Entrepreneur-in-Residence, Darla Moore School of Business | Steward, Linestone | Co-Founder, Zebras Unite
Jumping for joy today and celebrating the best news of 2024 with this "getting the band back together dream team" of Bridget Thoreson & Jennifer Brandel at Hearken, Inc. YES! I have been astonished by what I can only describe as "alliances and ruptures" over the past few months in the organizations I care about, co-founded and The Movement more broadly. The comings and goings tell a profound, nuanced story of, "How do we get along during times of crisis?" And especially in spaces that have cooperation and listening front and center values to their mission. I hold endless fascination in the organizational psychology of what allows for composting, combining, separating and boundaries. All processes are necessary. How they unfold is like watching the flowers turn into tomatoes before my eyes each day in my garden, nourished by the tomatoes from this fall's compost. A miracle, truly. A rupture is: a group of well meaning people who could once cooperate no longer can and have lost trust an alignment. I have come to see this as, above all else, a failure of communication and an absence of containers. I can't recommend this article, "Containers for Listening: Navigating conflict as a core skill for societies in collapse" as MUST READ https://lnkd.in/eYEAJgBe I feel deeply called to explore and prototype these "conflict containers." An alliance is: a group of people who, in the words of my mother, "Agrees to agree." Despite the differences, past conflicts, Big Feelings, there is something, some river of communication and shared understanding, that allows them to commit. In the words of Arizmendi “Today revolution is called participation.” Here's to following and flowing in these rivers of relationships together. Huge kudos to Hearken for, as ever, leading the way with such clarity of heart and vision and growth every step of the way.
🚨New job, previous company! Thrilled to share I am rejoining Hearken, Inc today as Chief Project Officer/Dream Wrangler. This mullet job title (business in the front, party in the back) was inspired by the incomparable Jennifer Brandel’s description of my work at our 2019 engagement summit. Wrangling dreams is where I love contributing. It’s also the type of work that’s often overlooked by any industry obsessed with short-term successes. Jenn has beautifully captured the essential nature of this connective tissue through the interstitium (the-interstitium.com), and as a proud interstitiumary I’m striving to gain recognition and build capacity for this transformational approach. I am now a “boomerang employee.” Jenn and I explore how to make boomeranging work from both sides of the hiring process in this week’s Explore Your Career River (careerriver.substack.com). I’ll be working at the intersection of journalism and civic health through initiatives such as Democracy SOS (democracy-sos.org). I’ll also be building out the Career River project examining how to navigate a fulfilling professional life by looking beyond the ladder. Here’s to all the dream wranglers out there: I see you, I support you and I can’t wait to discover what we can accomplish together. ❤️
