Draw Your Way to a Better Workday

0:00Hi, it is Helen from the Squiggly Careers podcast and before today's episode starts I wanted to let you know about some exciting news and how you can get involved in it early. The exciting news is our sprint is back, hooray! We have done lots of sprints now, we have had thousands and thousands of people get involved in our five day free learning experiences and we really hope that you are going to join us for our next one in September. but before then we want to give you the chance to vote on the topic that we cover. So we've got two options, we could do a sprint on connection. We know connection is a problem for people right now and we've got lots of practical ideas to build the relationships that you need to develop a community around your career and make sure that you've got that connection with people.

0:44The second topic that we could do is on progression. So we know progression is important for everyone but it is not always easy and if we are going to let go of promotion we have to replace that with something that feels meaningful motivating and possible so if you want some help with your progression if you need to think about the directions you could develop in the people that can help you with your possibilities then maybe you would like a sprint on progression so you get to vote to do that you need to go to yoursprint.vote. That's yoursprint.vote. You will see the two options, connection, progression.

1:22You just need to let us know which one you want and the winner will be the one that we focus on in September. So we can't wait to sprint with you, but before then we cannot wait to see what topic feels meaningful, motivating and matters most for you. So get voting and let's get on with today's episode.

1:39Helen:Think of it as looking after your brain, not improving your drawing skills. richer and more durable memory traces called the drawing effect. So what we thought we would do today is show how drawing could help you in a working week. I started thinking, oh, I'm not really good at drawing and I've connected with some of the things that I've drawn. Two people in a tug of war. OK. The tug of war represents the tension. Probably the short term is winning. what matters most now or what matters most today. I think it's just a skill we forget. Does it help you reflect? Does it help you learn? Does it improve your mood?

2:21Helen:I think one of my strengths is creating clarity. It doesn't have to be a good drawing because I'm going to explain it anyway. Say what you see. Say what you see. A tree? No, it's a brain. Keep going. You haven't won the game. Okay.

2:37Hi, I'm Helen. And I'm Sarah. And this is the Squiggly Careers podcast where every week we borrow some brilliance from ideas or things we've read or people we've talked to and we turn that idea into something practical you can do to support your development.

2:52Helen:And this week we are borrowing brilliance from drawing which we had to talk about first to decide whether it was a noun or a verb but we decided it was a doing word you can tell we've both got young kids. So we are borrowing brilliance from drawing and this is one of our episodes in partnership with post-it notes and we are really going to use these post-its today so if you are listening we are going to do our best to describe so you you won't miss out um but it might be a good one to head over to youtube or wherever you watch your podcast as well um to see some probably relatively low quality drawings i would say to manage people's expectations so our videos because i might not have known this but our videos are on spotify so you can go on there and you can watch them just go to squiggly careers on spotify and you'll be able to sit there or like you say on YouTube just go to the squiggly careers channel and you can scroll through lots of strange shots of us in like our faces frozen on thumbnails well even if so I don't usually watch podcasts I only listen I watch but there is one on Spotify where they've started doing video yeah and so that does pop up now automatically for me yeah and so actually occasionally it's helped me to change my habits so if I'm sitting on a train yeah I might then think oh I'll watch it at the same time or sometimes I just cross it because I think what I'm just listening so I don't need to watch sometimes because i have i have flipped to watching so i always used to listen when i was driving and then i'm driving less so you're not watching what you're driving driving less but what i do do is i will you know this on the peloton i watch because they've now got on the peloton that integrated youtube so i watch my podcasts when i'm pelotoning because podcasts generally around half an hour and that's like perfect time for me to exercise so that's a that's a win and then also sometimes i'm on a train i will i just i don't know i just find i just watch on a train so I find watching easier.

4:34Nice.

4:34Helen:So why have we picked drawing? Why have we picked drawing? So a few fun facts for you before we get drawing. So when you draw there was a study that found it has an immediate impact on your short term mood. Oh that's interesting. I thought you were going to say memory. No, memory is coming. So you are right. Memory is coming. The next one is supercharged is memory. Oh tell me more. It's more than writing so they compared and contrasted the writing. You know we'll often be like journal or write things down. actually even a single act of drawing produces more immediate mood benefits for adults and this is for adults and even if it's just like shapes I think it's because it's a quite a mindful activity I was thinking you can't really do anything else and draw and maybe that's also kind of part of it it's quite an active rest activity drawing is I suppose you could be listening to music but you You can't be answering an email and drawing at the same time.

5:32Helen:Okay, mood. So good mood booster. It does work for memory. It's called the drawing effect. So you get both richer and more durable memory traces than other techniques like writing or rereading or verbal repetition. So I suppose if you're like studying for something, the best thing you could do actually is visually come up with a way of trying to, I don't know, you know if you're studying for an exam. Yeah. trying to create drawings that will help to remind you. It's really interesting because I would, listening to you, I could be a bit, because we've chatted about this, I think you are naturally better at drawing and thinking in visuals and visually communicating than me.

6:14And so I could almost rule myself out, but what I have learned from you, like one way that that memory thing definitely works for me, is Sarah and I spend a lot of our time running sessions, workshops, presentations for companies to bring careers to life in those companies. and we're often talking for an hour 90 minutes and there's quite a lot to remember and the way that we prepare for that is because I've done it on the train this morning I've got a session tomorrow keynote I've never done before and I was both thinking about what I wanted to say and I basically create little grids and in each grid is like a thought or a drawing and all I do is remember those drawings so I haven't got like a script yeah I've just got visuals in my head and And I can, I almost see like swipe, draw, swipe, draw is like what's in my head.

6:59Helen:So that does work for me. And drawing activates your brain in a really unique way because it requires logic and creativity. And here, actually, they are particularly talking about sketching because of your fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination. Apparently new neural pathways are formed. Observational drawing. You know, if you're, I suppose, if you're drawing people or an apple or whatever it might be, you've got to bring together kind of both sides of your brain yeah um and it just keeps on talking about all like the different parts like your prefrontal cortex the region associated with higher order thinking and executive function apparently when you draw that bit comes to life it's like I got really into how good draw I decided I was like everyone should be drawing everything all of the time it's just so good for you um obviously also you know you're getting like confirmation bias at some point where like it just starts telling you every research you read you like drawing gets better and better so what we thought we would do today is show how drawing could help you in a working week both by yourself um and also within a team because i think there's some fun things you can do as a team here and helen and i are going to have a go because you could describe or you could draw so we are going to have a go at drawing um so shall we get our first we've gone for medium size the super sticky medium size post-it note first yeah um i've got a pink one what are you going for yeah i'm going for yellow we are going to go for the large ones in a bit which are i would say are our it's a bit like are you allowed a favorite child are you allowed a favorite post-it note i would say the large ones are our favorite ones love them yeah we definitely do have a favorite okay i'm going to put my um ipad down because we're going to do this at the same time right can i just caveat this before we start that i don't think i think some people could think well i'm not a good drawer yeah this whole podcast i'm not a good drawer and i would say that i hold that thought but i don't let it hold me back like i don't think i'm a good drawer i don't think i am well i i i do think you are better than me i do think i see you quickly connecting concepts to what you put down on a piece of paper and i don't think i'm that good but i think the more you do this the easier it becomes and don't don't worry don't set a bar for being a brilliant drawer because i've i've really i've learned a lot by following your lead here or so you are naturally good at it and I think I've done it more because of you and I find it really helpful so I'm following your lead on the podcast today and I do think if people do look at our drawings they will realize yeah it's a relatively low bar um and I think your point is also don't forget you don't have to share so you could do this and you could take away the pressure of anybody else seeing yeah I read something really interesting about that about how good that is for you to do something for the sake of doing something rather than for the sake of sharing.

9:41Helen:So we will do a couple of activities today that are more about team. But I think two or three that we're going to do actually at the start, you could just do this for yourself and that would be it. No one has to see the drawing. I think it is the, think of it as looking after your brain, not improving your drawing skills. I think that's what we're aiming for here. I am going to add in a rule for us because when I've done these sorts of exercises before, I think this makes it harder. so I know I know I'm making this harder but I think we'll get more benefit all right no words okay so because often what people do is they draw something and then they just start adding words because I think that's what feels your rule can I add a recommendation to your rule um I think try to like fill the post-it note because sometimes I see some people who aren't confident I totally get it like as someone who doesn't think they're good at drawing I get it but sometimes they'll pick up a post-it note and they'll do a drawing and it's in the top right corner and it's really small and it's just because it feels a bit tricky to do so we're going to go for a recommendation for as much of your post-it note as you can and a rule no words yeah okay so our first drawing yeah describe how you are feeling about work this week describe how you're feeling about work this week in a drawing oh and so i'm going to start drawing and we are going to do these um super fast everybody because i am mindful that as drawing live on an audio podcast is probably not the most interesting.

11:11Helen:But there we go. Even I'm tempted to sometimes... I want to kind of put some words. Okay, I'm not going to add to it. I'm just going to... Okay, right. Let's do the reveal. You show me your drawing first. Okay. Okay, everybody. She has done a framework or a diagram. I mean, maybe I should have made that a rule. I didn't think I needed to make that a rule. I'm allowed a framework. It's a cycle. Yeah. I mean, you have drawn almost like a strategy wheel. Helen, right, go on. No, well, it's not too tall to me to describe. Would you like me to explain my drawing? I would like to explain it. Hold it up to the camera so everyone can see it.

11:45Okay, hopefully you can all see it. We'll put pictures of this. I'll tell you what, we'll put pictures of this in our newsletter as well so that people aren't watching, they can see it in the newsletter. So what I've done is a cycle because this is how my week feels. It's a very full on week and I feel like I'm constantly cycling, hence the cycle, between conversations with people. So I've got a little like conversation bubble. ticks my to-do list like conversation conversation tick tick tick tick tick um what were those

12:10Helen:circles more cycling i can't remember the circles i can't remember what the circles are made sense at the time okay um and then sleep repeat i feel like at the moment my my week i can't remember what those circles were but i do feel like i it is a week where i am psych i'm cycling through a lot of things on repeat doesn't mean it's bad but it does represent how i feel this week which is useful to know right even just like listening to you if i'm working with you if i'm in the same team as you just knowing that is really helpful um and actually probably by drawing it maybe it's brought it to life in a different way maybe it makes it easier to talk about even just hearing you describe it i then think brings the drawing to life what was i doing I think I was thinking so fast.

12:56I think that's the thing. We're doing drawing and talking about it on a podcast live. It's an extra level of pressure that I hope other people don't have to do.

13:02Helen:I would say take tiny bit longer with your drawings. And we're trying to do it in about five seconds so it doesn't get boring if you are listening. I think it was when you said, people are listening, we've got to do it quicker. I was like, right, it's fast. Keep cycling. Keep cycling. Cycle even more. Do you want to see my one? Yes. Okay. What have we got here? So these are two people in a tug of war. Okay. and your face you're like oh god who are the people um I suppose sort of one of them is me yeah and actually the other I think is actually a nameless stick person um and I think the the tug of war represents sort of the tension sometimes in our weeks which I felt this week between what needs to happen now or what needs to happen today or this week and what needs to happen in the next year or in the next two years and I probably feel like this week um because we are always doing that we're it's like you could you I could have done juggling but it doesn't feel like juggling oh my god I've got you to your balls you look so excited okay so that's interesting right because I don't feel like I'm juggling yeah I just feel like probably that I'm being pulled in the two different directions probably the short term is winning this week it's like very much like what matters most now or what matters most today but I in my head I can't ever let go of what matters most in the long term it's always there for me and so I find it hard when there's no space for that and actually it starts to worry me or I start to sometimes feel frustrated and then it probably also starts to impact my being able to do what matters most like in a day so I would say that kind of that tug of war for me what makes me reflect on perhaps because I really value that you have that tug of war because because i think i'm so drawn to the near and the now that i i'm very reliant on you holding that tension so it kind of makes me think about oh how could how could i help you not be the only person like holding that tension it's very perhaps me even knowing that it's useful it's really useful so rather than me going oh it's a bad thing you actually go oh no it's helpful it's really useful i'm really going you hold us to account for the long term yeah no really useful okay take off that one yes take okay discard or put to one side at least one side and we're not gonna do a very that was like a mixed mixed picture shall we say okay let's do a very positive one okay this is already more fun than i thought um one strength that you want to make stronger like this year so we're a couple of months into the year into 2026 draw a strength that you want to make stronger oh interesting how do i do draw that that's what my brain is thinking interesting okay how do i you're not gonna like this i can't draw that again it was gonna be another framework don't can't draw the framework if you want to draw a framework draw a framework okay no i've got it i've got it it's coming to my brain

16:07okay i mean it's not very good i don't know how you

16:14Helen:okay okay that's as good as it's gonna go okay go okay so this is a strength i'd like to make stronger okay um and it's i've drawn lots of these are light bulbs everybody with kind of connecting connecting lines and intentionally some lines that go off the page okay because that's the specific thing that you've done off the page lines right the page lines because it's not just about having ideas because I don't think that's my problem I think I can come up with ideas I'm good at that but I think it is coming up with ideas that go beyond where we are right now that borrow brilliance from different people and places that we don't know about it's sort of ideas into the unknown and so it's like that's this kind of strength I want to make stronger and I think you do that by curiosity going to new places talking to new people yeah um so it's not just like come up with more ideas or come up with better ideas it's almost like the creative process that's sparked by going off the page nice that's where i kind of nice i like also i can see you doing it a little bit more already and i'm valuing it i'm like oh what have you learned from doing that thing um so this is mine diamond it is a diamond that's a good drawing i've drawn a diamond well i was trying to think because you want diamonds i mean i would like some more diamonds no it's not that it's because i was thinking about clarity and i think that one of my strengths diamonds have clarity they have measures of c's for things yes for clarity um the three c's i've forgotten what carrots clarity something else can't remember yeah i don't have any diamonds i can't help you anyway i'm sticking with the sea of clarity because i think one of my strengths is creating clarity and i think i could potentially do it even more um i think i could help our team even more I think I could maybe have some like clarity creating questions I could maybe give the team some clarity creating questions so rather than it being reliant on me creating clarity I could reflect on what are the questions I asked to do that that they could then use as well that's a really nice build it might because there's there's you creating clarity sort of almost doing the hard work for other people and then there's helping other people to get better at creating clarity for themselves I mean there's probably a podcast episode in how to create clarity we do one every week so you can probably do one um I think that would be incredibly useful because I already see how much people value you creating clarity I like I watch it happen you know sort of because that's not my skill and I think it's something that you kind of bring to conversations so when I'm part of conversations and you will often listen to me so often I will you know go off in a few different directions or talk about different things and I just feel like you're so good at sort of listening and you're sort of you're like processing I can almost feel like you're like the clarity creator in your brain is like I feel like it should have a sound and then you go and it's a question or it's a statement or it's these are the three things that matter most and I just think I think I said this to you earlier this week actually like never underestimate I think how helpful that is for other people how much people appreciate that I think it's one of those one of the ways that you are uniquely useful and you know we often take our natural talents for granted I think you even came back to me and you were like oh yeah but I don't want to be I don't know I don't I don't want to get too involved I don't want to get in people's way and I think I was going oh I think you're doing the opposite I actually think you're being really helpful so I think that's a really good one I think the diamond is genius it's good thinking ah thanks next one is a bit tougher okay ready I'm ready for it now I've built a bit of You're in it.

19:40Helen:You're in it. Draw a confidence gremlin that you've got that is either getting in your way or could get in your way of what you want to achieve this year. So sometimes we just talk about confidence gremlins generally, but I'm trying to connect the dots here with a confidence gremlin that we've got that could get in the way of the things that we want to do, the things that we want to achieve. Okay, here we go. This one is worse because we actually have got some beautiful confidence gremlins drawings. from a professional illustrator. So I just don't compare ours to his.

20:18Okay.

20:22Okay. You ready? Yeah, ready. You go first this time. Okay, so I'm holding up to Sarah a picture. What do you think it looks like? Describe what you see. Oh, it's like that game. Oh, what, like picture-try?

20:33Helen:No, the one with Roy Walker. Oh, I don't know. That one, catchphrase. Say what you see. Say what you see. Say what you see. Say what you see. a tree no it's a brain you haven't won the game okay it's a brain with arrows going into it okay with crosses right cross not not angry crosses but like crosses okay what do you think this might represent um that i don't know you stop yourself from learning in some way something about stopping yourself i feel like i'm i feel like i've got a confidence gremlin about not not like adding newness into my brain like i feel like part i feel like part of my vow part of the value you bring is like newness and and i think i've got a gremlin that if i'm not bringing newness then it's not valuable and i don't right now i'm like well i don't know where the newness is coming from because i'm stuck in a cycle but okay back to the earlier drawing I'm in a cycle and there is no space for newness and then I'm I think like I've got a gremlin like well how long can you be good for if you're not letting the newness in okay so what's the gremlin the gremlin is that I'm not I'm kind of I'm not adding as much value I'm not useful I'm not contributing I'm not creating I'm just not I'm not as good as I want to be because I'm not I'm not like using my brain i'm not like okay i'm just kind of i don't know it's not a thinker doer thing it's different to like like i'm doing more than i'm thinking it's not that i just i think you have to look i really think you have to look after your brain i really think you have to feed it like i think you have to sleep well i think you have to feed it with newness i think you have to be curious and i think if you are not doing that then you've not got a very good brain and i have this like i'm back to like things like with ai i think we really have to have like good brains yeah brains with newness brains that are connecting brains that are creating and i think i've got a bit of a confidence gremlin like am i am i building the best brain or am i like sort of just it was like am i getting worse or am i staying still that's it yeah gosh yeah yeah i want to i want to keep going back um if it's reassuring one of the exercises we're going to do shortly i tried it this morning on claude um and it didn't work like i quite like it when some things don't and it didn't we've not done it yet but when I get to it I was like I'll just see whether this is like better or faster and I was like this is like way worse it cannot do this yet okay I mean do I think it will be able to at some point obviously um so these are my boxing gloves okay who are you fighting um well nobody and that's probably sometimes my problem so um obviously I don't want to actually fight people but I think boxing gloves represent conflict for me always been a gremlin doesn't doesn't ever go in doesn't go anywhere I think that will always be with me but I still don't say the hard thing as much as I would like to in a way that is useful for other people I think the hard thing that's never my problem um and I am good at spotting issues and I'm a good critical thinker it's not it's naturally the way that my brain works but I think the gremlin still gets in my way and then I think it gets in other people's way because I don't say the hard thing I'm expecting people to guess what's going on in my head and obviously that's impossible and then I get frustrated if things don't get better or if we don't improve or whatever it might be and so I since we came up with say the hard thing which is in Learn Like a Lobster, I've watched you do it very well.

24:12Helen:And I think you're just better at it than I am. And I'm sort of very admiring from the sidelines. I don't even see myself doing it. Well, I know that you have. And, you know, we say the hard thing. You start with a question and you try and understand where people are and then you kind of work through it and make sure that you're acknowledging what you've heard. And then you are saying the hard thing, but in a sort of simple, straightforward way. and so I think that I can spot opportunities that pass me by to cage this gremlin that I don't currently take and so I'm like oh it's a really specific thing which I think I know when it's happening and I've got to increase my own accountability to cage the gremlin because this is sometimes something I hear when we do work with confidence with people is um you know like you almost give yourself a get out of jail card of being like I'm too busy to do anything different or only you can cage your gremlins and often I hear people sort of blame external factors and I could definitely do that I could blame being busy it's not my job they should just sort something you know like it's really it's really easy to go this is this is not about me but your gremlins are about you and so that I have done a good job of caging that gremlin way way better than say like 10 years ago yeah um and there are some situations now where i think i'm i'm good at it but there are still some where i'm like i'm not as good as i'd like to be so that's my one you know you're like there are still some i wonder whether you you prioritize the sum you know because you're spreading say the hard thing across lots of situations it's yeah whereas i i think if you were like in that in that's it that's the biggest that's like am i that's why i'm saying the hard thing is going to make the biggest difference right now i wonder whether it might make it easier yeah so we're going to switch okay to a new kind of post-it note well it's not a surprise for us because we do use these ones these are the ones where um when people were talk you were talking about using the grids yeah the drawing grids that we both use to prepare um this is what we use okay um so for people who are watching we're on to the we call them the massive yellow sticky post-it though i think they're called large so i was in canada uh last week um i don't quite know when this podcast will be coming out but i was literally there last week yeah and i'd taken the uh lobster post-it notes with me yeah and also because i was running a session on confidence gremlins where i was getting everyone to do a confidence gremlin gallery which is an exercise that we do when we're running that session in person with people i'd taken those like the lovely giant yellow ones that we love um and people were like in awe of them and i and because i'd taken so many i had a whole pack and i like i gifted them to somebody and wrote on it and gave them and i think it like made it made i just had to order some more because i took them to denmark last week gave them out but nobody gave them back you know like people were like because there were some left over at the end but people putting them in their bags so i was like oh okay okay i'll just leave those i just need to order some more right what are we doing um so This, I think, this is where Claude, who is usually obviously my best friend, did not work.

27:24Helen:Okay. He's failed. He's a heal, right? You decided Claude is. I feel, well, Claude, I don't know. Maybe it. Yeah. Anyway, it doesn't work. Okay. Doing it the way. Also, I think you miss out on all of those benefits that we talked about at the start of the episode. You're not getting any of that good stuff if you just put a prompt into AI. I'm like, you do need to draw. I think this is really nice as a partner activity. Okay. I think this would be a great thing to do at the start of a team day. You know when you're always looking for something to get everybody chatting and talking early on and maybe connecting, getting to know each other.

27:55Helen:So what I'm going to ask you to do is to describe your dream day, work day. So we're going to go work day. Describe your dream work day to me and I am going to try and sketch it as you talk to me. Okay. Go for it. I'm getting up early. It's five o 'clock. Sorry. I'm going to get up early. And oh, it's spring. The sun is shining. It's spring. Sun. birds like i'm up i'm up with the wildlife okay um and i'm gonna start outside i'm gonna get some like it's quiet everyone's still asleep my children not around so i'm outside and i'm having breakfast nice healthy breakfast i'm thinking overnight oats and an espresso if you want to get very specific on how my dream day started and i'm reading that would be dreamy and then I am probably on this dream day I'm working from home so I'm in my I'm in my office and I'm like ready to go by eight o 'clock and in the morning I'm I'm I'm probably taking all that energy that I've created by starting my day like that and I'm giving it to people so I'm running some workshops I'm spending time with the team like all the sunshiny energy is going back to the business and to people and then the afternoon my dream day I'm then reading probably with some post-it notes and I'm like thinking oh yeah that's a good thing that I could write or that'd be a really good idea to share with Sarah or that'd be a really good thing for a podcast and then I'd probably end my day on my peloton doing a hike watching something interesting on YouTube dream dream day dream day dream day how often do you reckon you have those dream days i mean not that often but but to be more positive um next friday um i have completely i've i put no meetings in capital letters in my diary and other than picking my kids up from school it is a day that i can design as i choose and it is it is quite springy that i could do that day maybe next week do you see your dream day yeah um and i'll hold it up i can see cups i can see you've got your like what i've done it sort of that way so it kind of flows like that i probably if i'd have had more time i'd have drawn a squiggle to like show the flow yeah but you're getting up you're in nature you've got your coffee and your books this is you in your studio which looks tiny bit like a tent there you don't work in attention but it does sort of look it's very woody um this is you giving your energy to other people books and ideas and post-its and you're kind of pelotoning and i think what's interesting about doing that is uh we're not going to repeat it for me but our ours would be very different yes so you're like actually sometimes we assume that our dream day is everybody's dream day but i mean i can tell you i'm not getting up at five o 'clock for a start um so but some would be similar some would be different and i think the point isn't to feel demotivated that you're not having your dream day at the moment but is to sort of notice okay well what are the things that then maybe you could do every day yeah and you that's not your day every day like i know that's not your day every day okay do you know if it was my day every day it wouldn't be a dream day would it yeah yeah so you're i think that's an interesting like insight like your dream day is not the same as your every day yeah but if you were to now take that drawing and if you were to going well out of those things what do you want to make part of your every day which would be the area where you'd be like oh if i was circling oh well i don't know if it's every day because i think it's a bit weather dependent but I'm thinking next day I'm like I'm thinking having done that and I'm like okay well what what's what's the the soonest thing that I can do yeah and I'm thinking it's sunny at the moment I could definitely do my early morning tomorrow like I could definitely get up sit outside I'm quite I'm like quite looking forward to the thought of that yeah yeah that'd be a great way to start my day and I think if you are doing this as a team exercise um and if you're using the giant yellow post notes or anything different i think having them up on the wall is really nice a bit like when we talk about having a confidence gremlin gallery and almost then you can go around and see different people's dream days or different people's confidence gremlin and just get people talking about them when we do the confidence gremlin gallery we always get people to sign their pictures which i always think is is really really nice works virtually though as well doesn't it like you had a team and you maybe you go into like a breakout room as a two and i draw yours usual mind and then you come back and you kind of you can hold it up to the screen that'd be quite a nice like a team screenshot i think yeah of like everybody's dream days especially if you're in a globe in a global team i don't i think everything that we've done would work virtually yeah i can't think of anything that we've you could you just do your drawing right you're sitting at home and just just hold them up yeah um i just think often what we're definitely seeing a bit of a trend towards is now i think probably because post the pandemic everyone's been working out how to work again teams are getting together a bit more frequently valuing kind of connection and like time time to like reconnect and I think often activities like this is how you get to know more about who people are not only why we're together as a team and what we need to achieve so when I talk to teams about things like values everyone always says I'll start with the why but I always think it's really interesting to start with the who because then you're just connecting with like who someone is what matters to them like that's given me a bit of an insight into your values right yeah you know like you know i know some of your values around like freedom and like energy is like like your values are showing up in your dream day yeah and i think it could be a bit intimidating to be like right we're going to start our team day talking about values yeah um unless you're our team which case they're probably like sure we're expecting it by this point yeah but if you were just like we're all just going to talk about our dream work day or just our dream maybe even your dream weekend day if you want to make it a work day i think my dream weekend day probably would be that day yeah ours wouldn't be that different but i think you get quick clues quick clues about what motivates and drives people um so how are you feeling about our drawing exercises today i was going back to the start in my head and you said what did you say mood you said memory and there was a third one you said activates all the different kind of parts of your brain yeah well i definitely i the pictures are memorable like you know i've got your boxing I've got them in my head.

34:07I've got my diamond in my head. But my main thing is mood, particularly because of how we've done it. Like I started thinking, oh, I'm not really good at drawing and I really want other people to find this easy. But it was really easy. And I feel like I've connected with some of the things that I've drawn and I've really enjoyed like hearing what you've drawn and why you've drawn it. It's been a very enjoyable process.

34:28Helen:Also, for most people in most jobs, how often do you draw in a day? Yeah. Like for most people, I imagine the answer to that is never. I mean, you might doodle. Yes. But like you're not necessarily thinking and creating a drawing that connects to what you're thinking. And you could even make it a bit of a practice or you could do, you could experiment for a week. Right. You know, the how am I feeling about work? You could do how do I feel about work today at the end of every day and just do a picture at the end of every work day and just do that. Like a drawing diary completely for yourself. And again, nobody needs to see it.

35:05Helen:But just notice, how does that help you? Does it help you reflect? Does it help you learn? Does it improve your mood? And it just might be interesting, I think, just given it's not a big part of most people's working day, but it's probably something we all did loads as a kid because who didn't draw as a kid? I think it's just a skill we forget. And also, I do think people get really preoccupied by, I'm not a good drawer. Yes. So we kind of have this fixed view and then it stops us from having a go. I think drawing and talking makes a difference because my drawing, it doesn't have to be a good drawing because I'm going to explain it anyway.

35:39Helen:Yeah. Like it's fine. Yeah, yeah. So actually when I first say to people, you're not allowed any words, people often look a bit angry at me. They're like, well, I was going to use those words to explain it. And I'm like, well, no, that's okay because you're going to share. It's sort of a draw and a share, which is really nice. Oh, well, thank you. I enjoyed that a lot. Welcome. That is everything for this week. We hope it has inspired you to have a go at drawing and to have a play with post-its, whether you're playing with the tiny ones, the medium ones, or our favourites, the massive yellow ones.

36:07Helen:But that's everything for this week. Thank you so much, whether you are listening or watching. If you ever have any feedback, you can always email us. We're helenandsarahatsquigglycareers.com. And if you have time for a five-minute favour, we always really appreciate a review, a star rating. It really helps other people to find us, and we really appreciate it and read everyone too. That's everything for this week. We'll be back with you again soon. Bye for now. Thanks, everybody. Thank you.