by Janus Boye
It’s generally considered good to pause, to learn and to reflect, in particular in times of change or crisis as with the current pandemic. Still, how do we ever find the time and how do we actually do something about it?
To Mathias Jakobsen, reflections are both a tool to change your own behavior as well as a tool to become closer with your colleagues and build stronger relationships as a foundation for collaboration
In our recent member call with a virtual reflection, Mathias took us through his thinking, the power of reflections and how it can be used in a team setting as well as for personal benefit. This call was not recorded, so below you’ll find my notes, a do-it-yourself guide and suggestions for further study.
Don’t just jump to the actions
Mathias is a consultant with Implement Consulting Group, where he helps companies transform to become post-bureaucratic organisations. He recently relocated from New York City to Copenhagen.
Besides introducing himself briefly, Mathias did a check-in asking us to type what we did before the call and what we would do after the call. Given the current events, with home school, stay-at-home orders and everything that is changing at the moment, this helped set the stage and also foster a sense of group feeling.
He then shared his well of knowledge as shown on the card he is holding in the screenshot below. You’ll find the different layers with facts, feelings, learnings and actions.
Mathias with his well of knowledge. Jump in the pool with facts, feelings, learnings and actions, but don’t just dive to the actions
To illustrate the thinking behind the well, he shared a common frustration with project retrospectives that just jump to the ‘what went well’ and ‘ what will we do differently next time’. You shouldn’t just jump to the actions according to Mathias, as this will not have as strong an impact. You need to swim through the other layers as well.
4 questions for your reflection
Mathias encouraged us to write down the answers with pen and paper instead of doing it digitally. Both to avoid digital distractions, but also because writing by hand tends to improve the impact of the reflections.
Here’s the step-by-step reflection exercise that Mathias took us through by asking four powerful questions:
Question 1: What happened this past week?
Simply just write down what happened during the past 7 days. The big things, the small things, the work, events in your personal life, whatever comes to mind and keep writing for 2 minutes.
Question 2: Draw a graph of how this past week made you feel
Mathias illustrated it in our call with this simple chart. Personally I used time on the x-axis (the days) and how I felt (good/bad) on the y-axis. Now, looking at what happened in the past 7 days, place the events on your graph.
Mathias holding up a sample graph you can use for the 2nd question in the reflection
Question 3: Most powerful insights
OK, so now looking at the graph, the different events, the highs and the lows, what’s your most powerful insights?
Question 4: What will I do to bring these insights to life?
Finally, looking at your most powerful insights for the past week, what can you do to bring these insights into life?
That’s it. You did it!
A few of us shared key insights in the call. In our peer groups and in the call where participants shared less in common, we focused on #3 and #4. The closing advice from Mathias was that for projects, you could go through all 4 steps together as a group.
Learn more about reflections
Mathias has a reframes podcast where he invites you to take a different perspective on life. There’s currently 4 reflection episodes, including on why it matters and how to do it.
Our corporate innovation & intrapreneurship group leader, Maarten Korz, also brought Theory U into the conversation. In brief, Theory U is a change management method to improve unproductive patterns of behaviour.
Steven Pemberton who will keynote the Boye Aarhus 20 conference in November also participated in the call and shared how he has been journaling for the past 40 years.