Reflective practice
Connect to ourself and how we master craft at work
WHY reflective practice?
Businesses that learn how to adapt to the ever-changing market landscape and technological advancements will win. Reflective Practice is a means through which adults learn through experience and apply those learnings to their work. It also helps individuals to process emotions as they relate to work to reduce the emotional burden that work can have on people, and reduce the negative impact of that experience on the work itself.
When teams feel safe enough to articulate their feelings as they relate to work, not only can leaders do something with that data beyond one on one management support, but your teams learn to manage themselves, leaving leaders more time to lead. Reflective Practice helps your teams contain and hold emotions to work more effectively and provides a platform for leaders to demonstrate appropriate self-authorising behaviours to improve the effectiveness of the group.
How to reflective practice?
Start by building a ritual around reflective practice. Once a week, or while you’re having your daily cuppa, talk to your team about work in the frame of:
What happened?
How did it feel?
What does that mean?
When you get really practiced at reflective practice, you won’t need a meeting or a scheduled session. You’ll have team members talking about what happened, how it felt and what it might mean as and when they need. They’ll learn from their experiences, and work with their emotions rather than have the feels get in the way, distract or disengage them.
A poem about REFLECTIVE PRACTICE
This is the reflection poem. THE WHOLE OF IT. Not just the tiny bit that G made Stef record on social media…
You’re real good at that thing that you do
I know it I feel it it's vital and true
and ‘cos you are awesome you still want to grow
your craft’s like a friend and you still want to know -
it and show it the care that it needs
‘a garden untended is sure to grow weeds’
but you’re really busy and on top of all that
where is the class that fits the format -
that you need for you, at this stage in your learning?
in seeking the teaching you must be discerning
you search here and there, you search high and low
is it under that rock? is it's buried in snow?
oh where is the teacher to add to your skill?
and if you're a leader you search with more will
‘cos you know that your people need to grow too
oh what is a wonderful leader to do?!
but what is that there on top of that Hill?
it's Sparkles it's shiny and gives you a thrill
you know it's your teacher, you know it you do!
you run up That Hill, and what confronts you?
a mirror, you shiver and get all goose pimply,
you look at yourself and you realize quite simply
you are the best teacher that you'll ever know,
you know the places that you need to go!
what you need is for your growth is the time and the space
to unpack experience and put it in place
but in the eyes of the mirror you realize a thing
if you did this with others you would all win!
so you gather your teams on top of that Hill
the mirrors not there because with all of your skill
you realize that in thinking with the brains of others
we get the perspective that lets us discover
insights we find about craft and our practice
and by listening to them, far from distract us,
it boosts and sits loose new understanding
and raises the tides of all boats that we stand in
this process has a name in research academical
thinkers use their juicy brains to study learning theoreticals
Reflective practice is what this thing it is called
and with this learning process leaders should be enthralled.
so on that hill as you sit with your team in a group
you ask them to consider three things in a loop
what happened? how did it feel? and what does that mean?
and as you talk it all out new Insights you glean
your brain does this thing - it's called integration!
by linking events to feelings you do distillation
of what that all means for further craft action
these Insights make Mastery and satisfaction
but it's not one shot! oh no no it's not
your smart your stylish you know quite a lot
so you make it to regular ritual you practise
Cos deep in your heart you know that the fact is,
achieving craft Mastery is the work of a lifetime
it takes focus and joy and the ability to mine
the gold from experience, the good and the bad
because learnings a lifestyle, not a trend or a fad.
if you want to learn more about practice reflective
reach out to us and let's get connective
we love helping great teens to learn from themselves,
this research we know should not sit upon shelves
but for all you leaders wanting to do something now
just ask those three questions and let it allow
the wisdom inside or in others or groups
to make sense of worklife's beeps bops and boops