By Kym Dakin
After my third Zoom interaction today, I’m experiencing an all too familiar feeling… I’m “Zoomed”. I’ll go out for a walk, or grab yet another coffee, or maybe just eat something I shouldn’t, but that won’t help much. Zoom and online platforms like it are convenient and all, but I’m not alone in aching for some kind of more satisfying connection with my Zoom-mates.
Luckily, the May 17th ATD program has an intriguing topic on offer: “How to Use Visual Image Cards to Create Deeper Connection.” Yippee! It sounds like just what I need, but I have to wait a whole month for that session.
In the meantime, I did some googling on these cards, and two other options: this may be just what we need to perk up these online meetings going forward.
Compatibility Communication System Cards
CCS Cards were first developed in the 90’s at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney Australia as a series of images to gauge people’s reactions to new museum installations. From there it became a board game introduced at the 1996 World’s Fair, and eventually became the virtual training tool that Leonie Cutts, founder of the CCs Corporation, and Nancy Ancheles of Catalyst & Co. will introduce us to in their May 17th zoom presentation.
Ancheles and Cutts promise that “When used well, these deceptively simple tools can improve participation, stimulate discovery, encourage mutual disclosure and equality of voice, speed up agreement across groups and inspire collaboration and action.” Sounds like just the antidote to zoom fatigue.
But hang on, there’s more….
Data Stories: Suddenly, the Numbers Come to Life…
Finally, let’s look at tools that can create data stories - which I’ve always considered a contradiction in terms, but I’m about to be educated.
BTW, if you don’t have the tech bandwidth of a large corporation, there are services such as The DataFace or Soak or Juice Analytics who can help.
In fact, for some inspiration, Juice Analytics has come up with an intriguing list of the “20 Best Data Storytelling Examples” I’m going to highlight three of these. Warning: the topics may be depressing, but once you click on the links, you’ll see how the data comes to life by compiling numbers, language and statistics over a given span of time, exemplifying the secret sauce of a successful Data Story: data visualization, interactivity, and classic storytelling.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have put together a startlingly vivid data story pictograph for their “Goalkeepers” mission, titled Examining Inequality: How Geography and Gender Stack the Deck For or Against You.
You’ll notice three timelines with the peaks indicating the amount of obstacle present in the progression towards a healthy, productive life of Bill Gates, Melinda Gates, and a small girl born in Africa. The difference is absolutely startling. anyone looking at this gets the strong visceral message in the verbal description: “Goalkeepers is our annual report card on the world’s progress toward the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), 17 ambitious goals the member states of the United Nations committed to reaching by 2030. As we write, billions of people are projected to miss the targets that we all agreed represent a decent life. If we hope to accelerate progress, we must address the inequality that separates the lucky from the unlucky.”
Gun Deaths in the Periscope
Another top data story comes to us from Periscopic, and it amplifies, in a sobering build of visual data, what millions of lives taken by guns cost in years unlived. As Juice describes it “This visualization shows “stolen years” due to gun deaths. It is a masterclass in connecting your audience with the emotional message by gradually revealing the data.” We are, as a culture, becoming numb to yet another mass shooting. But there is something staggering about seeing numbers displayed this way that is hard to ignore. And that’s the point.
And You Thought it was Just You....
No wonder Americans are anxious. And The Pudding’s entry spells this out in “30 Years of American Anxieties” by compiling “Dear Abby” letters over a 3 decade span of time. This entry creates, by analyzing the questions and emotions in over 20,000 letters, a visual story of the internal worries of Americans over time. Clicking on the link will give you a deep dive into some of the top sources of stress: sex, religion, and LBGTQ issues.
Now that we’re all stressed and anxious - it’s time for a treat, and this just could be better than chocolate! (But speaking of chocolate - this link will get you to a delicious - and PRETTY source: Chocolats Passion on Brackett Street in Portland, Maine. Not a Mainer? No worries - they send these babies across the globe!)
Artificial Intelligence with Soul!
Clive Thompson, a tech writer for LinkedIn’s Creator’s Hub shared a fascinating piece last month that’s been lurking in my memory ever since.
The image at the top of this post was created using AI to produce visuals to Emily Dickinson’s Poem “Because I could not Stop for Death”. After choosing an assortment of particular style of visuals, Thompson fed the poem line by line into the "Dream" generative tool, And out popped those stunning images. As Thompson explains, “The AI’s try earnestly to depict what you described, but they filter it through an inhumanly vectorized form of machine perception that has no clue how the world actually works.” So out pops the amazingly weird visual responses.
In fairness, Dickinson’s poetry can also be considered strangely hallucinating - “tell the truth, but at a slant”, after all. And there’s some serious “slantage” happening with the Dream tool!
How could you use this particular tool in a meeting? You might have to take a bit of time experimenting, but you could get imagery by feeding specific problems, and the emotions they generate into “Dream” - for example, feed in a sentence like: Our supply chain issues are STILL not improving! Or “Our team brought their A Game to the marketing plan for ACE Bioenergetics. Another Contract Coup!
For me, I don’t really have the budget for the higher tech options, stunning as they are. This means I’m really looking forward to the ATD topic: “Working Across the Table or the Globe: How to Use Visual Image Cards to Create Deeper Connection” on May 17th. Sign up here, and I hope to see you there!
At the end of this week, we'll be one-third of the way through this year 2022.
OK, first of all it is 2022--twenty-twenty-two--two thousand, twenty-two--WHAT?!
AND. We're one-third of the way through it. Wild.
What an opportunity for appreciation!!
Time be thine, And thy best graces spend it at thy will. William Shakespeare
Time be thine,
And thy best graces spend it at thy will.
William Shakespeare
What are you doing with your time? (no pressure)
I hope you are celebrating your time--recognizing that it is not a dress rehearsal--making it what you want it to be, need it to be, wish it to be, appreciating it and giving yourself grace in it.
Enjoy the blooming spring and celebrate your day!
(And remember to check out the great deals from ATD in this final week of Member Appreciation Month 2022!! We'll have to look at all of the great benefits of membership in this blog!!)
Guest Blogger: Kathleen Kerr
As a facilitator and advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) I strive to practice the ACT model – Acknowledge my biases, Challenge my own thinking, and Train my brain to see other options so I can act in ways congruent with my values. And this is still hard. And I am still learning. Here is an example of what I mean.
On a recent trip to Nashville, while in the Washington, DC airport, I am in the TSA security line, or in one of five queues, which lead up to three TSA desks.
While my attention was not fully on the line and who was next, I had done a quick mental count to see when it would be my turn – before I knew it, the TSA agent was calling out, “Next!” and she was looking directly at me. In that split second, behavioral conditioning drove me forward as I did not want to hold up the line. But as the TSA agent was checking my ID against my ticket and ushering me through the line, I realized that a Black woman in the line next to me had been waiting longer than me. If the agents followed the process, i.e., line 1, person one, line 2, person one, line 1, person two, line 2 person two…, she would have her turn, her ID checked, and she would have been on her way through security before me.
It was in that moment I realized how frequently this kind of inadvertent but real occurrence happens and how those of us not suffering in the experience can easily not notice, but for those on the losing end repeatedly, it feels like death by a thousand paper cuts.
The moment passed too quickly, and a few people later, it was her turn. By then, I was through the line and into the x-ray machine. When I had my wits about me to find her and let her know that I saw what happened, she was still on the other side of the x-ray machine. I was unable to catch her eye, and even if I did, how could I convey my thoughts with just a look and no words? That experience bothered me all the way to Nashville and beyond.
Luckily, life has a way of creating endless learning opportunities if only we recognize them and act on the learning opportunity. In an Unconscious Bias training I facilitated recently, I shared this story to illustrate how bias in action affects others and our complicity in the act. It is not enough to be aware of our biases, we must behave differently to create real and sustained change. While I was unable to behave differently in that moment, as one of my girlfriends told me when I shared this story, now, I will be on the lookout for this and next time I will act. And yes, it will be hard, even scary sometimes. Learning is often painful. For now, my job is to lean into the pain and trust that the payoff benefits everyone.
Have you read the 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace by Gary Chapman and Paul White? It looks at the power of expressing appreciation within organizations (and the world), how each of us of has a preferred way of receiving appreciation, how powerful it can be in creating community and wellness, and how meaningful that is both to the individual and the larger community.
How do you express appreciation? Is that the same way you prefer to receive it? Does it vary by situation? or by the person to whom or from whom the appreciation is expressed?
Do you feel appreciated in your workplace? Do you receive appreciation from supervisors? from peers? from customers/clients--either internal or external?
What makes appreciation meaningful to you?
guest author Kymberly Dakin-Neal
I want a DEI Do-over
Last month I was invited to a zoom performance by District Community Playback in Washington DC. I was excited to see how this company utilized a virtual platform for the audience. Playback is an art form that literally “plays back” true stories from the audience/ viewers, using improvisational forms, movement, and music. The conductor had asked us - the viewers - for instances of difference in the sociometric opening. A few people had volunteered, and then there was a lull after the conductor asked for more. So I decided to unmute and speak up - at the same time that another viewer, a black man, spoke up. This gentleman graciously gave me the floor. I thanked him and offered my instance of difference. I didn’t think anything of it until after the conductor asked for people to share feelings about how the previous segment had gone. The first woman to volunteer was a woman of color who said she felt frustrated that she did not get to hear from the black man who had given me the floor. She went on to say that this dynamic - a person of color stepping aside for a white person - was endemic in our culture, and she felt frustrated in seeing this play out yet again and being robbed of the story the man had to tell.
I felt myself stop breathing for a few seconds, like I’d been slapped in the face. After I recovered a bit, realization began to form. I had taken the man’s graciousness at face value, when in fact, if I had understood the exchange from a wider perspective, I might have seen the implications more quickly. But the truth is, as a white person in America, my privileges include not having to widen my perspective, whereas, people of color can’t afford to ever narrow their own.
Learning is painful. Regardless of how anti-racist I may believe I am, if I am not aware, and can’t own, that the scales have always been tipped in my direction, even as a woman, then I’m only adding to a pervasive and centuries old scourge.
The April Maine ATD panel event, titled “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion – Strategies that Work” is one I am looking forward to. I hope you will attend as well. The panelists: Dr. Idella Glenn of USM, Dr. Ryan Polly of Maine Health, David Pease of Bangor Savings Bank, and Roy King of the Maine Dept. of Corrections come from a variety of experience, background, and points of view. I have much to learn about this topic no matter how convinced I may be of my own good intentions. Maybe you do too. It’s sure to be an interesting morning for everyone.
We're coming right up on April, which is Member Appreciation Month in the world of ATD! And dear ATD Maine Chapter Members, we DO appreciate you!!
You're our network, our colleagues, and our friends! You care about Talent Development and your own development! You bring your questions and insights, your energy and enthusiasm, your challenges and discoveries to the mix and by doing so lift up all of us in this chapter, in this industry!
Thank you for sticking with us (or joining us) over the last couple of years! They've been something else, huh? So much learning! So much to learn!
We have a great future ahead of us, together!
Thanks!!
*And, keep an eye out for some of the Member Appreciation opportunities ATD national will be offering this month!
Congratulations to our 2021 Board for guiding our chapter to earning ATD's Care Plus status!!
Heartfelt thanks to our 2021 board members: Richard Parent (president), Debbie Madden (past president), Suzanne Hand (finance), Jae Allain (technology), Lee Ann Black (programs), Amy Ayotte (operations), Susan White Ahl (membership), Catherine Menyhart (volunteers & SIGs)!!
Happy World Poetry Day!
How does poetry fit with Talent Development? We're just trying to help people understand what they do and how to do it, right?
Ursula LeGuin said:
“Science describes accurately from outside, poetry describes accurately from inside. Science explicates, poetry implicates. Both celebrate what they describe.”
And Alice Osborn has this take:
"Poetry is so important because it helps us understand and appreciate the world around us. Poetry’s strength lies in its ability to shed a 'sideways' light on the world, so the truth sneaks up on you. No question about it. Poetry teaches us how to live. Poetry is like the Windex on a grubby car window—it bares open the vulnerabilities of human beings so we can all relate to each other a little better."
Isn't that some of what we do in talent development? --create opportunities "so we can all relate to each other a little better"? I love the idea of providing a "sideways light"--Zoom has certainly taught us a couple things about lighting!--and cleaning off the windows we look through to see who is there and what they're going through.
Inclusion. Sometimes it's hard to come at straight on--it's hard to see the exclusion head-on, but with that sideways light and with the inside-out explanation of poetry, we can see and better understand what is right in front of us.
This video got me thinking about inclusion this morning. Imagine not being able to hear the words--so not being able to experience them--their fullness, specificity, vagary, meaning, resonance, musicality. How can we recreate the true experience without just a simple translation? The experience of spoken-word poetry is so much more than just the words--what about what you do in Talent Development? Is it just the words that can easily be translated to people with different backgrounds, cultures, or languages? How else can we provide support to recreate the experience?
This morning, as we listened to Jason Gootman talk about forming self-care habits that stick, it occurred to me that today is the two-year anniversary (ATD Program day-wise, anyway) of our pivot to virtual programs in response to the pandemic.
That blows my mind.
... that it has been two full years, that it has been *only* two years, that we were able to "pivot" so quickly (and adeptly!), that we've retained a core of active participants, an active board, and active SIG, that we are continuing to invest and grow in our industry, that we--individually and as a group--are so very resilient in the face of all that the last two years have brought us.
I hope you'll look the Ides of March right in the eye (the I), and say "not today Brute'!" #WeGotThis!
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