Work in Public: Behind the book. A timeline!

Jul 2022: This all started when I was reading The 2-Hour Cocktail Party by Nick Gray

I loved it. I ended up throwing a cocktail party. That was awesome. But what I loved even more was Nick’s book. It was friendly, inviting, encouraging, practical. He gave away scripts, questions and specific details on how to run an event. I thought, gosh this is a glorious book! Check it out here.

After recording over 200 podcast interviews on The First Time Facilitator podcast, I thought a great way to package up all the content, and key takeaways that I share with clients, was to throw it into a book.

But rather than keeping it generic in terms of “How to run a workshop”, I decided to hone in on the 2-Hour Workshop. Because let’s face it, if you can host a 2-Hour Workshop, you can run an all day event!

The philosophy and practices apply: You need to get people there, get them engaged, share and work through content, and review/reflect on it at the end.

Nov 2022: To validate the idea…

I ran a masterclass in October 2022 called The 2-Hour Workshop Blueprint. I had over 50+ people sign up. One of the participants, Lily Gos even posted this on LinkedIn following a session. Thank you, Lily!

Then, the AMAZING Jenny Blake sent me a Voxer message, suggesting I book-end my facilitation focus by writing a book. She called it a low-hanging watermelon.

Okay. Idea validated! Next, it was time to commit…

I signed up to Matt Rud’s Punchy Book’s accelerator program, which is actually fantastic. I got really excited and then I went on an overseas holiday at the end of 2022 (so this quickly turned into a “2023 thing”).

1 Jan: Let’s do this!

On 1 January 2023, I signed up for Jia Jiang’s Sisyphi Camps. It’s a daily accountability camp where we set out 3 intentions, every day.

Below you’ll see an example of what my daily check-ins looked like for January. I was on a mission to have Version 1 of the book out by 23 February 2023.

That was only 52 days away. Why?

I was flying from Australia, to California, to speak at my friend Andy Storch’s Talent Development Think Tank Conference.

Again, I wanted to validate the book idea over there… so, time was of the essence!

In mid Jan 2023, I got stuck...

I couldn’t figure out how to translate my webinar, into a book. So, I sought help from two people 1. Dad (Aneurin Hughes) and 2. Jade Miller.

I was stuck because I had learnt so much over the years and wanted to put everything in the book. However, as I write about in the book, our job is to cut out a lot of the information, and help focus readers/our workshop participants, on what’s required to get a result.

So, I took my own advice and created a framework to help provide that linear structure through the book. Frameworks are a big part of building speed in your workshop design.

In the original text, I wrote about creating all types of frameworks! In the final version you’ll see that I cut this down to focus on three key things/topics (Jade helped me refine this over a coffee, as well with illustrations and the book cover).

That’s how (and why) I created the SPARK framework.

February 2023: Useful resources + California love

I started binge listening to podcasts, all related to book publishing. I heard Rob Fitzpatrick on Chandler Bolt’s podcast, and immediately bought Rob’s book, Write Useful Books. In it, he talks about engaging readers early, and getting their feedback. Brilliant! I setup a Whatsapp group called the Workshop Wingmates, where we had 25 people join to provide feedback on the book, including the book title.

Having a tight timeframe meant I needed to move quickly. I found an excellent printer in the USA called 48Hour Books. They were amazing. They took my manuscript and cover, printed it, and delivered it to Sonoma, California one day before the TDTT conference kicked off. I was chatting to Andy Storch in the lobby when the V1 books arrived. Here’s that moment! (and also, photos from the conference).

The messy middle: Mar-May 2023

March through to May, was a bit of the messy middle. When you collect great feedback from a cross-section of people, it’s really hard to figure out what to keep, what to discard, what to double down on. I thought I’d get feedback and immediately move to updating the document. However, I really had to sit with some concepts, go back to the intention behind the book and iterate from there.

I remember sending the manuscript link to the Workshop Wingmates Whatsapp group and throwing away my phone, ha ha. I literally had no idea what the response would be. While I tried to disassociate my ego from what I’d written, that’s really hard to do! So, it was quite lovely to receive this message in the group. I know V1 required more work, but it was encouraging.

Not to mention, it wasn’t like this was my full-time job. Clients were the priority, so fitting this in around everything else was tough, too!

Here’s that message from Tomoo (thank you!), and some of the screenshots of the V1 feedback, using the Help This Book tool.

In these months, I also had to start reaching out for book endorsements. It was really awkward because I was sharing an unedited, unformatted book with people that I so admire. But, that’s the game, so I reached out to some amazing people, and you’ll find their endorsements on the Home page for this book, and I thank them deeply for supporting the book.

Oh, I also spoke at a Corporate Strategy event in Malaysia, so I had 50 V1 copies locally printed, and handed them out there, too!

Here is some footage from Malaysia :)

Official release month: Jun 2023

Here we go! And boy oh boy, don’t I love a deadline. In the book, I offer a video training series and a link to resources that I use, so while the book was being edited/formatted, I had to create those. I also had to find a local publisher, update the book cover description and work out all the intricacies of Amazon. I actually have an Author account with them already, because back in 2008, after reading Tim Ferriss’ The 4 Hour Work Week, I wrote a netball coaching manual called Up and In.

Anyway, there were lots of moving pieces this month, but we’re here. Launch Week!

Big Thanks

  • Big thanks to Jenny Blake, who kickstarted this whole project when she sent me a voice note saying, “Leanne! You’ve had over 200 conversations about facilitation. I feel like you need to write a book about workshops!”

  • Huge props to my dad, Aneurin Hughes, who has been so helpful along the way, providing detailed feedback, constant encouragement, and great ideas on bringing this to life.

  • If you love the illustrations, make sure you connect with Jade Miller (https://jademiller.com.au/). She’s super talented at drawing, making you laugh and structuring ideas.

Shout-outs to:

  • My mentor, Alan Weiss, who can design impactful two-day workshops in five minutes

  • Andy Storch, for inviting me to speak at his Talent Development Think Tank conference in California; that conference was the impetus for getting this book together.

  • Shout-out to Dave Foxall, editor extraordinaire! It’s great to work with people who are so good with an eye for detail, patience, and a sense of humour.

This amazing core group of friends who commented on Version 1 of this book from front to back, while also sharing their workshop expertise:

  • Steph Clarke, Reimagining learning at work at 28 Thursdays and podcast host of Steph’s Business Bookshelf

  • Jan Keck, Creator of Ask Deep Questions, and soon-to-be-author of Ice Melters

  • Dr Cathryn Lloyd from Maverick Minds and author: The Story Cookbook, Facilitation with Stories and Seriously Playful Creativity

  • Antonio Iturra Novoa, Visual facilitator and specialist in collaboration, innovation and creativity, creator of Collaborative Offerings method

  • Rachel Okazaki, CEO, ATypical Physical Therapy and Wellness, Owner/Creative Director at The Hangry Moose

  • Prina Shah from Prina Shah Consulting and podcast host of Ways to Change the Workplace

Workshop Wingmates

Thank you for being part of this group, or sharing your feedback and thoughts during the writing process!

  • Jo Alilovic, Brendon Baker, Steven Bleistein, Mireille Beumer, Brad Callanan, Kate Crawshaw, Leanne Elliott, Sam Evans, Thomas Fry, Dee Gagnon, Jason Latimer, Sean Lavin, Ashleigh Loughnan, Oriol López Villena, Jasmine Malki, Eleanor McNeil, Hughes Mileng, Kate Munro, Tomoo Okubo, Rhonda Rosborough, Nicole Salter, Joeri Schilders, Stephen Shapiro, Jeff Skipper, Tom Scantlebury, KimSia Sim, Douglas Squirrel, Juan Daniel Sobrado, Gosia Syta, Penny Tainton, Clare Treston, and Bethan Winn.

And finally, lots of love to Quincey and Milo, who were by my side, sitting under the desk as I was drafting these ideas up.

Thank you, Chris, for your encouragement and support while I spoke about the book process, endlessly.

Thank you for being here, and reading this far.

Happy workshopping!

Leanne

p.s. Quincey and Milo below :)

Quincey and Milo