HR's New Ways/Asynchronous Work/Beyond Yes and... / NZ Workshops/Tedx Melbourne/See Workish

I'm coming for you, New Zealand 

It's exciting to be planning a return visit to Wellington, New Zealand (August 14 - 18, 2023) for some live in-person workshops! It's been a while, pre-pandemic, you know! 

There are 4 topics to choose from: 

🌕 VISUAL SENSEMAKING

Monday August 14: 9am - 12.30pm

This is one of the most popular workshop training programs I've been delivering over the past 10 years, and it's evolved to give you these highly clever visual skills to help you think, understand, decide, communicate and collaborate better in times of change and uncertainty. The Institute for the Future identified Sensemaking as a capability we'd need for these times, and this session will give you what you need. If you've heard about my workshops that have helped people sketch and draw, this is the session; we'll use visualisation as one of the key tools for making sense of what's happening, helping with your thinking, decision making, collaboration and innovation. 

🌕 ADVANCED TECHNIQUES IN FACILITATION

Tuesday August 15: 9am - 12.30pm

Lift your capability to design processes, lead groups and achieve outcomes ... and, handle challenging situations, people, groups and projects. If you've already had some experience facilitating or you've attended some initial training on facilitation skills, it's time to take things to the next level and move beyond the clichés that are too often part of the facilitator's vocabulary and toolkit. Time to step things up! Bring along queries, challenges, questions and curiosities as the whole learning session will be facilitated. 

🌕 CHANGE TOOLS

Thursday August 17: 9am - 12.30pm

This has been a popular workshop program for leaders and managers involved in change and transformation - whether by their job title, or as part of the work they're doing. It's not easy to navigate the change environment, communicate, influence and shift people's thinking when you're working with such diverse levels of engagement, interest and involvement. Leading change needs clever, creative, adaptive tools. Use the 10 change tools I'll share and demonstrate in the workshop to better engage, lead and impact in change and transformation. Bring along an example of anything you're working on in change and we'll apply the tools to it.

🌕 SPEAKING MASTERCLASS

Friday August 18: 9am - 12.30pm

Take your speaking and presenting to higher levels of performance: more creative, impactful, engaging and memorable. For all levels of expertise. If you've been invited to speak or present at a conference, or you'd like to develop this aspect of your consulting business or practice, or you're just curious to know how you might do better in the world of speaking, this session is going to be a winner. I'll be sharing insights from my journey from not speaking, to speaking a little, to speaking a lot, internationally, and the key things I've learned about the craft, the business and the audiences! Again, bring along queries, challenges and goals and we'll tackle them. 

All sessions use accelerated learning techniques so we cover a lot and achieve great outcomes in a half-day session. No waffle. No words wasted. No dull PowerPoints. Only actions, outcomes and acceleration in learning. 

Get tickets here

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See Workish 

This is the new 5-minute video wrap and curation of work and work-related topics I'm creating and sharing. It brings you up to date with work trends, ideas, information and developments related to work-ish things. 

Workish Episode 1 features:

Future AI jobs, Procrastiworking, Remote loneliness, Text to music, Human centric lives, Swipe useless meetings ... and some music from Theådore

Workish Episode 2 features:

The Business Case for Wellbeing, Designing Offices for the Future, Get Back into the office ... No... it's too expensive !, Async Secret Weapon, Jump on a Chopper

Workish Episode 3 features:

Return to office tensions, Integrating AI at work, Replacing managers with coaches, Neuropsychological safety at work, Attracting GenZ talent, New Zealand in person workshops

Improv. It’s more than ‘yes and …’

Ask someone about improvisation and they might say, ‘it’s all about saying ‘yes, and …’ or ‘hey isn’t that when comedians make things up’ or ‘oh my favourite show is ‘Whose line is it anyway’. 

Yet improvisation is so much more than this and has such wide application across different parts of our life. 

While there are many philosophies, principles, schools and practices for improv, know this... 

it is possibly one of the greatest capabilities to have in these times of uncetainty, change, challenge and pressure. 

I’m a fan of improv - learning about it from Impro Melbourne over many years, performing it at different events and shows and reading widely about it. 

But perhaps the greatest application and use of improv has been in my everyday life. 

Sometimes the sh*t hits the fan. At different times in life, things happen, and you’re confronted by the stuff of life that is painful, difficult, tough or challenging … to say the least. 

How do you cope, handle or deal? 

The learned principles and practices of improvisation when applied daily to life can help. 

Don’t dismiss. Don’t laugh it off. Don’t think there’s something wrong with you. 

With an improviser’s mindset you’ll be able to tackle, respond and cope. Well. This is possible by using improv tools, principles and practices that help us:

▫️adapt

▫️be creative

▫️trust ourselves, and 

▫️move ahead. 

These benefits make improvisation way more than a skill for the stage. 

Read more about it in this article from Psychology Today about Keith Johnstone.

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TEDx Melbourne - a night of AI

5 x AI speakers … at TEDxMelbourne. 

An insightful bot view into artificial intelligence in creativity, health, education, the future. 

Jon Yeo shared the comprehensive and detailed process of the last 6 months, coaching and curating the artificial bot speakers and their content, tone. 

The extensive prompts, iterations, output, experiments and lessons were outlined. There were many questions and comments from the room of 100% human attendees! 

Some quotable quotes: 

- This was a complete experiment. We didn’t know what we’d get out of it. 

- If it’s boring, blame the source material. 

- Does art require a soul?

- It’s not human. Do we want it to be human? Are we ok with that if it is? 

- It’s more binary than granular. 

- The law of averages exist in large amounts of data. 

- Who gets to choose the deployment of AI?

- It’s an intelligence … but it’s not artificial. What kind of intelligence is it then? 

… and thank you to the sponsors and volunteers who helped make the event happen. 

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On Asynchronous Work

Watch this session I presented for the Remote Agility Framework community on my book Sync Async: Making progress easier in the changing world of work

Over the past 18 months I've been working with several Human Resources teams, helping them boost their capabilities for the new world of work. 

That means, newer ways of working, working in different ways, trying new things, evolving their processes and ways of thinking. 

Join this complimentary session if you're an HR professional and would like to learn about new ways in HR. 

It's on July 20, 2023 from 2 - 3pm AEST. A recording will be made available. 

The session outline : 

As the world of work keeps evolving, there's so much that's changing in every workplace. 

And Human Resources practitioners are so often involved with that change: initating, guiding, advising, championing, advocating and innovating. 

So committed to the support of people in the organisation, the HR function can often be left behind in capability development and innovation ... while the rest of the organisation forges ahead with the new and wonderful!

Newer ways of working are sweeping the world and bringing changes to workplaces across every sector, field and industry. 

🌕Is your HR team evolving and adapting to be able to respond to the changing world of work? 

🌕Or are you using the same tools, methods, practices and process of the past?

🌕What is the cost when the HR team aren't leading -- or at least up with -- the evolution of new ways of working? 

⭐️Case studies and insights⭐️

I'll present case studies from working directly with HR teams, what capabilities they've developed ... and why.

Join this complimentary masterclass and I'll share the new ways of working that HR teams are adopting to ensure they're able to handle the changing world of work. 

Registrations are free; sign up here

Hybrid working/Asynchronous audiobook/New ways in schooling/Workplaces for the anti-work trend

3 things needed in hybrid working 

As the world of hybrid work keeps evolving and changing, we’d do well to check on how it’s going and what tweaks and changes are needed. 

Two out of three key requirements for people seem to be lacking. 

Let’s look at them: 

🔸Choice or Autonomy

🔸Mastery or Learning

🔸Connectivity in all its forms. 

From your experience and observations, which one/s are working in hybrid do you think? 

And which is being missed? Read more in this article from Fortune quoting the great work of Lynda Gratton. 

And consider how you and your teams can lead with greater focus on the important parts that are being missed. 

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Sync Async Audiobook is out now !

My most recent book ‘Sync Async: Making progress easier in the changing world of work’ is now available in audiobook. 

What’s it about? 

One of the best ways to respond and adapt to the changing world of work is to consider not just the work itself … but the WAY it gets done. 

Consider:

◻️ Do we really need everyone at the same meeting at the same time? (synchronous work)

◻️ Could some people contribute prior to, or after the meeting or begin working on tasks outside of a meeting? (asynchronous work)

A growing number of teams and businesses are learning and experiencing the value of deliberately working in sync / async ways. 

That is, some work is completed synchronously — at the same time with other people; and other elements of work completed asynchronously — at a time and in a way that suits them. 

In this book you'll hear about:

◻️ how, why and when to work in sync and async ways

◻️ tools for creating your team’s sync async strategy

◻️ ways to identify the type of work you prefer 

◻️ techniques to work in more async ways

◻️ how to make daily progress easier — get started on things that have stopped and accelerate things that have slowed. 

You don’t need to wait for a culture to change or for someone to give you the go ahead on this. You can start working better in both sync and async ways from today. 

There will always be too much to do and not enough time in which to do it. Putting practical sync async techniques to work can make your work easier … and the rest of life better. 

Available via your usual audiobook app or supplier. Use one of your Audible credits to get the book now. 

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New ways in schooling

Evolutions in how we work don’t just happen in corporate offices or businesses. 

New ways in how a school can work are most certainly working for the glorious Hester Hornbrook Academy led by their highly regarded principal, Sally Lasslett. 

In this great piece in The Age, insights abound on how innovation, inclusion and new ways of thinking and working are helping make education happen … for the better. 

Adaptive thinking in education is working on things like: 

▫️meeting students where they are

▫️classes starting at 10 am 

▫️no rows of desks, replaced with flexible seating like groups of desks or beanbags

▫️a focus on who students want to be,

and

▫️no need to leave after a graduation; students can keep coming back!

Funded by Melbourne City Mission (MCM), the independent school is thriving and growing and gaining attention for the right reasons. 

It’s a most beautiful example of how to think beyond the default or mainstream … no matter the kind of work you do or the services your organisation provides. 

Read more here

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A workplace for people who don’t like work 

What would it be like? 

Following on from the above post about Hester Hornbrook Academy in Melbourne, Australia, which has created a school for students who don’t like going to school, let’s think further …

How might we apply this to the workplace, more broadly? 

Some changes in ways of working have been successes for those who need them:

▫️the non linear work day

▫️remote work

▫️asynchronous work

▫️work from anywhere 

▫️the four day work week 

▫️flexible working hours …

And so what else? 

How else are workplaces helping make work better for those who don’t like work? Or don’t much like going to work? 

There are things like:

▫️quiet spaces, booths and soundproofed areas

▫️collaborative cafe-style designs for a less formal feel

▫️softer furnishings to create a more comfortable environment

▫️ambient sounds and effects to create calm yet productive spaces 

▫️creative tools for communication and collaboration 

▫️online apps for contribution and collaboration 

▫️cross functional teams to create greater progress and autonomy 

▫️self-selected teams enabling people to exercise choice

▫️incremental work to help make better progress 

▫️less time wasting activities like boring meetings and more outcome focused work

▫️iterative work to break tasks down in to manageable pieces

▫️a mindset of good enough to reduce the effects of perfectionism, …and plenty more. 

What else?

What do you see that companies, business, leaders and teams are offering to make work that little more workable — particularly if you don’t want to go to work? 

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The meh of work / the anti-work trend 

Any leader leading a team, any worker trying to work, is sure to have felt and seen that malaise … the discomfort and disinterested feeling towards work. 

Where did the motivation go? How long has it been gone? And was it ever really there? 

The stats are showing that many of us are wading through the ‘scrap heap of broken promises’ about a version of a future dream we’ve been quietly conjuring. 

It’s a 50/50 moment. Some of us are happy enough and interested, some of us not so much. 

With job roles important to our identity, if something isn’t quite right then it can feel incredibly wrong, having compounding effects elsewhere in our lives. 

While a magic fix might not be as entirely visible — or as possible — as people would wish it to be, simply understanding that people are pretty ‘meh’ with things is important. 

You know the … ‘I don’t need a solution, just give me some support, empathy and understanding’? Yeah, that. 

As a team leader or HR practitioner, consultant, adviser or manager, be aware of these tones so you read the room and respond accordingly. 

Read more here in Fortune 

How to decline meetings/The work environment matters/Visual mapping in schools/Dreamers dreaming/Audio book recording/

Decline 1 in 3 meetings

Decline, delete or at least press the ‘Maybe’ button on the invitation. 

The point is, don’t automatically ‘Accept’ meeting invites — you’re creating too much synchronous work (in real time work with others) and it’s taking up too much time in your schedule. 

We might accept meeting invites by default, automatically, habitually. 

Real time meetings, chats and other ‘now’ happenings are thieves of time, attention, energy, progress and motivation. Real time should be saved for the really, truly important stuff. 

This year I’m sharing techniques on how to deliberately #meetless

Do you think declining or deleting an invitation is being rude? 

If so, before you accept or delete, ask a clarifying question like: 

• why am I invited to this meeting; could you give me a bit more information please?
• could I see the agenda for the meeting please and then I’ll decide whether to attend
• why is this meeting being called
• I’m not available to attend this meeting; how else can I contribute to this work? 

Many workplaces simply don’t provide an alternative way of participating, contributing or being involved in work … unless you’re there, at the meeting. 

And that’s not inclusive enough. It’s a dated way of working. 

But as times are changing and modern work is evolving, more people are realizing the cost of meetings and actively questioning them. 

The exclusion and drain of meetings — the time, effort, energy, resources and motivation — ARE worth calling out and pushing back on. 

Meeting culture has gone unchallenged for too long. 

It’s time to #meetless

Start by:

🟥 removing 1 in 3 meetings

🟥 declining 1 in 3 invites

🟥 questioning 1 in 3 requests. 

Meet less and you’ll make more and better progress.

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Three Driving Changes Impacting How We Work Today

Thank you to Leaderonomics for sharing this article on the changes to work. 

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Visual Mapping Techniques in Schools

I worked with the heads of department and wellbeing staff at Strathcona Girls Grammar recently. 

No PowerPoint. Woo hoo!

What did we do? Whiteboards and visual mapping tools for better meeting processes, greater creativity and deeper connections with each other … and students. 

Here are those committed and dedicated professionals, hard at work, before the students arrive in the next few days for the new school year. 

It was such a pleasure to work with them with these visual collaboration tools. I returned later in the week with a session for all staff!

If you're an educator, teacher or work in schools, get in touch to find out more about BWOW Schools - Better Ways of Working. 

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Dream on dreamers

Our brains aren’t meant to operate at optimal efficiency. All the time. 

Here are a few ways to offload your thoughts:

🌕 allow yourself to lose focus. We can’t keep at it all day.

🌕 let the mind wander to daydream and access your creative ideas/

🌕 try cognitive offloading. When you’re overloaded, offload by writing things down, typing them out or … I love to use the Voice Memo on my phone. Then it’s gone from your mind. Aaaah!

Don’t let cognitive overload burden you. 

Know a few techniques like these that will help you not just overcome overwhelm … but outsmart it — and be at the ready for the next time it happens. Read more in this article in Fast Company.

✨See more in my book ‘Argh! Too much information, not enough brain: A practical guide to outsmarting overwhelm’. It’s available in paperback, ebook and audio book. 

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Where work gets done

- A grey cubicle with no line of sight of other people, everyone baking under fluorescent lighting. 

- Walking outdoors listening and talking. 

- A cafe-style set-up with chairs and tables and a buzz about the space. 

- A lounge environment with comfortable seating, smooth edges and a menu to choose from. 

- A park bench in the shade with a view of the playground and the kids playing. 

The world of work and where work is done keeps evolving. 

With devices, software, apps and our smarts, many of us can work from a variety of locations, environments and spaces. 

And yes, many people don’t get to access this level of flexibility. But increasingly, people want greater control over the ‘where of work’.

They know the environments in which they work best. They have preferences for how things work for them and where they like to do paid work. 

It includes things like:

▫️Location and accessibility

▫️Arrival facilities or neighbouring facilities 

▫️The physical space available to set up, move about and spread out (hello to the spreader-outers!)

▫️The features, fittings and design of the space

▫️The equipment, furniture, power and resources available 

▫️The overall ambience and vibe of the space …

 This list isn’t exhaustive but it can help reveal that the things important to me, may not matter so much to you, and what’s a must for you, may not be on my list at all. 

On a recent visit to meet with the good people at Steelcase in Melbourne, I got to see more of the contemporary design elements, new furniture, equipment and tools that make for a modern workspace and workplace. 

Businesses are refreshing and updating their spaces — whether staff come in to the office frequently or not — so there are enhanced spaces for:

▫️Conversation

▫️Collaboration

▫️Silence

▫️Privacy

▫️Creativity

▫️Productivity

▫️Focus

▫️Recharging 

… and 

▫️Choice. 

The variety and choice of space in which to work helps match our mood to the task, our personality to the space, and our energy to the outcomes. 

The variables are many when we consider HOW people want to work and WHERE they do their best work. 

The refreshing of workspaces, workplaces and work environments is booming. And ‘where’ is part of the decision making process for many candidates in choosing to apply or accept a job role. 

Someone controlling where you work is about control … not about setting up the best possible working environment for where work gets done. 

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Testing 1 2 … 

I spent two half days in February 2023 recording the audio for my book ‘Sync Async: Making progress easier in the changing world of work’. 

It's great to work with the team recording at SquareSound in Port Melbourne — it’s where I’ve recorded two of my other audio books ‘ish’ and ‘Argh!’  

They know what they’re doing. It’s a pleasure to work with a professional team and to take your ideas from out of your mind, onto the page and then in to an audiobook. 

There’s been a lot of interest in the ebook and paperback for ‘Sync Async’ and many questions about whether there would be an audiobook … so I decided an audiobook would be a ‘yes’! 

Use your Audible subscription to download and listen. 

⭐️What’s async work all about? 

Have a read of this article in Leaderonomics 

Or this article in Forbes 

Or get the ebook or paperback of ‘Sync Async’ from wherever you get your books. The audio book is coming soooooon!

How to #meetless/Asynchronous Work/Workplace HR Trends/Watch for meeting hogs/Going for good enough

The best work resolution to make …

If you’re going to make a resolution about work this year, let it be this:

Resolve to reduce your work meetings this year. 

Meet less. Way less. 

Tally up last year’s meetings if you need to work out what ‘less’ would mean. And make sure it’s less by a lot. 

Being at the request of so many meeting invites weighs heavily on our time, attention and energy. 

And the drain is exaggerated when the things we want and need to do remain undone and incomplete. Exhaustion quickly returns after a day of back-to-back meetings with barely a break. And they are mostly dull, disengaging experiences that don’t facilitate active participation and contribution. 

Yes, many meetings could have been an email. Or not held at all. Or for this resolution … not attended at all. 

It could have been a chat message or a shared document or a first draft shared for comments. 

💥Resolve, vow and promise to decline invites more than you ever have before. 

💥Resolve to hold your nerve if you feel guilty about it or are shamed in to attending because a colleague wants you there … pleeeeese. 

💥And see this instead, as progressing towards more modern work. 

It is modern work that uses less dated and wasteful tools for control and communication, and uses more open tools for collaboration and contribution. 

Delete the time and energy drain that is the ‘have you got a moment’ or ‘it will only take a few mins’ or ‘can you just come to this meeting’. 

I’ll share more in the coming weeks on how to bring this resolution to practical reality. 

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Meet = sync  Meet less = async 

Here’s how to start achieving a #meetless resolution this year:

⬇️ DECREASE the amount of SYNCHRONOUS work you do with others : these are the meetings, quick chats, interviews, conversations where you all have to be there at the same time 

and … 

⬆️ INCREASE the amount of ASYNCHRONOUS work you do with others : this is work you do at times and in ways that suit you, like contribute to shared documents and files, have uninterrupted work time, use chat and messaging, email and video. 

Asynchronous ways of working provide HUGE flexibility, allowing people to contribute and work in ways and times that suit them. 

Asynchronous work can become more inclusive, more considerate and allow people more time to think and contribute … rather than the control, theatre and waste of an ‘everybody-now-meeting’. 

Save synchronous meetings for the times that really, truly matter and that absolutely need to be done with others, all at the same time. 

Yes, you still have meetings but stop meeting as the default action to progress work. 

It’s vital to learn and understand more about how to work asynchronously. 

It’s the best way to reduce pressure, stress and overwhelm and increase progress, wellbeing and engagement. 

Want to learn more…?

Get ‘Sync Async : Making progress easier in the changing world of work’ — for the tools, techniques and ways to help you #meetless and achieve the outcomes and results you’re aiming for. 

It’s available as an ebook and paperback wherever you get your books. 

Make #meetless something you’ll do this year - as a leader, manager, colleague and friend. 

Sync Async : Making progress easier in the changing world of work

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Workplace HR Trends 

It’s a great time to read about foresight and what we think might evolve or occur in workplaces and spaces. 

Review and consider how you’ll approach the year, what priorities and plans could be impacted and how you’ll evolve strategies, styles and your approach to work. 

The insights for Human Resources trends include things like: 

. Wellbeing

. Skills-based hiring

. Flexibility 

. Hybrid working and hybrid learning

. Reporting 

. Office redesign 

. Blended workforce

. Burnout 

Read more here.

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SNORT : Meeting hogs are on notice

There’s a perfect environment that meeting hogs love to create, and you need to be alert to it. 

Here are 4 signs a meeting hog is in the area :

🐽They call lots of meetings 

🐽They invite lots of people 

🐽They drone on for too long

🐽They don’t let many people speak, participate or contribute. 

The meeting hog’s work life revolves around all talk and no work. 

Meeting hogs love taking people away from their work activities and holding and controlling them like an audience at a performance. But the ‘show’ is a bad one. Stay alert! Keep an eye out for the meeting hog. 

They’ll be: 

🐽getting ready with committees and working groups

🐽suggesting regular status updates

🐽scheduling weekly check-ins

🐽setting up fortnightly rhythms and meeting cycles

and 

🐽sending out recurring appointments. 

But stay strong. 

This year aim to #meetless - for your own well-being, productivity, impact and motivation. 

I’ll share techniques to make this strong and positive change in your work life. Tackling and responding to the meeting hog is one of the key strategies you’ll need. 

Meetings are becoming old ways of working. Sure, not all meetings, but many … most of them. And meeting hogs love to argue for the importance of their meetings. 

Hold an intention to #meetless - First, stay alert to meeting hogs. 

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The good/bad trait to shift this year

If there’s a mindset you’d like to shift in 2023 … consider understanding and finding a replacement for perfectionism. 

This good/bad trait that’s often shared in job interviews when we’re asked about our weaknesses, isn’t worth the effort it drains from us. 

There’s no connection between perfectionism and high performance. *gulp*

And perfectionism can actually be behind anxiety, depression, overwork, rework, stress, and other issues we suffer from. 

The antidote, solution or alternative is going for good enough. But how do you do that? 

‘ish:The problem with our pursuit for perfection and the life-changing practice of good enough’ shares the research, stories, stats, steps and insight on how to think and work in ways that don’t require perfect anything. 

There are other, better ways to think and work. 

This award-winning book is available in paperback, audio and e-book - wherever you get your books. Have you read it yet ... or listened to it? 

It’s been recommended by many people who have experienced the significant shift it presents. If you’re up for it, it’s an easy read and listen. 

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All the remote things Podcast

It was a pleasure to join a recent podcast episode of ‘All the Remote Things’ with Tony Ponton. 

We talked through different concepts, ideas and thinking, plus a little about my background in communications and agile ways of working. I shared some tips on better ways of working!

Watch or listen to the full episode here.

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Unleashing Brilliance Podcast

And more podcastness right here with Janine Garner's Unleashing Brilliance. It was so great to have a conversation about imperfection, new ways of thinking and working, creativity and collaboration. Thanks Janine!

Listen here.