There will always be frustrations and things that feel like they’re blocking progress. I think the thing is that you can’t change anyone else, but you can change yourself, and then over time, that will impact your environment.
We’ve just returned from hosting the 2022 edition of our annual Humanizing Work Conference in Veil, Colorado. On the last day of the conference, we asked a few of the participants to share an idea or concept they picked up that was particularly meaningful or useful to them, that they thought you might benefit from hearing.
In this episode, you’ll get a glimpse into the takeaways from seven participants on ideas you can use at work right away.
Links
Ignite Insights + Innovation
Helping Improve
Lee Likes Bikes
Full Transcript
Peter Green
Welcome to this special edition of The Humanizing Work Show. We’ve just returned from hosting the 2022 edition of our annual Humanizing Work Conference in Vail, Colorado. On the last day of the conference, we asked a few of the participants to share some idea or concept they picked up that was particularly meaningful or useful to them, one that they thought you might benefit from hearing. This was the first year we’ve been in person in the conference since 2019, and it was a joy to be with each other and all of the participants.
Richard and I were especially grateful to be joined by some of our best friends in facilitating the sessions. Our roster included world class coaches and trainers, Tricia Broderick from Ignite Insight + Innovation, Jake Calabrese and Paul Tevis from Helping Improve, and Lee McCormick, a champion downhill mountain biker and mountain bike coach from Lee Likes Bikes. For all of our listeners, we’re so glad to have you listening in. If you’d like to help spread the message of humanizing work, the best thing you can do is rate the podcast, subscribe and share it with others. If you’re watching on YouTube, please hit the subscribe button and the like video, and then hit the notification button so you always have the latest episode at the top of your list.
First, we’re going to hear from Arren Mund, who works at Ag Leader. His key takeaway was based on Tricia’s session called Managing Up.
Arren Mund
In my mind, managing up meant telling those above you, you know, how they’re doing things wrong and helping them fix them. And she reworded it to partnering up. So for me, that was that aha: “holy moly, partnering up means I have some responsibility. I can’t just complain?”, and of course I can’t. So I needed the smack in the face.
Peter Green
Next up is Jerry Corona from Ticketmaster, whose take away was based on a session I offered called Commitments and Accountability. What Jerry shares is a good example of how the participants at the Humanizing Work Conference often learn as much or more from each other as they do from us as facilitators, since his takeaway was not a specific point I emphasized in the session. Instead, Jerry’s takeaway resulted from breakout group discussions during the session and then afterwards with his learning group.
Jerry Corona
The one experience that I’m really going to take home that I found out that I thought I had to get a commitment from my team. I realized I’m the one that needs to make a commitment, not my team. That’s the one thing that really was very surprising to me, and I now realize that maybe I could take that and I need to make changes in myself, not my team’s.
Peter Green
Liz Erbe from United Fire Group shares two takeaways. The first is from Lee McCormick’s session Business Coaching Lessons from a Top Extreme Sports Coach. And it’s related to the fear that some of us experience when trying something new. Liz also shares what it was like being with team members in person for the first time–an important reminder to all of us about the challenge of remote work and how important it is to spend at least some time in person with teammates on a regular basis in order to develop relationships and trust.
Liz Erbe
The most recent one, which I’ll just go with that little bias there was this morning with Lee, and we talked about lots of different things that apply to professional coaching. And the number one thing he said was “believe that you won’t die”, right? Like when you’re going to try something new. I think that’s really big, because I think there are a lot of people that struggle with that and that it was such a simple way to articulate what I can see in other people who are afraid to try something new. And it was more of a simple, simpler way for me to dig into what it is that maybe somebody else might be struggling to do. And then I just got a couple tools that, to help with conversations that I tend to need to have at work that I often struggle to talk about. But I left with some really nice structures. And then the biggest one is I got to watch people that I work with learn. That was huge to me. Like it wasn’t so much that like this big moment, so much as it was, I got to see them feel emotion. I got to see them self-reflect and I got to see them react to that and ask questions. So getting to see them learn was insightful. I, I learned more about how they learn and what they enjoy and what they look like when they are happy and what they look like when they are thinking and what they look like when they’re trying to solve a problem. In this remote world. I’ve never worked physically in the space with these people in over two years, and I feel like not just not to separate the content from any learning, but like I got so much from just being here with them that I would not be able to get just working with them at home.
Peter Green
Next up is Megan Twatchmann, also from UFG, whose takeaway is from a session Paul Tevis taught on using improv skills at work.
Megan Twatchmann
Yeah, so I actually had a personal aha moment. I am deathly afraid of being on stage, of improv, of anything that’s not rehearsed or scheduled. I had a person at the conference come up to me, I didn’t know him, and he encouraged me to attend this improv session. And the aha moment was: one, I can do it. And two, I can use it as a scrum master, and that was just a huge aha moment.
Peter Green
Next we have Ryan Witt who works with Arren at Ag leader. Ryan shares the aha moment he experienced at Tricia’s session on Being a Courageous Leader.
Ryan Witt
One of the things we learned was in one of Tricia’s classes, so it was being a courageous leader. And that’s something that I’ve always thought I’ve done well. But there’s also times when I chickened out and she gave us several new little tools and ways to think through it that I’m very confident will help immensely the next time things come around.
Peter Green
Next up is Michaela Humphrey from United Fire Group, whose takeaway is really about the value of seeking out ongoing learning experiences and then being open to learn from whatever those experiences have to offer.
Michaela Humphrey
I definitely got way more than I expected out of this. I got to bring some of my own issues and struggles with me and have actually learned how to apply the tools and techniques. I don’t just have to go back going, “I have all these great tools, but I don’t really know how to implement them with my team.” I’ve learned how to implement them. So I’m super excited to go back and bring all of these wonderful tools with me.
Peter Green
Finally, we have Chad Robertson from Netscout who had an important mental shift related to leading change.
Chad Robertson
Just the reminder that no matter where I go, no matter what team I’m working on, no matter what the role, there will always be frustrations and there will always be things that feel like they’re limiters or feel like block blocking progress. But and all of that is subject to change, but it changes very slowly. And so I think what I realized, again, it’s like, you know, you learn a lesson until you finally learn it and it gets repeated until you learn it. I think is the thing is the that you can’t change anything else. You can’t change your environment, you can change yourself and then yourself over time will impact your environment. It’s just a much longer. It’s a strategic goal. It’s a strategic outcome instead of just a tactical one. And so that’s it. It’s just reflecting again that figure out how to be a better me, and then let that shine.
Peter Green
We’re so grateful to all of these participants for taking a few moments away from the conference to share their takeaways with you. The Humanizing Work Conference is a really special and unique gathering, and we hope to see you at next year’s conference. If you’re not already an alumni of our courses, you can qualify to attend by attending any course offered by Humanizing Work, Ignite Insight + Innovation, or Helping Improve. We’ll drop links to all of these sites on the episode page at humanizingwork.com/show.
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