About Retrospectives
As part of my commitment to growth and belief in the importance of self-reflection, I added a new element to my year.
The purpose of the retrospective is pulled directly from Agile Methodology. As stated in the Principles from the Agile Manifesto:
At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.
I’m adopting the retrospective to look back on what worked, what didn’t, and collect some thoughts on future actions.
While this post is primarily an exercise for me, I’m also committed to working in public and I hope that seeing the process will inspire you to reflect on who you were this year, and get you thinking about who you want to be next year.
Every year my first post will be My Three Words and my last post of the year will be the Retrospective.
Here is my look back on 2023:
What went well
This year, I finally felt like I was back in a rhythm, professionally.
The company I co-founded with Sarah Ohanesian, Super Productive, had a stellar year. This is far and away the most capable and well run company I’ve ever been a part of. The secret sauce is no mystery to anyone: my business partner. Sarah and I are a force to be reckoned with whereas on my own, I am a lot of potential and a lot of missed opportunities. This third year working together has solidified, for me, that she and I should continue working together for most, if not all, of the rest of my career.
I also got back to professional speaking. In addition to my own Keynote, The Way of The Lovable Leader, I created a tag-team keynote with Sarah that people are clamoring for. It’s called Brains @ Work, and it’s about the invisible power of Neurodiversity at work. We show how important it is and how valuable it can be to create an environment for different types of brains to thrive.
From a content perspective, I feel proud of the following:
- I released the audiobook version of The Lovable Leader.
- I launched a new podcast called The Post Pod Show with my friend, and fellow podcaster, Lou Diamond. It’s a show giving a behind-the-scenes look at producing and hosting a podcast, from the perspective of two seasoned podcasters.
- I also tinkered around with an idea called The Friday Afternoon Nap Time Show, which was intended to be a Linkedin Live turned podcast that I created during my son’s nap time on Fridays. I created 9 episodes that I’m happy with.
Personally, I’m very proud of some of the steps I’ve taken with regard to my health.
- I’ve been working out 2-4 days per week for almost 5 months now.
- I’ve been practicing intermittent fasting along with eating better and avoiding many of my trigger foods that cause my weight to steadily climb.
- I started wearing invisible braces called Candid™ back in September and, in 12-months, I will once again have beautifully straight teeth. And yes, this time, I do plan to actually wear my retainers after that.
Lastly, I’m grateful that I’ve been able to continue taking Fridays off to spend with my son. The time spent with him is priceless and I will never look back in regret for taking that time to be with him instead of working an extra day each week.
What didn’t go well
The year was definitely filled with a lot of things I wish I could’ve done better. I’ll talk about many of these in my review of my three words for 2023.
But I’ll start here…
I didn’t write as much as I would’ve liked. I didn’t record as many episodes of my podcast as I would’ve liked. I didn’t complete as many projects as I would’ve liked.
And none of this is about hitting some arbitrary metric that I might deem worthy of the label “success.” It’s more that, in my gut, I know that I had more I wanted to say through my writing. I yearned to have more conversations with more people. There are more important projects I wanted to complete to improve my life and the lives of others. These are things that I find deeply satisfying to my mind and spirit. I love creating things, and the dip in production doesn’t sit well with me.
A lot of this is my adjustment to my new time constraints. Having two children leaves me with significantly less time to allocate toward my ambitions. It’s part of the trade-off. The unfortunate part about it is that I’ve yet to figure out how to balance the two internal demands on my time: working on the projects that are meaningful to me, professionally and personally, while also being present and responsible for my most important roles as father and husband.
The result of this tension is a lot of projects left unattended to and a feeling of underwhelm with regard to my own internal feelings of progress.
Action Steps
I think the most important change I need to make is to ensure I have enough time to create and build things. When I am jumping from meeting to meeting, I have little time remaining to create things, which is my real place of joy, personally and professionally.
- I need to make sure my schedule is structured for me to have uninterrupted stretches of time for deep work.
- I need to make sure I have ample time dedicated and protected on my schedule for each of my projects.
- I need my physical spaces to be tidy, organized, and uncluttered so that my thoughts are likewise tidy, organized, and uncluttered.
Additionally, I plan to maintain and sustain the focus on my health and wellbeing.
My Three Words for 2023: A Review
Sustainable
Sustainable was all about being able do things in a way that I could sustain, and that did not require energy or consistency from me that would be unrealistic.
In general, I felt good about this for 3 reasons:
- I lowered the bar for most things I took on. This put the projects I pursued within reach.
- I opted to abandon or not start projects I felt I could not sustain.
- I learned from reality what is actually sustainable versus what I imagined was realistic.
In short, sustainable was not something I planned so much as something that I learned. What is sustainable is that which was sustained. This shift has helped me better accept versus resist what I’m supposed to be able to accomplish.
Audience
I flat out failed at this one, possible more than any other word in my 10 year history of doing this exercise.
I basically didn’t make many conscious efforts to do anything differently other than a few more TikTok videos and Instagram Reels. My audience grew at the same rate it has in previous years.
I have little good to say about my commitment to this word.
169
Did it! I got my weight under 170 for the first time since my wedding in 2018, which was the first time since I’d met my wife in 2014. So, this one was a big deal for me, especially since I have never picked a specific and quantifiable word before. Normally, my words are more thematic, but this year I went for something very binary and objective, and I did it!
Quick Stats
- 54 articles published on Becoming Superhuman (~28% decrease YoY)
- 50 episodes of the Shareable Podcasts published (~92% increase YoY)
- At least 5 Published Podcast appearances (I have to go back and count them up)
- 34 books read (so far, probably a few more before end of the year)
See you in 2024!
This has been the last post of 2023.
My first post will be My Three Words shortly after New Years Day, and then will resume regular posting in the second week of January.
Have a good one!
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