January 29, 2021

Weeknotes 5: Infrastructure Week

Welcome to the fifth weeknote (reminder: weeknotes are intentional moments of reflection), and the first time we are putting this out over email. Yes, I guess everyone will have an email/substack/whatever for the next 15 minutes. I can’t resist, I’m within the event horizon. These updates used to just live on the website (and will continue to do so),  but we live in a multichannel world, and I’m a Barbie Girl.

Speaking of last century pop culture, It has been exciting to work with old friends the last few weeks on some projects we can’t yet speak about. But I can’t get the A-Team reference out of my head, as we are coming together to work cooperatively on tough problems. Maybe I’ll just lean into it by listening to 10 hours of the A-Team Theme Song.

I published another interview for Typology City – my project focused on urban typologies, especially the tiny bits of urbanity which we connect with on the street. I spoke with Mari Kroin about her student work, Wet Paint: A Study of Subway Columns. Please read the whole interview.

Interesting conversations had:

Spoke with the managing director of a huge management consultancy, where we traded leadership styles, prompting us to remember the Six Emotional Leadership Styles (PDF) by Daniel Goleman, Richard Boyatzis, and Annie McKee

Spoke with a friend-of-friend who used to work in government as a designer, who reminded me that organizational structure eats culture, and to be clear what kind of future we want to create is baked into the org structure.

Friend who is a head of innovation in a US county reminds me that enablement is more authentic than empowerment (can I really empower you?) and passes on this link: Enablement: how governments can achieve more by letting go

On Tap for Next Week

Getting deeper into content around cities and housing typologies. 

Journeys with purpose 

Engagement in the news

New Journey Opportunities

These are links to job openings collected from friends, and friends-of-friends, which might be interesting in your journey

News from Expedition Works

This week was all about writing proposals, continuing the arduous work of company formation (wow, how many of the same forms do I really need to fill out). Basically everything that every business needs to do to be legal. I’m swimming in acronyms, but breaking apart the tasks into smaller chunks and distributing it across the week allows me to not feel like I’m drowning in paperwork.

We love mail. If you have any feedback or links you can leave it in this google form, which is anonymous by default. We won’t sell your info. That’s gross. 

December 27, 2020

Weeknote 2: These are the days of miracle and wonder

Reminder: weeknotes are intentional moments of reflection. 

So this was a short week with Christmas break the last two days of the week. This allowed me to both have conversations and be present with family. 

Interesting conversations I had this week:

  • The best conversations are those which consist of about 60% catching up and just talking, with 20% explaining what I’d love to do in the future, and the balance setting up next conversations and whom to speak with. 
  • I hope to mix these type of conversations with more tactical and directional conversation in the next few months. 
  • Rank and file federal government workers (the bureaucracy or deep state to some) are cautiously hopeful that the new administration will respect internal expertise and install political appointees with some knowledge of how to run an agency
  • Discussed how focusing on the spirit can help define what tactics to employ
  • Looking at future opportunities through the prism of autonomy, mastery, and purpose can help me decide what new roles to prioritize or defer
  • Triangulating and understanding what a possible position requires, demands, and what the current company culture values requires lots of conversations, before the electron cloud-like picture emerges
  • Sometimes it only takes 10 minutes to explain what you want and need, as long as you have clear and actionable requests. 

On tap for next week

  • Writing lots for typology.city
  • Being present with family

I hope everyone has an excellent holiday, and a happy new year!