Maren Deepwell

Search results for: “mentoring”

  • 4 months into re-inventing Mondays

    4 months into re-inventing Mondays

    Time has flown by. It feels like only a moment ago that I was blogging about being 3 months into my career transition… and here we are, having passed the four month mark. Looking back at my previous posts on this topic has inspired me to share some updates about how things are going, how much my efforts to re-invent Mondays are bearing fruit and how free-lance life is treating me. In case you missed them, here are quick links to previous posts on this topic:

    Are you ready? Let’s jump in.

    Settling into uncertainty

    Not knowing what the following day, week or month would hold filled me with uncertainty during the first month of free-lance life. Although I had felt well prepared for not knowing what the day would bring, after all, life as a CEO was never predictable, I really felt it in those first few weeks. I remember recording a podcast in those early weeks, talking about my empty calendar, my empty inbox, the sense that it was really just me, sitting at my desk, alone, making it up as I went along.

    Fast forward to now, and I am glad to say that I have begun to settle into uncertainty. The past few months have had many ups and downs and brought much time for reflection, and I realise now that I need the uncertainty just now. I don’t want to know what the next day or week will look like. The not knowing gives me space to experience and try out different ways of working and allows me to figure out what I enjoy and what I’d prefer not to do again.

    A folder of things I have said no to

    My mix of pro bono and paid work definitely keeps me busy, and I am probably overcommitting my time in the interest of trying out new things. I am mentoring at a local high school, offering pro bono coaching, writing articles and going to events alongside consultancy contracts, course design, leadership development and workshops.

    I am on the hunt for what brings me joy, and what sparks my curiosity, and along the way I have plenty of experiences that teach me where I don’t feel I can contribute. Some things just aren’t a good fit, regardless of how lucrative they may be. Hence I have set up a new folder called literally ‘Things I have said no to’.

    So far, it’s not very full, but the list is growing steadily, and I hope to use it in the long term to help learn what really matters to me, what fills my cup, and what I *could* have said yes to for money. It is a privileged position to be in for sure, but it is also a way of exercising responsibility. I can’t do everything, and I need to focus my energy where it matters.

    Habits that work for me, and some that don’t

    In some of the previous posts I have talked a lot about my work/life balance and that continues to be a big theme for me. Recently I worked on a course about digital wellbeing, and trying out the exercises I designed prompted me to focus on what habits I have that foster wellbeing and help manage my relationship with technology. Given how nuanced my relationship with technology is this is a complex topic, but one worth thinking about. Here are some insights into what I feel works well and also some things that maybe don’t:

    Over the past four months, I have become A LOT BETTER at taking breaks. Breaks to step away from the screen, breaks from wearing headphones, from notifications, from social media, from email and from technology all together. This has all sorts of beneficial consequences. Take today. I had a pretty intense meeting, which demanded a lot of my attention and focus. Coming at the end of an already pretty busy morning of focused work, I ended the call with a headache. I felt tired, irritated. I got up, went downstairs, and had a drink of water. Stress headaches like that used to be quite a usual feature of my working life. Old me would have had a quick break, and then got back to work, trying to focus enough to ignore how my head felt. And it probably would have worked, but at the end of the day I would have felt spent, exhausted. Instead of returning to my desk, I took half an hour to do something different. I did a small DIY chore that had been on my to do list for ages, taking all my attention to sand and paint a small hole in the wall. Even after ten minutes my headache was gone, and I felt much better. I did go back to work after a while, feeling refreshed and ready to concentrate again. For me, that’s a win.

    One area of my life where technology has become more prevalent is fitness. I usually find half an hour in the morning to exercise, stretch or meditate. I watch the video class on the screen in my office, where I have enough space to spread a yoga mat or follow the routines. My neighbours, I hope, aren’t watching my efforts at jumping jacks… . The fitness app I use works with my smart watch, and enables me to match exercise choices to my mood and energy levels. Some days I want to sweat, some days I just want to sit. For a variety of reasons, morning meetings have become rare for me just now, and this morning I stood in the sun in my office in tree pose, happy to soak in early spring sunshine and energy. Another win!

    A habit that doesn’t work so well for me all the time is my CEO brain. It’s super helpful for running my free-lance business (and soon, a properly registered new company… more of that next month), and it’s equally valuable for leadership training and coaching and lots of other things. It’s helpful when I can help out, take responsibility as needed, and it can make working with me easy. I am so used to not breaking things, that I have become a very steady pair of hands. Unfortunately those steady hands are attached to a mind and heart that all too easily assume responsibility and care, too. I catch myself solving a problem or thinking about a strategy that my clients haven’t asked for. They may be paying me to design a workshop or a course, meanwhile I have revamped their professional development offering in my head. Coaching is a good antidote for CEO brain, as it’s trained me to place trust in the other person, to trust that they know or can find their path, or the solution to the problems facing them. And of course they do. They are creative and capable and amazing at doing what they do. As my own free-lance venture grows, I hope that I can utilise my CEO brain in good ways, without taking on responsibility beyond what is appropriate.

    On my wish-list

    At the start of embarking on this adventure my wish-list ran something like: make enough money to pay the bills, find more joy and balance. Along the way I unexpectedly acquired a record player for my study (yay!) and a lot more fun people to work with than I had imagined in those first few quiet weeks. Over the past few months my list has expanded and now includes: a sit/stand desk, more art for my work-space and a wall I can write and scribble on.

    The thing that isn’t on my wish list anymore is more joy. That’s definitely happening and I am grateful every day for this adventure and all the amazing people I get to work with every week.

    Listen

    Podcast episodes about my fresh start:

    Listen to Leading Virtual Teams on: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and Spotify.

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  • Non-fiction reading for February

    Non-fiction reading for February

    The book that really stayed with me last month was Coach the Person not the Problem by Marcia Reynolds. It’s a fascinating read full of practical guidance and insightful ideas, and a great read if you are interested in developing a coaching approach to leadership or your coaching and mentoring skills.

    There was a lot to take away from the book, such as a really useful habit to set an intention for a conversation or a coaching session at the start. For example, you might choose to focus on feeling open or curious or caring, and focus on that before the conversation starts. It sounds obvious, but in my experience that’s harder to put into practice than it sounds.

    I have a whole spectrum of interactions in any given week, and I am about to start mentoring young adults as part of a national programme, too. I don’t really know what to expect or what unexpected emotions, situations or challenges the clients I work with may bring into our session on any given day. I found the step by step guidance on how to establish and maintain a certain focus extremely helpful!

    On my radar for this month

    I read a lot of fiction in January, so these two titles are still on my list to read from last month:

    • Goth – A History by Lol Tolhurst
    • The Coaching Habit. Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever by Michael Bungay Stanier

    Non-fiction reading 2024

    Creativity and culture

    • Art Matters by Neil Gaiman and Chris Riddell
    • Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert

    Hybrid working and leadership

    • Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
    • Rooms of Their Own (Where Great Writers Write), Improbable Libraries and Shedworking, all three by Alex Johnson
    • Working Identity: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career by Herminia Ibarra

    Coaching and reflective inquiry

    • The Big Book of Beautiful Questions by Warren Berger
    • Coach the Person not the Problem by Marcia Reynolds

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  • My personal vault. Or what I learnt from a decade of progress tracking

    My personal vault. Or what I learnt from a decade of progress tracking

    I made a fun discovery today: It’s now been over ten years since I started this list of things I have done. Wow! I had no idea it had been that long, and seeing those entries from 2013 made me pause and reflect on the habit of keeping the list, a decade in the making.

    Why did I start tracking progress in this way?

    My archive page is a lot like a personal vault. If you scroll all the way to the bottom of the page you’ll see that at the start I added some entries a bit like you would on a CV. I added dates of degrees I completed and images of things like my doctoral thesis from 2008:

    Initially, I added these things as I was moving blogs, and I didn’t want to loose track of what I was up to. I was just in the finishing years of my graduate studies, and started working full-time and I had no real idea of what was going to happen next.

    For a while, in the first few years of working at ALT, I didn’t really keep a record of anything until I started blogging publicly again in 2010 on WordPress, rather than my old Google Blogger sites. But then from 2013 onwards I started keeping a running list of projects I completed, conference papers, media stuff and so on.

    Looking back to 2013, this entry makes me smile: June: Radio 4, Today Programme . Not particularly helpful for anyone other than myself, but it does bring back the morning I spent nervously sitting next to a very intimidating John Humphreys in the BBC radio studios in London. Similarly, in 2014 I went to the European Parliament in Brussels… noted in a similarly cryptic entry, but equally memorable for me. And although the 2015 link to an appearance on Parliament TV still works, many of the older links have rotted.

    As we progress through the years the list of things I recorded each year becomes both longer and more comprehensive, particularly as I started to add links to blog posts on my own domain that contain a lot more information about a specific event or project. 2020’s entry is a bit shorter, but it looks remarkably ‘normal’ given everything that happened that year.

    What do I use it for?

    So, how is this useful?

    Well, the practice of making the list and adding new entries to it is useful to me in itself. I could probably use a tool to compile this kind of information for me, but there’s great value for me in the act of processing what I have done and reflecting on it as I make the list.

    For example, adding new items to the 2024 section of the list earlier today made me realise just how busy a year I have had so far, and we are only three weeks into it:

    So on a regular basis, as I publish something or a new project gets scheduled or completed, I will update the list, add links and date each entry. Wherever possible I try to capture what I am doing in a blog post as I add it to the list, so that I don’t have to rely on external websites to retain the information.

    Then, on a monthly basis as I compile my newsletter, I refer back to the list, and cross-check what else I may want to mention. This is super helpful for me and makes compiling the newsletter pretty easy.

    I also use the list as an archive in case someone asks me what talks I have recently given or what papers I have published on a particular topic and I make use of it for reviewing my progress or performance.

    It’s a kind of super power when it comes to things like annual appraisals or planning career development. It doesn’t take me long to answer the questions like ‘What have you done in the past year ?’ or make a list of articles I have published. That is magnified if I want to write end of year reviews or reflections.

    It’s important to me to keep learning and developing and over the years keeping this archive up to date has become a natural process of my workflow, just as blogging or journalling have become part of my practice.

    Tips for starting your own archive

    If you are keen to start your own list, get started with literally anything. You could add a workshop you have run or an event you attended, or even books you’ve read. You could add projects you have been involved with or led, or papers you have published.

    The key is not to worry whether something is worthy of being included, and to simply include everything. I find once you start making a list of everything, things quickly amount to more than expected.

    Over time, as you practice keeping the list, the satisfaction of adding to it will become a good motivator for keeping going but initially it can be difficult to find the courage to get started.

    You might prefer to keep your list private, which is completely fine. The reason I have mine on my blog is that I am comfortable working here and I use my blog every few days. It’s a convenient place for me to refer back to or to send people to, but I don’t think the page that shows my archive gets a lot of visitors.

    For me however it is priceless, and it reminds me when I have low days how much I have achieved over the years. Maybe your list will do the same for you.

    One consideration for me is that I want to do what I can to keep the data safe. That is why I don’t rely on a platform like LinkedIn to keep this information. In an ideal world I might update the information somewhere like that, a network where folk who consider working with me might more easily get an idea of what I have accomplished. However, although that would be useful, I don’t trust that the information will still be there in 10 years or that it won’t suddenly get reformatted or repurposed as platforms change. Thus, I keep it here on my own domain first and foremost, and I update everywhere else when I feel it’s necessary.

    So, good luck if you are just getting started and kudos to you if you are already on your way to keeping that precious list of everything you’ve done.

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    Cover image credit: Photo by C M on Unsplash

  • Thank you for an awesome year in coaching

    Thank you for an awesome year in coaching

    This week I am kicking off blogging with a BIG thank you to all my coaching clients and fellow coaches for an amazing year!

    I am really proud to have completed all components of my first milestone credential as a professional coach – thanks to Katie Linder’s inspiring training programme and all the coaches I have met and connected with through this supportive network over the past two years.

    As I wait to complete the formal credentialing process it’s interesting to look back to when I started coach training in January 2022. At that stage I wasn’t expected that two years later coaching and mentoring would become such an important part of my professional practice. It’s been a fantastic fit for me from the start, and throughout the training process I have learnt so much about leadership and professional development.

    Until October all of my coaching and coach training had to be accommodated alongside a very full on job, and I am grateful to have hit the milestone of having worked with 25+ clients in the past year! Mostly individuals, and also a few teams, have been part of my work and I am grateful to everyone who’s connected with me about coaching.

    It’s been a huge privilege to share your journeys and a whole lot of fun to put curiosity at the heart of exploring work, life and everything in between. This year I have worked with academics, edtech professionals, leaders and their teams, founders and entrepreneurs – and I am already looking forward to what 2024 has in store for us! 

    Share your feedback or a testimonial

    Do you have feedback about coaching with me or a testimonial I could share with future clients? Get in touch, share your feedback on social media or complete the form below. I’d love to hear from you.

  • Curious about coaching? Find out what to expect, how to prepare and how to make the most of it

    Curious about coaching? Find out what to expect, how to prepare and how to make the most of it

    This academic year I am looking forward to working with many new clients, most of whom are new to coaching. The questions I get asked most often by new clients or those considering giving coaching a go, are… ‘What is a coaching session like?’, ‘What should I expect from the first session?’, ‘How should I prepare?’ and also ‘How can I make the most of it?’.

    In this post, I have brought together answers and examples to give you a sense of coaching with me, to explain what’s involved and what to expect. This way, you can hopefully find at least a starting point and we can discuss other questions you have when we meet.

    When is coaching a good fit?

    The question most of my new clients ask to begin with, is whether coaching is right for them. Most often, we discuss this in our initial conversation, which gives them a chance to meet me, discuss what brings them to coaching and what they are hoping to achieve as well as how I can help. Coaching can bring many benefits, and it’s a really powerful tool for self discovery, productivity, professional development and much more, but it isn’t the right fit for everyone or every situation.

    Coaching might be a good fit if you are:

    • Looking for a safe or creative space to focus on an important decision or period of change;
    • Feeling stuck and struggle with productivity or specific tasks;
    • Ready to plan for the next stage in your career or further ahead to the next 5 years;
    • Looking for someone to think (or draw) with to find solutions to problems.

    Coaching offers a range of tools, resources and strategies in a creative, safe space that is focused on your needs. With a background in art and design, I build creativity into all aspects of my coaching practice. We might use sketch notes, visual conversations and other creative approaches as part of coaching sessions, and to help tackle any problems you bring to the session.

    What to expect

    If you are new to coaching, you might well ask how coaching is different from mentoring, therapy or hiring a consultant. Coaching certainly has aspects in common with all three, but is also distinct from them as a professional practice. In contrast to mentoring, which usually includes passing on context-specific know-how or experience, I coach clients from a range of disciplines or backgrounds. For example, I might coach a mid-career science researcher who is stepping up into a senior role even though I don’t have a background in science.

    Similarly, coaching has commonalities with therapy in that it entails you getting know yourself better and engage in reflection. However, distinct from therapy, coaching is usually focused on the present or future plans, instead of looking back to understand how, for instance, childhood experiences have shaped you.

    Coaching, particularly for groups and teams, can also be similar to having an expert act as an external consultant, advising your team, and indeed this is something I also do. However, as a coach, I work with teams and organisations to help them find solutions and ways forward, rather than presenting solutions to my clients.

    My coaching approach is specifically designed for professionals working in the third sector, education and learning technology, with a focus on leadership and career development, as well as managing change and creative problem solving. I offer support tailored to you, creating a flexible and memorable coaching engagement that enables you to develop into the kind of leader you want to be in your community, team, project or organisation.

    How to prepare

    Choose a quiet and private space for your coaching session, and make sure you are comfortable and able to focus on the conversation. I usually use Zoom to facilitate our online coaching sessions, and I also offer to meet in person for a coaching day.

    During a typical coaching session, we will be setting an agenda together, defining what the session will focus on and session objectives. We will use powerful questions to reflect and explore the topic, and I might recommend specific activities and resources to help you work towards your aim such as planning tools, milestones maps and tools to help you identify your values. I’ll make sure we regularly check in on session objectives and ensure you leave each session ready to take next steps.

    All 1-to-1 coaching packages include:

    • Exploratory 30 min conversation
    • Coaching plan
    • Six 1-hour coaching sessions (online)
    • Coaching resources

    I regularly share coaching ideas on my blog and on the podcast, which include lots of practical examples and resources for you to try.

    Walk with your coach

    Sometimes a video call is not the best environment to get us thinking, so for established clients I offer coaching sessions whilst we walk. Usually, this would be coaching via a phone call, but if you are based locally, we could also meet in person. Walking coaching sessions are particularly suited to think together about difficult situations or to reflect on a particular problem or idea.

    Why I love coaching

    I had wonderful mentors and coaches on my journey to becoming a CEO and in the 11 years in an executive leadership role in the non-profit sector. Coaching helped me through difficult periods of transition and supported me in taking difficult decisions under pressure. My own experience has helped me appreciate just how powerful coaching can be and how valuable it is for developing all aspects of your professional practice and values as an emerging leader or an established one. 

    What’s most rewarding for me about coaching is working with clients who are facing great challenges. I really enjoy working together to reflect, set new goals and find out what the next step might be. I am always curious to hear about where you want to go next and help you get there no matter whether that’s getting out of bed tomorrow morning or a new job.

    One tool I have been trying out with clients is writing a personal mission or vision statement (in one sentence), which is harder than it sounds. I tried it out for myself, and it prompted interesting reflections for me. If you’d like to have a go yourself, start with your goal and values and try to express these in one sentence. Let me know how you get on 🙂

    What qualifies me to be a coach?

    I bring a lot of professional and leadership experience to coaching, and as a coach I adhere to the ethical and professional standards of the the International Coaching Federation (ICF). The ICF defines coaching as ‘partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximise their personal and professional potential. The process of coaching often unlocks previously untapped sources of imagination, productivity and leadership’. With close to 100 hours of ICF standard coaching experience and having completed all mandatory training I am in the process of becoming an ICF Associate Certified Coach.

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  • Feeling like a CEO?! – My last career transition update: July 2023

    Feeling like a CEO?! – My last career transition update: July 2023

    When I first started in my role in spring 2012, I started working with a wonderful mentor, Margaret. Initially it was meant to be a short-term measure to support me as I stepped up into my first executive role. As it turned out, Margaret and I established a long term relationship that reached well into 2018, and has since turned into a wonderful friendship. We co-wrote three blog posts in 2018, mentoring unpacked, reflecting on our journey and work together.

    Recently Margaret forwarded me an email I sent to her in my first week as CEO. It was lovely to go back to those early days and read about them in my own words. Although I applied for the role as an external candidate, I had in fact been working for the organisation since 2008 in different roles, and so my first day turned out to be a bit of a non-event. I just turned up for work as usual, as did everyone else, and we got on with our lives. The fact that I was now officially in charge wasn’t mentioned by any of my colleagues. My email brought that palpable sense of leadership transitions always being a bit weird right back to me.

    I worked so very hard in that first week, and my words, although upbeat and confident, reflect that in every word. Establishing authority, setting boundaries so that I could meet my new expanded remit and responsibilities, holding colleagues to account when they challenged me. It definitely wasn’t easy, but I loved it. I was so excited, and that excitement carried me through many years.

    Fast forward to the present and this week is a special week, as it rings in the final stage of handover and transition; and afforded me and our current team two days to meet in person together with Billy, our new CEO. A rare treat indeed and, as it turns out when you are challenged in the crystal maze, a huge amount of fun! We had the best time solving puzzles, eating pizza and planning ahead for what is promising to be a wonderful 30th Annual Conference for the Association (incidentally, if you have not yet registered, do it before the early bird deadline on 6th August).

    For me, personally, it feels a lot like my first few weeks on the job in reverse. Instead of a post-it note at the bottom of my monitor reminding me of my new role, I now have welcome reminders everywhere that I am stepping away from the CEO perspective and into a new mindset. Although it’s bittersweet, it feels like the right step for me, and it feels good to have such a committed and inspiring individual step into that space. If you don’t already, follow Billy on social media and find out more about the transition on Billy’s blog!

    Next month, there will be no transition update as we will be completing our handover! So instead look out for a big thank you post from me as we ring in a new era of leadership for ALT.

    Previous posts in this series:

    Preparing for my new career chapter

    So whilst this is all happening, how am I preparing for my new chapter you might ask?

    Well, at the moment, I work with my coaching clients in the evenings and some weekends, and it’s inspiring for me to work with emerging leaders and managers who are finding their footing leading projects and people.

    Having had some wonderful mentors and coaches myself over the past 15 years, I feel very lucky indeed that I now get to support people who are developing in their careers whilst finding work/life balance and being there with them every step of the way.

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