decision making meeting, and coming up this week a lovely two day graphic recording/facilitation workshop up in the mountains of Central British Columbia.

While whirlwinds are deep experiential times, they leave little for reflection (including blogging). This morning I took a few moments before ramping up to full production mode and I was skimming my blog feeds.

I love Palojono, the blog of Jono,  a designer who is a great writer and visual thinker.Jono helped me reflect, to see the thread through my current work. My practice right now is very focused on using questions. We have really spent a lot of time designing the questions that sit underneath consultations and meetings. I build questions into my talks. Thank you Jono, and here are some of your tips I’d like to share out and amplify with my network. His are related to giving a talk, but as I read them, I could easily pull them into other contexts.

via palojono: Asking great questions at talks.

Great questions…
1. Build a relationship between you and the speaker
A good question is an effective way of telling someone, yes, I get it, and what’s more this is interesting to me. It allows them to recognize you and increases the chance and ease of meeting up after a talk to discuss in more depth through the common ground created.
2. Let other’s know who you are
Asking a question in a room of strangers is an opportunity to share a little of yourself, what you’re interested in, who you are, and what you know about the subject. On many occasions, strangers have introduced themselves to me after a talk simply because I asked a question. In case you can’t tell, I think great questions are a great networking tool. (Nancy’s Note: relationships, trust, “entry doors…”)
3. Start conversations
In very many talks there is as much to be learned from the audience as the speaker. Asking a great question invites others to chime in and start a natural dialogue that is often more revealing than any prepared presentation. (Nancy’s NoteThen shut up and listen! ListenNote?)
4. Buy others time
There are many times when the bell sounds on a talk and “Any questions?” shoots round the room before I’ve barely had a chance to process the last thing that was said. A first question plays the invaluable role of giving others a little chance to think about what they want to ask once the speaker has finished. Sometimes we just need a little processing time before we’re ready to share. (Nancy’s Note: the basis of improvisation – make the other person look good!)
5. Relate the content to what you care about
Questions beget answers. Many people forget that a question of a speaker really allows you to learn an answer to your situation. When it’s a talented and experienced speaker it’s really an incredible opportunity. A great question plays the useful function of steering the talk towards what’s more relevant to you. (Nancy’s Note: from a communities of practice perspective, this hooks into the importance of finding shared domain!)
6. Force you to engage in the talk
Challenging yourself to think of great questions also forces you to think through the content of the talk and compare it to what you already know. It’s too easy to let a good talk wash over you, and a bad talk not even enter. I typically write a big question mark in the corner of my page at the start of a talk and use it as the seed for a question mindmap. Setting myself the responsibility of asking a great question means I not only have to pay attention, but I have to think critically about the talk all the way through. What a great cheap way to max out your value.

Chris Corrigan; Learning from Failure

Don't be chicken(Yes, I’m  popping my head up after a month of  heavy work and little inclination to stay at my computer as summer finally arrived in Seattle.)

I have long been a fan of learning from failures. In college, a friend of mine told me the day before I graduated, “I never met anyone who could fall down and get up so quickly.” When I picked up on Dave Snowden’s “safe-fail” experiment language I said YEAH!

Last month I happened upon a post by Chris Corrigan on just this topic. It was juicy and relevant. I work with many professionals for whom the risk of looking anything less than competent is not an option. This is a barrier. Chris sees this too.

The pressure that comes from perfection and maintaining a failsafe environment is a killer, and while we all demand high levels of accountability and performance, working in a climate where we can fail-safe provides more opportunity to find creative ways forward that are hitherto unknown.

My first line strategy is to role model. When I’m uncertain, I talk about it. When I am not sure something will work, I position it as an experiment. Just a shift in language can change the environment for risk.

Chris gets at this more clearly.

1. Be in a learning journey with others. While you are working with people, see your work as a learning journey and share questions and inquiries with your team.

2. Take time to reflect on successes and failures together. We are having a lovely conversation on the OSLIST, the Open Space facilitator’s listserv about failures right now and it’s refreshing to hear stories about where things went sideways. What we learn from those experiences is deep, both about ourselves and our work.

3. Be helpful. When a colleague takes a risk and fail, be prepared to setp up to help them sort it out. My best boss ever gave us three rules to operate under: be loyal to your team, make mistakes and make sure he was the first to know when you made one. There was almost nothing we could do that he couldn’t take care of, and we always had him at our backs, as long as he was the first to hear about it. Providing that support to team members is fantastic.

4. Apologize together. Show a united front, and help make amends when things go wrong. This is a take on one of the improv principles of making your partner look good. It is also about taking responsibility and having many minds and hearts to put to work to correct what needs correcting. This one matters when your mistake costs lives. Would be nice to see this more in the corporate world.

5. Build on the offer. Another improv principle, this one invites us to see what we just went through as an offer to move on to the next thing.

6. Don’t be hard on yourself. You can’t get out of a pickle if you are berating yourself up for being there. I find The Work of Byron Katie to be very very helpful in helping become clear about what to do next and to loosen up on the story that just because I failed, therefore I am a failure.

I like that last one. I am on part work/part vacation this week. I will have to practice that! Go for it. Don’t be chicken.

(Photo is mine from the Agricultural Sustainability Institute at the University of California, Davis)

iPad Lust and Clash with Ideology

I have been wanting an iPad for my graphic recording work but I just haven’t given in. (I’m also debating various ebook readers to cut down on paper. I have a book habit.) But I keep getting uncomfortable. George Siemens sums it up for me.

However, for those committed to openness, the iPad forces a clash between technolust and ideology. Perhaps we need a self-help group for people in a state of cognitive dissonance due to the impressive Apple technology, but less impressive stance on openness and end user control.

via elearnspace › iPad. Yes, it’s rather good.