Podcast appearances and mentions of John Fitch

Robert Fulton has long been known as the inventor of the steam-powered boat. Except that's not true - he developed the first commercially successful steam-powered boat. Fulton was an innovator on the work of John Fitch, the actual inventor. It's funny how a man's name can be associated with something that lost a bit (or a lot) of its meaning because of popular notions. The same could be said of Jesus Christ. Did you know that there were seven times that he self-referenced himself with categorical statements beginning with "I am ..."? These are important not only because of what he said, but to whom he said it to, and to their universal application to all mankind. The greatest statesmen whoever lived (and they said nation-building things!) babbled toddler noises when compared to the profoundly powerful things Jesus said about himself - and what that means to you and me. Listen-in on this interesting conversation that Nate has with Sean. ▶️ Nate's Message on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@roswellgrace8562/videos

Many people do not know the story of the Corvette SS and maybe have never heard of it.  It was the first purpose-built GM racecar and personal project of Zora Arkus Duntov's. It was raced in 1957 at the 12 Hours of Sebring by John Fitch.  A number of technological features were first tested on this car, including fuel injection.  This car will be sold at auction at Sotheby's in Miami in February 2025. Your CORVETTE TODAY host, Steve Garrett, is joined by Jan Hyde, Corvette race car historian and founder of Registry Of Corvette Race Cars.com.  Jan gives us the complete backstory of this legendary Corvette.  You'll learn about it's origins, it's development, it's racing pedigree and the estimated price it will sell for at auction. Learn about an integral piece of Corvette racing history, the Corvette SS, on this episode of CORVETTE TODAY.

On 11 June 1955, more than 80 people were killed and 100 injured at the Le Mans 24-hour race. A car driven by Pierre Levegh crashed into the crowd of around 300,000 causing the deaths. John Fitch was an American racing driver on the Mercedes team at the centre of the tragedy. After the crash, racing was banned in several countries. John Fitch spoke to Claire Bowes in 2010. (Photo: Crash at Le Mans. Credit: Fox Photos/Getty Images)

今天分享沐光文化出版的書《留白時間：停止無效努力》 原本以為這是本工具書，可是這本書講了非常多人對於時間的看法 看完這本書後，對於時間有非常多新的想法 像是 適時的休息跟留白，才能走得更長久 你的人生最重要的是什麼，也許在留白的時候才能想清楚 有品質的閒暇/休息時光，讓你更有創造力 書裡有很多對於時間的想法和標題，也都非常有能量 塞滿時間不是努力，是恐懼 休息不等於偷懶，休息是積極活動 新的一年，試著練習擺脫時間的焦慮，過過有品質的生活 或許這才是我們生命中追求的事情 購書連結

Amer Elec Power Service Corp v. John Fitch

How are you dealing with this new set up of more teleworking from home? Do you have time for a break? Are you running meeting after meeting on zoom during the day? Are you in a busyness mode? Or are you able to organize meaningful breaks during the day?   Today in a new episode of Pacify Your Mind podcast, “the challenge of slowing down” I am talking about some of our sublte barriers to well-being and selfcare. We tend to experience even more such resistances to slow down in COVID times. It is up to us to reinvent a new work-life integration! In this episode I refer to the documentary Notes from Brussels from director Nadine Van Loon. https://www.notesfrombrussels.eu I also refer to the book "Time off " of John Fitch and Max Frenzel. Happy listening! If you are interested to explore further your work-life balance and go beyond your mental resistances I would be happy to guide you. Check here my well-being coaching : https://pacify-your-mind.com/en/well-being-coaching/

Episode: 2166 John Fitch, a steamboat builder surrounded by the early makers of America.  Today, a host of creative people hovers over a steamboat.

Bruce Daisley LinkedinBruce Daisley WebsiteBruce Daisley TwitterEat Sleep Work Repeat BookBruce Daisley's other book, The Joy of WorkThe Good Jobs Strategy, Zeynep TonPriya Parker, The Art of Gathering  

Trash Sports Takes #9: Huggy BearOur very first live Beer Segment, featuring 2 special edition brews from our friends at @brewdogofficial while we discuss Floyd Mayweather vs Logan Paul.Undercard Fight 1:  Chad Johnson vs Brian MaxwellJarret Dick Punch Hurd (24-2, 16 KO) vs. Luis Arias (19-2-1, 9 KO)Badou Jack vs. Dervin ColinaMayweather (50-0) vs Logan Paul (0-1)Did Floyd Knock Logan Out?Mayweather landed 40% compared to Paul's 13%Double UFC Champion Amanda Nunes challenged Kim Kardashian to a fight. Dana White sounds like he's been hitting the pipe when discussing it. Jake the Snake Roberts' awful childhood and substance abuse.@Aubrey_huff and self-titled “MMA Legend” @jonfitchdotnet are pulling on each other's little dicks. @skipbayless is back on his bullshit again.@dannykanell has a trash take about the way softball players should conduct themselves.Dallas Baptist third baseman Andrew Benefield hit the biggest home run of his life vs Oregon State on Monday and boomers are NOT having it.Yankees pitcher Garrett Cole's hilarious interviewWhat happens when Booger McFarland wipes his ass?Like what we have to say? Hate our very existence? Let us know! We can be found on: Twitter at @TrashSportsTake, @BrentNLiberty, and @dill_spearsInstagram @trashsportstakespodcastTikTok: @TrashSportsTakesPodcast Facebook at Facebook.com/TrashSportsTakes. TrashSportsTakes.com/sport-podcastSupport the show(https://www.patreon.com/Idiotvillepodcast)Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/Idiotvillepodcast)

This week we're learning how time off can actually help us be more productive, with help from writers John Fitch and Max Frenzel. Listen to hear how to build a healthy rest ethic, what leisure practices can help spark creativity, and how we can encourage more time off in our productivity-obsessed society. John and Max are the authors of the book Time Off: A Practical Guide to Building Your Rest Ethic and Finding Success Without the Stress.Have an idea for a future episode? Call us at 347-687-8109 and leave a voicemail, or write to us at upgrade@lifehacker.com. We want to hear from you!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Logan Health Registered Nurses Carol Mitch & John Fitch joined the KGEZ Good Morning Show with John Hendricks and Robin Mitchell on Tuesday June 1, 2021 to discuss the recent strike at Logan Health.

Kalispell Regional Healthcare Registered Nurses John Fitch & Carol Mitch appeared on Glacier Bank Community Conversations segment of the KGEZ Good Morning Show with John Hendricks and Robin Mitchell on Monday April 19, 2021 to discuss the SEIU representation for KRH nurses.

Deep work has been hailed as the answer to all of our modern work problems. But is it? Justin discusses in this episode. Shownotes JOIN the COMMUNITY (https://community.effectiveremotework.com) Deep Work by Cal Newport (https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Work-Focused-Success-Distracted/dp/1455586692) 005: Makers, Managers, and Productivity Systems (https://podcast.effectiveremotework.com/5) Essentialism by Greg McKeown (https://www.amazon.com/Essentialism-Disciplined-Pursuit-Greg-McKeown/dp/0804137382) Time Off by Max Frenzel and John Fitch (https://www.amazon.com/Time-Off-Practical-Building-Finding/dp/1734794402)

Happy Anniversary! Our twentieth episode is our second Fitchburg Feature.  City Councilwoman Sam Squallia joined us in a discussion largely centered on various economic and community development advances the city of Fitchburg has made recently. Included  are the progress being made on the Twin Cities Rail Trail and the recent acquisition by the City of more than $200,000.00 of state funding to examine improvements to infrastructure in the John Fitch retail district that will make the district more climate change resilient moving forward. Sam offered us an update on progress made for the artists village in the north downtown region as well as new businesses coming to the city including a robotics-themed brewery coming to the Route 12 corridor. All this and more in episode 20 of Scotts on the Rocks Politica. Sam Squallia is host of Discussing Fitchburg Now.

John Fitch, Co-author of the international bestseller, Time Off: A Practical Guide to Building Your Rest Ethic and Finding Success Without the Stress, was such a pleasure to talk to! We talked about how important rest and leisure time is, as well as John's own recovery from being a workaholic. Enjoy the episode!https://www.john-fitch.com/

Bruce Daisley LinkedinBruce Daisley WebsiteBruce Daisley TwitterEat Sleep Work Repeat BookBruce Daisley's other book, The Joy of WorkThe Good Jobs Strategy, Zeynep TonPriya Parker, The Art of Gathering  

Episode: 1962 Rockets, jets, and other (inherently fast) recoil propulsion systems.  Today, jets and rockets.

In this episode, we explore the other component of mettle that is often overlooked. How do you spend your time off? How do you rest? Do you have a rest ethic? What does time off mean to you? For most people the answer is going to be vacation or holiday. But as John Fitch explains, to be our best it should go much deeper than that. Although rest and relaxation are part of it, it goes much deeper than that. Your rest ethic should serve as a nourishment of your soul through many activities that may surprise you. I invite you to give some of your time to listening to this important message in a world that is always "on" and dangerously teetering on burnout. We live in a time where busyness is seen as a badge of honor. Time off can seem like a forgotten or even despised concept. But in this book, you will learn how the deliberate practice of time off will enable you to be your most successful and creative self. Time off and leisure will be the essential skills and competitive advantages that keep you happy and unique. "Time Off" book link https://www.amazon.com/Time-Off-Practical-Building-Finding/dp/1734794402/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=time+off&qid=1605700357&sr=8-1 "Atomic Habits" book link (referenced by John) https://www.amazon.com/Atomic-Habits-Proven-Build-Break/dp/0735211299/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=atomic+habits&qid=1605700386&sr=8-3 "The Way We're Working Isn't Working" book link (referenced by Tara) https://www.amazon.com/Way-Were-Working-Isnt-Performance/dp/1451610262/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=the+way+we%27re+working&qid=1605701300&sr=8-1 "The Top Five Regrets of the Dying" book link (referenced by John) https://www.amazon.com/Top-Five-Regrets-Dying-Transformed/dp/1401956009/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1Q8A0FUCDGPHG&dchild=1&keywords=the+five+regrets+of+dying&qid=1605701370&sprefix=the+five+regrets+of+%2Caps%2C176&sr=8-1 "Indistractable" book link (reference by John) https://www.amazon.com/Indistractable-Nir-Eyal-Julie-Li-audiobook/dp/B07SV4V6ZK/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2KPHW9NTJSCFM&dchild=1&keywords=indestractible&qid=1605702352&sprefix=indestracti%2Caps%2C185&sr=8-1 About John Fitch John is a startup coach and entrepreneur. He lives in Austin, Texas and enjoys jiu jitsu, cooking and hosting dinner parties in his time off. "I love connecting new dots and creating prototypes of products and businesses. When new ideas aren't successful, it's usually because a team was overconfident about how well customers/users would understand the idea and how much they would perceive its value. I specialize in quickly receiving customer/user reactions, before making any expensive commitments. It involves a lot of play, unlearning, and empathy." https://www.john-fitch.com/ https://www.timeoffbook.com/ Twitter @johnwfitch https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnwfitch/

If you haven't listened to part 1, then please take a pause and check out episode 45. In this continuation John and Max are dropping even more gems about the modern workforce, productivity and the idea of leisure time. Buckle up, it's going to be an interesting ride. Share this episode with your friends, bookmark it so you can revisit it, and tell us your favourite quote in the comments! SKIP AHEAD: 01:15 - The concept of leisure 02:50 - The protestant work ethic and how it affects leisure 04:25 - Revisiting “time off” 04:55 - Lessons in leisure from a Jamaican  07:02 - 4-day work week vs 4-hour work day vs a 9-5 work day 12:00 - How has developing a rest ethic helped you 15:58 - The importance of play time for adults 18:40 - How to call ourselves back to rest 22:19 - What is distraction engineering 24:30 - How “things” can stress us out 28: 12 - Tech Shabbat explained 30:53 - A comment on the future of work 31:50 - If you're feeling burnt out

So, when was the last time that you intentionally took some time-off? On this episode Jen Fisher talks with John Fitch and Max Frenzel, co-authors of the book Time-off and luminaries in the art and science of why we all need to create a rest ethic that matches our work ethic.

So, when was the last time that you intentionally took some time-off? On this episode, Deloitte chief well-being officer Jen Fisher talks with John Fitch and Max Frenzel, co-authors of the book Time-off and luminaries in the art and science of why we all need to create a rest ethic that matches our work ethic.

You have never heard a discussion on rest, productivity and reimagining work quite like this one. This interview will probably blow your mind !! Max Frenzel and John Fitch are the authors of “Time Off: a practical guide to building your rest ethic and finding success without the stress”. In their book and in this interview series (this is part 1 of 2) they discuss how critical it is for us to prioritize rest. Bookmark the episode, and share it with a friend because this is one you'll definitely have on repeat. SKIP AHEAD: 06:45 - Simple ways to take time off 11:10 - The importance of rest ethic 14:16 - What is time off 14:30 - What exactly is rest ethic 15:45 - What percentage of the creative process is active work 17:46 - How is overwork stifling us (an alternative view of artificial intelligence and the future of work) 19:14 - How rest can make you a better leader 20:15 - How our relationship to work has changed 23:05 - Rethinking work and productivity 25:10 - Why are we addicted to overwork 27:35 - Factory work vs Knowledge work 28:27 - How is hard work different from work ethic (and a word on “distraction economy”)   For context this episode was recorded during the Coronavirus pandemic of 2020. p.s.: John's doggie came by for a little visit (so you'll hear a little doggie whining)  

This week we're learning how time off can actually help us be more productive, with help from writers John Fitch and Max Frenzel. Listen to hear how to build a healthy rest ethic, what leisure practices can help spark creativity, and how we can encourage more time off in our productivity-obsessed society. John and Max are the authors of the book Time Off: A Practical Guide to Building Your Rest Ethic and Finding Success Without the Stress.Have an idea for a future episode? Call us at 347-687-8109 and leave a voicemail, or write to us at upgrade@lifehacker.com. We want to hear from you!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

"I just started to see really smart, prolific, skilled people who shared my values." -Lynda Baker I'm excited to have Lynda Baker, IAF Certified Professional Facilitator Master, meeting leader coach, and founder and president of Meeting Solutions Online on today’s episode of Control the Room. As a certified professional facilitator, she creates collaborative client relationships, plans appropriate group processes, creates and sustains a participatory environment, and guides groups to appropriate and useful outcomes. She also trains meeting leaders and managers who want to remove blocks that prevent them from running productive meetings. While a freshman in college, she wanted to be an orientation leader. She volunteered to work at the admissions office at the State University of New York, who had an excellent peer advisor orientation. Lynda learned about active listening, leading groups of students, and parent groups. The program equipped her with the skills to engage others in conversation. Additionally, she and several peers from this group volunteered to be response volunteers at a local crisis center. These experiences planted the seed to be involved in her career. Working in an incubator, "I found myself demonstrating these really amazing pieces of technology in a room that was an intranet because the internet wasn't even that powerful in those days." We talk about her early days of being seduced by technology, why she clicked with the IAF, and how the IAF holds people accountable. Listen in to find out how Laura teaches the concepts of facilitation, why "your" meeting isn't "your" meeting, and why you don't have to manage or control every part of the conversation.   Show Highlights [00:55] How Lynda started her career path to a group facilitator. [03:58] Her journey from her early experiences to what she does today. [07:24] How Lynda got started and what she would do differently if she were to relaunch now. [10:14] IAF and understanding facilitated values and facilitated behaviors and the impact of engagement. [13:26] Differences between a moderator and a facilitator. [15:35] Laura speaks about her experience with training facilitation. [18:36] Leaders and how they can harness the power of facilitation. [21:30] Why engagement is not entertainment. [25:48] Having operating agreements instead of ground rules.  [29:47] Gratitude in facilitation and recognizing the contributions of the group. [34:22] How can participants be better participants? [38:27] Behaviors that go unchecked during facilitation. [41:50] Why Laura believes that a Master’s degree in Leadership Change is the most critical degree needed for our world today. Links and Resources Meeting Solutions Online Lynda Baker on LinkedIn About the Guest Lynda facilitates well-designed meetings, face-to-face and on-line, that create actionable results. As a certified professional facilitator, she establishes collaborative client relationships, plans appropriate group processes, creates and sustains a participatory environment, and guides groups to appropriate and useful outcomes. She also trains meeting leaders and managers who want to remove blocks that prevent them from running productive meetings. Proudly cited as a creative senior-level organizational development professional with a passion for finding the right process to engage collaboration for problem-solving, decision-making, and action planning; her superpower is surfacing clarity that leads to productive outcomes and action plans across organizational levels. About Voltage Control Voltage Control is a facilitation agency that helps teams work better together with custom-designed meetings and workshops, both in-person and virtual. Our master facilitators offer trusted guidance and custom coaching to companies who want to transform ineffective meetings, reignite stalled projects, and cut through assumptions. Based in Austin, Voltage Control designs and leads public and private workshops that range from small meetings to large conference-style gatherings.  Share An Episode of Control The Room Apple Podcasts Spotify Android Stitcher Engage Control The Room Voltage Control on the Web Contact Voltage Control   Intro: Welcome to the Control the Room Podcast, a series devoted to the exploration of meeting culture and uncovering cures for the common meeting. Some meetings have tight control, and others are loose. To control the room means achieving outcomes while striking a balance between imposing and removing structure, asserting and distributing power, leaning in and leaning out, all in the service of having a truly magical meeting. Douglas: Today I'm here with Lynda Baker, IAF-certified professional facilitator-master, meeting leader coach, and founder and president of Meeting Solutions Online. Welcome to the show, Lynda. Lynda: Thank you, Douglas. I’m happy to be here. Douglas: So, Lynda, tell us a little bit about how you got started. Lynda: Well, I really was a wee tot, I must confess. I think I really got started as a facilitator when I was a freshman in college. I was one of those enthusiastic freshmen who wanted to be an orientation leader someday, and so I volunteered to work in the admissions office at this wonderful institution, the State University of New York at Stony Brook. And they had an awesome peer-advisor, peer-counseling orientation. And I learned about T-groups and about active listening and about leading groups of students who were coming to the university in conversations and leading parent groups, talking to parents who were interested in coming to the university, or having their children come. And even though there was a certain amount of content that we were sharing, we were also equipped with lots of skills to engage these students, prospective students, and these parents, in conversations. So there was that piece. And the other piece was that it was the early days of creating what I think are now referred to as I&R services, information and referral services, like people who call crisis lines and want information. And there was a crisis line that was being created in the town of Stony Brook called Response, and several of my peers and I volunteered to be trained to be Response volunteers on the phone. And I think both of those activities as a college student really planted the seeds for me to be passionate about this field, although I didn't find that out until a little bit later in my career. Douglas: And so tell me a little bit more about—I mean, I think it's fascinating to think back around some of the early seeds that are planted and how they start to grow and develop into something that's ultimately a beautiful, flowering career in facilitation. You kind of mentioned that there was a moment much later on that it became more obvious. So was there something that was transformative later, or how did that journey from those early experiences flow into where you are today? Lynda: Well, I think that the professional career that I chose and my academic training had very strong elements of facilitation, and my master's degree is in Higher Education Administration. So I was a student personnel worker, and I worked with college students and really did a lot of shared leadership. I did leadership training with them and empowered them to make decisions. And trained resident advisors. So I had that background. And then I was in a graduate program in counseling psychology. So my academic background dovetailed quite well. But I think it was when I was working, very interestingly enough, I was working at an organization called the Austin Technology Incubator, and it was in the early days of what we now call remote workshops. In those days, we called it electronic-meeting software or group-decision-support software. And I found myself demonstrating these really amazing pieces of technology in a room that was an intranet because the Internet wasn't even that powerful in those days. The Web wasn't even that powerful in those days. And I would demonstrate this really cool software that companies at the Incubator were developing. And I worked for the Incubator as their external relations assistant. I did public relations, and I worked with students. And people would say, “You're really good at that. Do you work for this company?” And I would say, “No. I work for the Incubator.” And I started realizing that I could do something that I really loved to do that lots of other people didn’t necessarily like to do or were not necessarily that good at doing. And it occurred to me: I'm at this incubator that's incubating businesses, starting businesses. I'm getting feedback that this is something I'm really good at. Maybe I need to just go out on my own and do more of this in another way. So I actually started my business in the ’90s, thinking I was going to do electronic-meeting software. I was going to haul around 20 laptop computers and set them up in rooms, or I was going to buy a boat load of keypads, and we were going to do—you know, of course, now people laugh at that, like who needs that? Just log on. So it's really exciting to see what's happened with this field and what's going on now, particularly in 2020 when everything is “electronic meetings,” when everything is digital and virtual. Douglas: I find that remarkable, this idea that incubators are there to help startups get launched. But I often find that people share that experience that you had, where they're part of the startup or a part of the support environment. They're an employee of the incubator, and they learn by watching these startups, and then that gives them the confidence to go start their own thing. So it's awesome that this has been happening since the ’90s. I hadn’t heard a story quite like that. That's incredible. So when you were making that shift to start to have these electronic meetings with clients, and you had this dream of putting together these laptops, what was your first step in starting a company? There's a lot of folks out there who want to start facilitation companies, and that's pretty early in the game. So how did you get started, and what would you do differently if you had to start over now? Lynda: Well, I think one of the things I did was I did a lot of work aligning with the handful of companies that were in the marketplace, who had software that enabled people to collaborate together—I wanted to say online, but I'm not even sure that that was an accurate statement—on a shared network of computers. And at the time, looking back on it, I think that I was a little bit more seduced, I think, by the razzmatazz of the technology. And it was later that I became more developed in terms of my own skills. And I got that, in large part, through affiliating with the International Association of Facilitators. They were having their second, I think, or third conference in Dallas. Douglas: So what was it about the International Association of Facilitators that allowed you to kind of take a step back from the razzmatazz of the software? What was that thing that really clicked for you? Lynda: I think I was introduced to the founders of IAF, actually, were the founders, and many people who were involved with the Institute of Cultural Affairs, which is this global organization of people who were doing lots of facilitation and said, “You know, there are other people out there doing facilitation, too. We are doing it to try to advance participation in communities, to advance participation as a sort of a social movement. But there are lots of people out there also doing this. Maybe we can create an association.” So they were really, many of those people from ICA were the founders of IAF. And I think I was realizing that there were lots of people who shared the same values that I shared about collaboration, about engagement. And then I also met some of the people who've now become stellar luminaries in my field. I met Sam Kaner and I met Roger Schwarz, and I met lots of people, Ingrid Bens. I just started to see really smart, prolific, skilled people who shared my values, and they didn't need the razzmatazz of technology necessarily, but they understood what facilitative values were. They understood what facilitative behaviors were, and they understood the impact of engaging participation. This notion that the whole really is greater than the sum of its parts, which is, actually, the topic of my recent MURAL talk is the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. We, the people means we, the people. It’s not just a platitude. You can really make a “we, the people” occur in a meaningful way in a meeting room. Douglas: That's brilliant. And it sounds like the community and just the amazing people that were coming together to talk about these things and how they were shaping the craft, if you will, it really spoke to you. Lynda: Well, yes, it was the community, and it was a community and still is a community that holds people accountable to some standards. When I got involved, they first started talking about what are facilitator competencies? How do we collectively define this body of knowledge, these abilities, behaviors, skills? How do these things fit together to really define what a facilitator is? I think about the ways in which certain words are used in our culture. Counselor is a good one. You go to the doctor's office or you go to some place, a medical place, and they say, “Oh, the financial counselor would like to talk to you.” It's, like, that’s not a counselor; that’s accounts receivable. But people use the word counselor so loosely. And I think facilitator is like that as well sometimes. People think everybody's a facilitator. And everybody's not a facilitator; this is a profession. And IAF got out there and said, “We're going to define what these competencies are, what it means to say you’re a facilitator. And we have standards.” And I really appreciated that, and I appreciate it being a part of that movement in our field. Douglas: The word moderator came to mind when you were talking about words that kind of get thrown around. And I know my heart sinks whenever I coach someone that is looking to improve their meetings; or even a lot of virtual stuff these days, where we get pulled in just to coach and help people. A lot of times, people don't have budget, but we can still help them out and point them in the right direction. I was helping out someone recently and kind of explaining how some of this stuff works. And they were like, they came back to me and said, “Oh, we found a moderator.” And I was just like, “Well, you know, you can you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink, necessarily.” Lynda: You can't make them facilitate. They might just want to moderate instead. It's an interesting thing that you bring that up, because I will say to people, sometimes, “I think you don't need a facilitator. I think what you're talking about may be, in fact, a moderator.” In other words, I think it's up to us as a profession to try to educate people, and I think that's another reason why I appreciate the designation, is to help educate people about, I'm not a presenter. And yes, a trainer may use facilitative techniques, but someone who's delivering training is not a facilitator of training. They are a trainer who's using facilitative techniques. So, I'm a former president of the Austin chapter of the Association of Talent Development, which used to be Society for Training and Development, so I have a lot of strong feelings about training, and I understand what training is, and it's not the same as being a facilitator. So it's to your point, this is like a moderator, trainer, facilitator. It's like, oh, they're all the same thing. No, no, no, no, no, no. They’re not the same thing. Douglas: So, you teach a class on facilitation, or facilitative leadership, I think, to be more specific. And I'm really curious. We never spoke about this, so I'll be learning on the fly. Students usually have aha moments, and usually they're fairly common threads from semester to semester, cohort to cohort. What's the thing that keeps just recurring as you're teaching this class that are just, like, pivotal moments for students as they’re embarking on learning about facilitation? Lynda: So you were asking about my class that I teach. I teach a class called Facilitation as a Tool for Strategic Leadership. And my colleague, Dr. Tom Sechrest, had me come to speak to his classes in the master's program in leadership and change at St. Edward's University many years. And after several years of enthusiasm in these students, on Tom's part, he said, “Maybe you ought to teach a special projects class on this subject of facilitation. I knew it was important in my class as a speaker, but it could be a whole class.” So I embarked on that three years ago. And of course, this year it was totally online. And as of two days ago, my students’ final projects are due, so I’m going to be reading about their aha moments any moment. But I think that what I've observed that's been very interesting is having trained facilitation, teaching people techniques, for many, many years—I teach the technology of participation, which is an ICA methodology—I now am really teaching more concepts of facilitation. I'm not necessarily teaching skills. And I think what's been really fascinating to me is students will say, “I took conflict resolution, and we learned a little bit about action learning. But the way you teach this class, I sort of see how it is applied in interacting with people. You demonstrated a lot of that to me.” And I have to be honest, Douglas. I don't realize that I'm doing that intentionally, but I've been very gratified to see how people seem to say, “Hmm, if I’m going to be a strategic leader, I may not be a facilitator in the traditional sense of being what a facilitator is, but if I really understand what facilitators do, there are foundational principles and values and behaviors that I can shamelessly steal from that profession and use as being a really good strategic leader.” I mean, I think that that's interesting now that I think about it—I hadn’t thought about it except about our conversation we had before we even started this recording, when we were talking about Roger Schwarz’s book Smarter Leaders, Smarter Teams. I mean, I think his first book was The Skilled Facilitator, but he's teaching leadership now. I hadn't really thought about it, frankly, until this very minute, that synapse, or that connection—that if more leaders were facilitated, we'd probably be in a lot better shape. Douglas: Absolutely. And we've been talking a lot about how that's the future, right? We're looking at so many ineffective meetings and wasted time. If the leaders understand these things, then they can enact more change across the organization and influence direction through more participation. And I think that's where true innovation can come from. I guess, looking through that lens of leaders harnessing the power of facilitation, what do you think that can unlock for organizations as far as— like, what is the specific future you could imagine? How would you see organizations starting to change if more leaders were facilitators? Lynda: Well, I've always said that it's curious that people crave community and yet they abhor meetings. And I think if more leaders understood that people are passionate about getting things done, and they know that they must get them done with other people and cannot get them done alone, and that the reason why they abhor meetings is that there are so many blocks to their productivity in those sessions that they become frustrated. So I think that the secret sauce for a facilitator and for a leader is to learn how to remove obstacles and blocks rather than put things in that are irrelevant or clever or entertaining or the many things that people do. “Oh, I think I'll do an icebreaker.” It's like, “Is there any ice in the room?” I mean, people, I think, need to understand that their jobs are not to be necessarily entertaining, but engaging in relevant ways and listening to what people's needs are and responding in meaningful ways to what their needs are. So I think if leaders begin to understand ways to not be afraid of learning what those obstacles are, not be afraid of being humble, that’s the big learning I've had, to be honest, living in this virtual space right now. I told my students this summer, “I think I’m the Brené Brown of facilitators.” I will just come out and say, “You know what. I just left a breakout room, and by mistake, I left the whole meeting. I needed to get back in.” And then they feel comfortable saying, “Really? I didn't know where the Chat button was. Thank you so much for admitting your vulnerability and your…” You know, I think we need to be more human with each other. Douglas: Absolutely. My speaking coach even gave me advice. He’s like, “You don't want to be the hero. No one wants to hear about how awesome you are. But if you show how fallible you are, they'll listen. They'll eat it up.” And I think that's just to better engage the audience in the speech, but on the facilitation side, we absolutely need to show our human side because it's not about us. It's not about us entertaining and what not. And you talking about the obstacles and removing those reminded me of our preshow conversation and the definition of facilitation being to make it easy, and I think more facilitators need to meditate on that one. Lynda: I think, when I first started working in this field, one of my very good friends and colleagues said to me, “You have to remember that this meeting isn't your meeting. It's their meeting.” And I kept thinking, “Yeah, but they've hired me to help them with their meeting.” Said, “Well, your job is to hold the space and be good at process, but it's their meeting.” And I think when I've trained facilitators to hold their breath—or not hold their breath, perhaps—but take a breath and not necessarily intervene quickly in a quiet space in the meeting, that the group will pick up, eventually, the thread of that conversation. Roger Schwarz once said, “If you don't intervene at a particular moment and you think it's a really appropriate moment, there's a good chance that whatever that challenge is, it will come back again.” But it's this notion that there are times to intervene that are appropriate. It also is that you don't have to manage or control every part of this conversation, but you develop a sensitivity to when you can move in and move out. I think you talk about tight control and loose control. It's kind of like the dance, how you really move in and move out. And it's one of the things that IAF promoted at early conference, I think. They talk about the art and science of facilitation. And it really is both an art and a science, I think. Douglas: It reminds me of how Keith McCanless talks about falling off the horse and getting on the horse. And sometimes you lose control, and sometimes you—and you have to just be at peace with that. But my whole philosophy is you don't want things to be out of control. We want to unleash everyone. We want to distribute control. But as soon as things veer into—in the form of if we're looking at complexity theory, if we get into chaos, that's not generally a good thing. Wading into complexity and allowing emergent phenomenon, that's all good stuff. And how do we as facilitators maybe surf that line and balance around just enough support where we don’t deep into chaos? So we control it just enough so that beautiful things can happen. But we'd all over control it, where we get into the simple demand, and now it's just, you know, obvious solutions that are going to stifle everything. Lynda: I think that there is a skill to managing conflict, for example, as opposed to trying to cut it off or fearing it. I think that oftentimes there are undiscussables or conflictual undercurrents in a group that can be very illustrative and educational and healing if dealt with appropriately. And oftentimes, that's why people bring in facilitators, because there's something up—they don't quite know what, or they don't know how—but they know they can't do it themselves. And so I think that the degree to which we can hold the space and manage those situations before they are chaotic, but they are conflictual in some ways, that we can guide people to learn from conflicts and not be afraid to talk about difficult things. One of the expressions that I've heard people talk about when they talk about ground rules—which, I don't like that phrase. I like to call them operating agreements rather than ground rules—is when people say, “There's no such thing as a bad idea.” And I often find that to be very—it's really a superficial comment. There are some ideas that are better than other ideas. And if we want to get really good ideas, we need to be comfortable talking about an idea that maybe has some aspects of it that are not going to help us advance to our desired outcome or to advance the results our company needs or to advance to a higher place. So I think that words matter a lot. I think it’s up to us to try to help—I made that comment earlier about we, the people. If we really want to have free speech, we need to be really skilled at communicating with one another and deepening the dialog, agreeing on what important words mean, and that's what helps contribute to getting to the bottom of issues and not being afraid to go there. Douglas: So I agree that words matter, and you have some opinions on ground rules don't set the right tone and your preference for operating agreements. I think that's awesome. What other sorts of verbal judo do you have or kind of words in your toolkit when you're dealing with, let's say, conflict or needing to maybe shift energy in the room? What are some of your Lynda favorites? Lynda: The first thing that came to my mind, and I'm not even sure if this is what I would call verbal judo, is I often will say, “You need to complain to the person who can do something about the complaint.” I think that some of the operating agreements that I talk about—although Schwarz calls them ground rules, but actually he's calling them eight behaviors for smarter teams now. They used to be ground rules, now they’re behaviors—are agreeing what important words mean. The famous Fisher and Ury, Getting to Yes guys, talk about focusing on interests rather than positions, sharing relevant information. A lot of those, even if a group’s not necessarily embracing those kinds of practices, I do my best to try to promote the use of those words that become—you become more unconsciously competent about it. If you use it for a long-enough time, you start to develop your own skill in actually doing those things. In the beginning of my career, I used to say, “I'm going to share relevant information right now,” or “I’d like to focus on an interest rather than a position right now.” And it felt very mechanical. I'm more comfortable saying things like, “This is what I'm interested in. Help me understand what you're interested in, or “This is how I see it. Do you see it similarly, or do you see it differently?” Douglas: I like that, framing it really clearly and then asking, inviting people to challenge it and correct and maybe nuance. I think that's powerful, for sure. And I guess, I want to come back to this notion of facilitation making leaders better. And I think that one thing I've noticed in facilitation a lot of times, facilitators talk about holding space, facilitators practice active listening, and I think there's a general thread of gratitude in facilitation, just being grateful for everyone's contribution and recognizing everyone's space and contribution. And I think that alone has a very powerful impact when leaders practice these things, specifically the gratitude. So I say all this out of curiosity around your experience with the, I would say, the overlap between facilitation and gratitude. Lynda: Wow, that's interesting. I hadn't really thought about the connection between the word grace and gratitude until just now. I think that the current world that we are operating in is a world in which we are called to give one another grace. To me, that means that we are as grateful as we can be for their circumstance and situation, and I think that as a facilitator, we need to be grateful for people giving us the authority, if you will, to lead their meetings. I learned many years ago that a key to introducing yourself to any group is to express your appreciation to them for giving you their attention. And that is a gift for which you need to be grateful because it's very easy for people to tune you out as a speaker, as a trainer, as a facilitator. So I think we need to express our gratitude for people's time and commitment and earn the right to be in front of that room. There's a lot of humility that I think goes a long way when you realize that for a certain amount of time—an hour, two hours, a day, several days, a couple of weeks—you are being given a lot of attention, and that is very precious. Douglas: If you could change anything about the way most meetings are run, what would it be? Lynda: Wow. I think the simple slowing-down-to-speed-up philosophy would be a good way to start. That means listening to what is said and periodically pausing and summarizing what you think has been said and checking back with people and seeing if you are tracking with them. I think that would go a long way if people did that. And I don't only mean meeting leaders. I mean, attendees could do a little bit more of that as well. Douglas Yeah. So let’s talk about that. John Fitch and I have a book that we are working on called The Non-obvious Guide to Magical Meetings, and we have a whole section on how to make meetings better as a participant, so I love the fact that you brought up this notion of participants. So as facilitators, we end up in other people's meetings. And what's some of your advice to folks that want to be better participants in meetings? Lynda: I almost feel like, I don't know, maybe a charlatan, answering that question, because I don't think I'm a very good participant. I have to confess. Douglas: So what makes you a bad participant, Lynda? Lynda: Well, I get very excited and passionate as the participant. I think I have a lot of needs for attention. And when I get excited in a meeting, I sometimes get carried away, and I think that I'm the kind of participant that some people who are not experienced facilitators think are those people who go on and on, and you have to shut them up already. And so I think that's why I'm a really good facilitator, because I have sympathy for those people, because I am one of those people. But that's not what you asked. You asked, How could participants be better participants? So now that I've confessed—I did tell you I was the Brené Brown of meeting facilitators—now that I've confessed that I need to teach myself some behaviors, I've been doing a little bit more of this. I have been. When I'm ready to say something in a meeting and I get really excited about it, I've tried to take a few breaths and think to myself, “If you don't say that right now, why don't you wait for two or three more people to say something, and see if maybe someone else is going to say it first.” So that would be one thing. When you're really excited about saying something, you can write it down, and then wait a few minutes. That’s one behavior. Another one would be the very thing I said before, which is if you don't feel like you want to—some people say, “Well, I don't really have anything to contribute.” I think a good participant can also be a good-enough listener to say, “Although I don't have any ideas directly about what's just been discussed…” I can hear you typing over there. You might be jotting down some really important notes. Although a participant may say, “I don't have much to contribute,” they can listen and do that observation. “I seem to hear a theme. I seem to hear a theme right now in this conversation,” or “I heard this, this, and this. Is that what people are saying?” So that’s another way. And I think the other great thing everybody can do is to learn how to ask better questions. What I tell my students is, questions are the Swiss Army knife of a good facilitator. Douglas: Mm. I think it's really great, too, when participants start asking really great, great questions. And I will often—that's one of my operating agreements. I'll stop saying ground rules. I encourage them to, if they have something to share, that they can share in the form of a question, it's best to ask the question. If they think someone else maybe has more details on something, they can poll the group with this. And often, you will learn something because someone answers your question, they're going to answer it slightly differently than you would have shared. And I just think that's a super-amazing alignment tool is getting the team to ask questions of each other rather than just spewing facts over and over again. Lynda: I think that is also that combination approach of combining advocacy and inquiry, advocating your particular point of view and asking questions. I think you pointed out before, when I mentioned, that you said being able to pose your opinion and then ask people if they see it that way or they see it differently. And that requires sincere curiosity. It's not, “I have a technique. I'm going to tell you what I think. And then I'm going to ask you if you see it similarly or differently.” You have to really be curious about whether they do see it the same way or differently. Otherwise, it doesn't really work, you know? And I think that's the idea of being a values-based facilitator, that if your values are really to seek transparency and to share relevant information, then you really are curious. You really want feedback. Sometimes we don't want feedback. Then it would not be a good idea to ask for it. Douglas: Let's talk a little bit about values-based facilitation. Lynda: I think that we often have behaviors that go unchecked. We don't necessarily align the way we behave in interactions as well as in facilitative skill or facilitative behaviors as human beings interacting with one another. And I think that really getting to the bottom of what we believe, what our values are, what our code of ethics is—I mean, the IAF has a code of ethics. We believe in the power of collaboration. We believe that it is important to disclose conflicts of interest. We honor the integrity of all participants in a group—you start to have to, in a way, hold yourself accountable to, how do your behaviors align with that? And I think that as a culture, we're looking a lot more closely at, how do our behaviors align with our values? That's why I think that a meeting room, whether it's face to face or virtual, really needs to reflect values or principles that are way bigger than just your personal opinions about how to manage participation. And as I mentioned earlier, that whole idea of, what does it mean that everyone is welcome? What does that mean, really? If you really believe that everyone is welcome, how do you equitably welcome everybody to the table? How do you respect people who do or do not want to have their cameras turned on? How do you connect with people and welcome people? And how do people want to be welcomed? The difference between the Golden Rule and the Platinum Rule—the Golden Rule is treat others as you would like to be treated. But the Platinum Rule says treat them the way they want to be treated. It may not be the same as the way you want to be treated. So I think that's the best I can do on values-based facilitation. There's certainly authors that have written extensively. And I think looking at organizations like the IAF or ICA or looking at basic beliefs of an organization or the underpinnings of a philosophy. Douglas: Yeah, that's great. What's something that you recently discovered that has given you hope or making you really curious? Lynda: I think it's the gift of being able to teach at the university at this time. For the first time in the years that I've been teaching at St. Edward's, this year I was able to say to my students, “You are all learning about facilitation as you are earning your master's degree in leadership and change. I know that you thought this degree was important when you began to pursue it, but I want you to recognize right this minute that master’s of leadership and change is the most critical degree needed for our world today. And you are all earning that degree, and you're learning about facilitation as you're doing that.” And there were many students who looked back at me on, as I refer to it, the Hollywood Squares of Zoom, and their eyes lit up. And I think that as a mom and as a professor and as a professional in this field, I feel like there are lots of young people who really understand the value of engagement and participation. And our world really needs engagement and participation and compassion and empowerment today, not just young people, but thinking about cities and counties that have discovered, “You know, if we don't have strong leadership beyond our city or county or state, it's up to us. It's up to each individual to step up to the plate, and say, ‘Yes, I can. And yes, I will.’” And I think facilitators are needed more now than ever before to help people realize that, yes, they can, and yes, we will. Douglas: Lynda, thank you so much for this great conversation today. It's been such a pleasure to have you on the show and to talk with you. I just want to give you a moment to let listeners know how they can find you. Lynda: Sheltering in place, they can find me. They can find me at meetingsolutionsonline.com. My email address is lynda.baker@meetingsolutionsonline.com. And I would love to hear from your listeners. I'd love to hear what they heard, what they thought, what they agreed with, and what they maybe wanted to hear more about, or even disagreed with, because I'm aspiring to learn more about this field myself always. So, thank you so much for the invitation to speak with you, Douglas. It’s been really, really exciting and intriguing for me to hear from you as well. So thank you very much. Douglas: Always a pleasure, Lynda. Outro: Thanks for joining me for another episode of Control the Room. Don't forget to subscribe to receive updates when new episodes are released. If you want more, head over to our blog, where I post weekly articles and resources about working better 

John Fitch is an entrepreneur, startup coach, and the co-author of Time Off, a refreshing book that enables readers to be their most successful and creative selves through intentional leisure and rest. John is also the Chief Product Officer at Voltage Control, a facilitation agency that helps companies work better together through customized meetings and workshops. After working at software startups for years, John wholeheartedly believes that the future of work is all about creativity. Consequently, he spends both his professional and personal time playing, innovating, and designing. In this episode… Do you feel like work dominates your life? Is your rest time infrequent and unhelpful? What if there was a way to create high-quality work without pulling all-nighters or working weekends? According to John Fitch, the co-author of Time Off, a large quantity of input does not always guarantee high-quality output. In fact, too much work often leaves us exhausted and high-strung, with only sub-par results to show for all of our effort. Instead, John suggests that the secret to productive and creative work is actually rest and leisure. In this episode of Succeed Under Stress, Dr. Jonathan Horowitz sits down with entrepreneur and author John Fitch to discuss how a healthy rest ethic is the key to creativity and success. Listen today as John talks about implementing an ancient Greek concept of time, the importance of daily creativity, and why you should try slow motion multitasking.

Our society is obsessed with work ethic, but at the same time overworked, under rested, and seems to always feel a bit frazzled. Especially in this time of a global pandemic, our work lives and home lives are less separated than ever before, and it’s harder to truly find “time off.” John Fitch’s book tackles just that subject – how we, as individuals and... Read More The post S3E26 – Cultivating a Rest Ethic and Taking Time Off with Author John Fitch appeared first on Office Baggage.

With it being Neil's first week back from a staycation and Cody going into a long weekend it seemed only fitting to have John Fitch co-author of 'Time Off' on the podcast. John speaks a little bit about his book, his relationship with the term 'Rest Ethic,' the four phases of creativity & most importantly, time off. Subscribe to the show on:Itunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-studioptbo-podcast/id1398036967?mt=2#episodeGuid=Buzzsprout-739630Google Play: https://play.google.com/music/listen?u=0#/ps/Ibfgbfiuvh5wi3vxoge76uwnjeeSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/03DG8shK4ksLFbSncPHv43?si=5fN-_NolQOOPXjoas15UXATunein: https://tunein.com/podcasts/Business--Economics-Podcasts/The-StudioPTBO-Podcast-p1207815/PS: When you're ready... here are 4 ways we can help you grow your business:1. Join the StudioPTBO Marketing Hacks Group on Facebook and connect with fellow entrepreneurs who are running businesses and growing teams.In this group we talk about how to grow and build your company on social and create momentum across your entire organization >>> https://www.facebook.com/groups/3402675632829752. Download A Free Copy "7 Essential Steps To Generating Leads For Your Business"We published this article to help provide massive value to this community and help you get started. Visit https://studioptbo.com/lead-generation to download your copy today.3. Get instant access to our free real estate online marketing training! Click here >> https://studioptbo.com/real-estate-freetraining4. Work with the StudioPTBO team privately. If you'd like to work directly with our team to help you build your business... just click here >>> https://studioptbo.com/book-now

Guide B2B Jam Session Live w_ John Fitch See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Time Off  with John Fitch ----------------- “You can have anything you want in life, but you can't have everything.” Most of our biggest dreams are totally unsustainable, but they come with a price. Want six-pack abs? Are you willing to skip carbs and spend 2 hours a day in the gym each day? Want a 7-figure bank balance? Are you up for 70-hour work weeks for the next 10 years? Want to start your own business and work for yourself? Are you prepared to become your own worst boss? I love my work and family. I rarely dream about leisure. And yet, I need it. We all need to rest and recharge. We need to step back so we can step back in more fully. On this week's podcast, you'll meet  the author of the new book, Time Off: A Practical Guide to Building Your Rest Ethic and Finding Success Without the Stress. Listen & Learn:  How the future of work might look more like leisure How an ethical rest ethic is just as important as a work ethic  How work, schedules, and the future are changing How to recontextualized the idea of downtime Links & Resources:  Time Off Book John's Website  ABOUT OUR GUEST John Fitch is a coach, writer, and angel investor. He's the co-author of a new book, Time Off: A Practical Guide to Building Your Rest Ethic and Finding Success Without the Stress. Nutritional Tip of the Week: Fruit Until Five Got Questions? Send me a voicemail here: Ask Lucas a Question Or write to us: podcast@yogabody.com  Like the Show? Leave us a Review on iTunes

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"I've read a lot into behavioral psychology, and one thing that is appreciated across the board regardless of the therapist or psychologist is that you change the environment, you change the behavior." John Fitch I'm Douglas Ferguson, and I'm on a mission to help people everywhere have better meetings. There's clear evidence that poorly run meetings not only waste time, but they also squander a lot of money. A recent report by Doodle found that $541 billion is lost globally every year on common meeting mistakes–and that's just the report from the County for Direct Labor Costs. This staggering amount translates into opportunity costs we incur from ineffective meetings. I'm excited to have John Fitch with me today! John is the CPO at Voltage Control and the author of Time Off. John is an author, business model generator, and prototype creator. He enjoys deep, intentional work that leads to the facilitation of new ideas and business models. John is a big fan of compartmentalization, especially with work colleagues, projects, and phases of projects. He stresses the importance of reflection and the design lens of conversation. John believes that compartmentalizing takes conversation design, "which I admit, I'm not a pro at, but I know that to compartmentalize we need to talk about it, have a language about it. I think it's fascinating," he says.  With COVID-19 and many of us working from home, John stresses the importance of having clearly compartmentalized spaces. "Now, if work is in your home and you haven't developed a rest ethic and have yours defined, and you're intentional about it, now that work is at home, it can be surrounding you at all times." Learning how to take time off can be an investment in many ways. It can help create new ideas and turn activities into meditation time, to name a few. Time off can also bring you awareness of what you do in a space of rest so that you can be intentional about how you spend time away from work. Find out why you should use breaks in your projects or meetings, how our days can be dictated by our emotional behaviors, and how you can have boot-up and boot-down time for your creative process.   Show Highlights [01:45] Time Off–the book and what it means to have a Rest Ethic. [02:22] Compartmentalizing work matters. [04:25] Doing specific tasks in your own space can help with compartmentalization. [07:29] Use your transition time commuting as a slow interstitial time-off switch. [08:05] Superhuman and it’s relevance to complexity theory. [08:54] Driving and music can be a form of meditation. [10:57] Incubation and the process of stepping away from the thing you are trying to achieve leads to more success.  [13:02] Use exercise to think through challenges–John’s interview with Terry Rudolph, a Quantum Physicist. [18:20] Build intentional time into your schedule for rest during meetings or projects. [21:31] Emotional triggers, both positive and negative, lead to a biased judgment of work. [26:15] Utilizing rest time requires a transition period and acclimation periods. [30:27] How John upgraded his business through time off and a real-life example from his book. [32:15] Intentionally plan time off and give others a heads up that you are planning to be disconnected. [34:17] When you lead a room, read others and be prepared to facilitate. [38:24] John’s recommendations to leaders for facilitating better meetings. [42:25] How you should reframe activities in your own mind. Links and Resources John Fitch Time Off  Time Off Podcast About the Guest John Fitch is a maker who loves tinkering and building prototypes of products and businesses. “When new ideas aren't successful, it’s usually because a team was overconfident about how well customers and users would understand the idea and how much they would perceive its value.” He specializes in enabling teams to receive customer and user reactions before making any expensive commitments. This process involves a lot of play, unlearning, and empathy. About Voltage Control Voltage Control is a facilitation agency that helps teams work better together with custom-designed meetings and workshops, both in-person and virtual. Our master facilitators offer trusted guidance and custom coaching to companies who want to transform ineffective meetings, reignite stalled projects, and cut through assumptions. Based in Austin, Voltage Control designs and leads public and private workshops that range from small meetings to large conference-style gatherings.  Share An Episode of Control The Room Apple Podcasts Spotify Android Stitcher Engage Control The Room Voltage Control on the Web Contact Voltage Control Intro: Welcome to the Control the Room Podcast, a series devoted to the exploration of meeting culture and uncovering cures for the common meeting. Some meetings have tight control, and others are loose. To control the room means achieving outcomes while striking a balance between imposing and removing structure, asserting and distributing power, leaning in and leaning out, all in the service of having a truly magical meeting. Douglas: I’m super excited to have John Fitch on the show this week. And John Fitch is the chief product officer at Voltage Control and the author of Time Off. Welcome to the show, John. John: Douglas, it's an honor to be on a podcast episode with you, deep in conversation. And it's also one of those classic funny lines where they're like, “Hey, it's been a while,” whereas right before recording this, you and I were prototyping some cool stuff. So it’s cool, then, to transition from the intensity, deep work of prototyping to a more casual conversation. Douglas: In a way, this casual conversation comes off as a bit of time off compared to the deep, intentional work that's required for facilitation. John: Well said. And you said a word there that is really important. You said intentional. And in the book Time Off and the whole point of view I have is we talk about it's important to have a work ethic, and we just proved that, prototyping some awesome software. We did it with an intentional work ethic. And having an intentional rest ethic is what the book Time Off is all about. So you’re right. And time off can be active, which is another, I think, eye opener for our readers. It doesn't just mean vegging out on the couch, which is totally fine, that's a form of time off, but sometimes stopping what you're doing and just having an awesome conversation with a colleague, a friend. In this case, you're both of those. So, yeah. Good point. Douglas: Excellent. And I want to get to your background a little bit. But before we do, I love this notion of being able to be friends and colleagues at the same time. And I think there is this notion of compartmentalization that's so important to be able to do those things. I'm curious to hear your thoughts on this notion of compartmentalization. John: I think it’s fantastic to compartmentalize lots of things. And especially with those you work with, but it's important to compartmentalize the projects, and what phase is it in. I think we've talked many times before in our facilitation coaching that it's important to look at your meeting culture through seasons. That's a compartmentalization, right? You've decided, hey, right now we're in a season of production, or we're in a season of reflection or redesign or growth. And all of those have been intentionally compartmentalized. And so I think across relationships, that's really important. But also within your company culture, within yourself, you've got to compartmentalize parts of yourself. Like, I can't necessarily bring the version of me that's going out hunting and hiking to every prototyping session I have. And so I think that mindfulness and that internal check in, both for yourself but also across your team, is just, you know, that's the beauty of reflection and intention. So I think it's cool to just simply talk about it. And I know you've had Daniel Stillman on the podcast and so cool to just think about the design lens of conversation. And to your point, compartmentalizing things, I think takes a lot of amazing conversation design that I know I'm not a pro at. But I know that to compartmentalize, we've got to talk about it, we have to have a language about it. So I think it's fascinating. Douglas: You know, it's interesting you bring up this notion of hunting or fishing, and I think exercise can play a role there, these things that have a space associated with them. You go to do those things in that space tend to help with compartmentalization because you can think of that it serves a purpose. Right at the beginning of COVID, I read some really fascinating writings by psychologists that were saying to really think about how you redesign your space and the purpose each room has for you so that you can still compartmentalize your life, even though you're confined to a much smaller, let's say, footprint. John: Yeah. It’s fascinating. I've been thinking about now, since Time Off is out, you have friends and readers who reach out, and they’re like, “Hey, have you thought about what you're writing next?” And in regard to the whole Time Off sort of franchise, if I'm to use that word, I think a natural follow up would be time on and intentional time on. And then a book title that I'm the most excited about regarding what you just said would be a title something like Time Away. I, too, have read a lot into behavioral psychology, and one thing that is pretty much appreciated across the board, regardless of the therapist or psychologist, is you change the environment, you change the behavior. And that's so fascinating. And, yeah, right now we're all limited. You and I can't both just pack our bags and go to Ireland. Well, I mean, I guess we could, but probably not smart at the moment. But just by changing things up in your own house. I remember—remind me of Linda's last name, who spoke at Control the Room. Douglas: Linda Baker. John: Yeah. Linda Baker. She gave a presentation on feng shui, and I think that's under that lens of energy design, space design. And it is amazing if you just rearrange things. And I know I've been on so many Zoom calls with you. You’ve really transformed your office, I assume for the better. But all of those intentional environment changes have, I would assume, changed your behavior. Would you say so? Douglas: Absolutely. You know, I’ve created stations, if you will, within my house, so that each spot’s almost like traveling to a new—it's like a replica of what I had previously. I've got the space where I'm doing workshops. I got the space where I’m boxing and doing Pilates. I got the space where I'm eating. I got the space where I'm relaxing, and I got the place where I'm sleeping. I try to keep those responsibilities delineated and compartmentalized so I can be very intentional about what I'm going to do and how I spend that time. John: And that’s really important. I think that's one thing I've been thinking a lot about with the pandemic. In some ways, it was a big, forced time off for some people, depending on their context. But also, I didn't really think about this because it'd been so long since I had the lifestyle of, oh, I go to a workplace. I work. I leave. I go home. A lot of people that going home, that interstitial time, was sort of a slow time-off switch. Like, they were going home, and when they went home, they were able to leave work at the office and home is home, and that's a clear compartmentalization. Whereas now if work is in your home and you haven't developed, as we call it, a rest ethic and have yours defined and you're intentional about it, now that work’s at home, it could just be surrounding you at all times. Douglas: Yeah. It’s not only the compartmentalization you're describing, it's the transition. And, you know, in complexity theory, whenever we're talking about complexity theory, one of the examples I love to give is Superman. Superman doesn't turn from Clark Kent into Superman instantaneously. He goes into the phone booth and changes. And likewise, when we're moving from simple to complicated or complex, we can't just transition from those domains instantaneously. We have to go through some transformation and recall that disorder. And I know for a fact I used to—I live out in the country, and my drive home, I always planned it so that I would never be stuck, because I hate sitting still in traffic, but I love driving. And just the motion, my thoughts form and dissolve and reform. And it's a great way for me to, I think, it's almost like active meditation. We've talked about this before, John. John: I’m curious. Is there a particular playlist or something you would listen to in that transition time? Douglas: You know, it's interesting, John. You know I have very eclectic music tastes, and so I have about, gosh, I don’t even know what the total is. I think it’s somewhere in the realm of, like, 500,000 songs on a USB thumb drive. And it’s amazing because it used to be that back in the day, it was like a wall full of CDs. I still have a whole shelfful of albums, but now I have this thumb drive that's like the size of a—I mean, it's so tiny. It's maybe two centimeters or something. It’s the tiniest little thumb drive. And I just put it on random. And the nice thing about listening to a really eclectic database of music on random, I can always skip something if I'm not in the mood for it. But it's the weird serendipities of things that flow from one thing to another. And I might be on a thread of thought, and then it totally changes my gears because it intercepts where I'm at and re-shifts me. So I kind of like being taken on a journey that I'm not having to plan, that I'm not having to put thought into, and I just flow with it.   John: I like it. It’s like the audio version of Google's Feeling Lucky feature. I mean, that's a cool environment change. I mean, it's your audio’s mind space. You're just allowing serendipity. And I actually think that has a lot of beautiful correlation to our book Time Off, which a lot of times people who haven't talked to me or read the book when I just surface level tell them, “Yeah, I wrote this book,” they’re like, “Oh, that’s cool. You wrote a book on vacations,” and I’m like, “No, no, no, no. It’s our goal, my coauthor’s and I’s goal, is to really expand the connotation of time off, not just being vacation from work.” It’s micropractices. And why it’s important is we looked at the creative process, and there’s four phases of it. And one of the phases that’s absolutely essential is called incubation, and it’s when you’re not actively working on the thing you’re trying to achieve. It’s by stepping away from it, by doing something else. Again, that could be something very passive. It could be something very active, like an intense workout. The point is, is your subconscious and other parts of your brain are able to work in the background in those moments.   And so what I like about your random music selection is that is a form of incubation that—well, you’re driving, so you can’t really actively code or do  any of your workshop facilitation work, but you're able to be an open channel. And so those sounds come through, and who knows what memories that ignites, and one idea can flow into the next. And I know a type A personality like me really benefited from changing my perspective of time off of this, like, I'm not working to, like, no, it's actually a very productive practice for an investment in better ideas or an investment to an epiphany, perhaps. So I like that you’re just opening it up. You don't know what's going to come. Douglas: Yes. It's really fantastic. And one of my other favorite active-meditation techniques is actually just going to the gym and just having my sauna time, getting into a groove of—there’s a Pilates routine that I kind of developed out of my greatest hits, the things I really, really like. There’s a spine corrector and some different exercises on the Cadillac that I've done so many times that I don’t even have to think about what's next. I just go in there and I flow through it. I'll do that as a warmup, as a way of stretching and getting ready to do something more intense. And an hour will just evaporate. I'm not thinking about much of anything. And I found that time to be very valuable, and I miss it terribly because it's really hard to recreate that at home. John: It's really cool that you brought up exercise. That's one of the many deep dives in our book Time Off, and it reminds me of—we interviewed this quantum physicist named Terry Rudolph. And exercise is a really big part of his rest ethic, and he gave us—each person we interview, we ask them to give very practical advice for the reader to immediately try. And his was—and you could replace the word run with any kind of movement. But he essentially said, look, run hard to empty your mind, or jog slowly to think through a problem without distractions. And so he essentially told us, if you need to clear your mind, go really hard. So that could be your high-intensity workouts. And challenge yourself so that you're not able to think about anything, basically. And you just kind of get lost on focusing on not dying in that high-intensity activity. So it's, in a way, you’re unplugged for a while and getting back to the body. Or as, if you want to use a workout as productivity, you could set some clear intentions or questions to contemplate in advance, and then use that time off exercising to really give you a macro view. So that could be, like, as you've told me, in the sauna or in Pilates, where it is active, you're definitely working out, but there's enough space in there for you to dream up, have a macro view. And so I think that's a cool oscillation of intention. And also, that analogy could be made to a work project. There's times where, like today, actually, you and I were prototyping. You can only do that for so long, just like you can only sprint for so long on the Treadmill, or you can only stay in the really intense, infrared sauna for so long. And so it's just being aware of that oscillation and intentional about it to reap the benefits and not just choosing and obsessing over one. Douglas: That’s right. And I think that it's another thing to think about how you might hijack some of the systems to do things that you might need, because you, not to overuse the word hijacking, but imagine your emotions. Your brain chemistry is hijacking you at the moment. Well, then going for a really long run, in a way, you're kind of depriving yourself of oxygen, because everything's just devoted to surviving that intensity. Whatever weird conversation you just had with someone that didn't sit well, that's going to all be history. And so then you'll be in a much better headspace to analyze it, synthesize it, and address it. So that's interesting. Time off can be both micro and macro, I guess. John: I’m curious. That's a good point. So I'm just, in real time, I know you have a ton of experience in music and especially in synthesizers and other instruments. I mean, you've helped produce music. And if you think about it, time off is essential in music, too. Time off between certain notes gives you a rhythm. Time off from one section of the orchestra is important to evoke a certain emotion. I'm curious in, like, synthesizer space, is time off an important part of your whole setup? I’m just totally randomly curious about that. Douglas: Yeah. It's no different than other music, right? You’ve got micro timing, which, to bring it back to the micro and macro, you’ve got these moments with inside the melody itself, where literally—and if we want to really break it back down to the voltages, the voltage is either on or it's off. If the voltage was on the entire time, nothing would happen, because the system would just be totally primed. You'd imagine it would just be complete stress, right? So in order to have anything interesting happen, it needs to oscillate up and down. So the voltage goes positive and it goes negative. Or if it's d.c., it goes just positive and zero. And that's where you get these really cool modulations, where really stuff interesting happens. But I think if you were going to really bring it back to work and life and habits and how we keep our brains healthy, we also need to think about the frequency of isolation, because I would argue that even if you're having too much rest and the contact switch alone could be exhausting, just switching between turn it on and off. So I think that the frequency is important to having it too fast, the duration too short, and then switch is too fast, it's probably equally harmful. John: Hm. You and I have been conductors of a lot of rooms. It's been a great honor we’re able to learn so much when we do that. I'm curious before I go in, because I've contemplated it for a few years, putting the book together, but in your own master facilitation, whether it's a large-group gathering or a small team or a design sprint, Douglas, how have you used time off as a function as a facilitator? Anything come to mind? Douglas: Well, yeah. I mean, there's the cardinal rule of the 90-minute break. We don't want to go over 90 minutes before we have breaks, and making sure that that's written into the agenda and being very strict about seeing to that. Also, just time away from the material can be really powerful, whether that's by design—we build something into the agenda for us to kind of take a tour around through something different. It's exactly the reason why you might do improv games or icebreakers and these types of things, where we intentionally want to move the energy or the patterns through the room. And it's definitely an amazing tool when things get uncomfortable, and it's unproductively uncomfortable, and we can call a break. We can use that time to let people disperse and then come back together at a time. It's similar to going on that sprint, letting the emotions discharge so that we can come back together when people are a little less emotional or a little less spun up. John: Yeah. It reminds me when I was in film school, we took this class, and I was really focused on being a producer, which was kind of the business mind, the coordinator of the project. But in order to do that, you had to take editing, and you had to take directing. And I remember being really fascinated by, in our directing class, one of the biggest tips we heard from renowned filmmakers was if you're the director, I think on average, it was like two or three months was the minimum recommended from when your filming ended, so all of your production of the live action footage, etc. Two to three months between that and when you sat down the first time with your editor, because you needed to be detached from the material, because there may have been a particular shot, a particular line, a particular character, that in that time of production you were just really excited about personally and in detaching from a while allowed their advice. And I definitely, when I was producing documentaries, benefited from this advice, that by the time you had been so detached, you were able to really reflect and kind of come to the material new again and work with the editor from the perspective, more of a new viewer versus someone who's been deep in the weeds for a long time. Douglas: Yeah, that’s interesting. I feel like the weeds could cause a couple of problems. If I were to bring it back to design sprints, it's a reason that we encourage people not to do any synthesis at the end of day five. So if you've done interviews all day, you're going to be suffering from recency bias from the most recent interview. Just go clear your head over the weekend and come back. Take that time off to let it all just dissipate, disassociate from whatever happened. It was much more effective. And John, it makes me wonder. I'm curious to hear your thoughts on this. Do you think there could be things around emotional triggers that are—I mean, maybe that scene was filmed on your birthday. People were giving you lots of Happy Birthdays and encouragement; maybe you got a cool gift from someone. Or maybe you found out your grandmother was sick the day this other scene was filmed. And so could you have these associations with them that are subconscious, where you might judge them in ways that aren’t accurate? John: Oh, that's certainly the reason you need a team, because of that complexity of influences. And I actually wish that I would have known how much that my film-school experience would have prepared me to work in software and design. I had no idea. I think I would have been much more intentional as a student because we had these—and I mean, you and I do them all the time, working together, and we help organizations get comfortable with doing them. We just have a different language for it—but in film school, we call them design crits, “crits” short for critique. And you would show up with your work in progress, a.k.a. a prototype; and you would sit there with about eight to nine others; show the 90 seconds, four-minute clip, whatever the professor allowed for. I mean, you had to get good at taking feedback, and through repetition, it was not easy first. But by the time I graduated, you look at feedback as this beautiful gift. And it's because of yes, there's certain things that I'm attached to. And how many John Fitch's are there in the world? I mean, I'm sure there's some people with a similar psychographic as me, but that's not going to get me an award-winning film. And so just exposing yourself to more and more feedback early on, I think, humbles you and gets you out of your own head with all of those influences, because someone will resonate with something that you might think is not that exciting. Whereas you can see a pattern of something your deep—like to your points earlier, something around, oh, my birthday happened, and I had a super-good day, and we shot that one scene, and that scene's got to be in the film. And unless I get checked by a team or early viewers, early testers, that could be a poor decision on the quality of the story. And so, we are in the art of helping people, I think, quickly adapt, thanks to the gift of feedback. Douglas: It's amazing, right? It’s interesting. Even if your time off isn't giving you the answers, like we can rely on the perception of others, the perspective of others. And I want to come back to this notion of, I feel like a lot of this is borne out of kind of tech burnout and getting in these situations where people are overworked and they need to kind of step away from things so they can do better work. It's almost like a rejuvenation and a recovery, to use the athlete metaphor. If you train all the time, you'll just wear yourself out. There has to be time for recovery. So that's why people do the sauna, the ice bath, the compression sleeves. Take a day off. Take a week off. Heal. And I've been thinking a bit lately about this notion of flipping the switch from active to inactive or time on to time off. And I've personally found it a bit difficult just to completely flip that switch into the other mode, and it’s because we kind of prime our nervous system and our mind and our habitual states, the things that we kind of get acclimated to, and how we spend our days are based off of behaviors. And as we were kind of going through this transition for moving more and more things, pretty much going to a 100 percent virtual facilitation company versus a 15, 20 percent virtual company, it required a lot of my work and attention, and I poured myself into it, partly to support the community, but also to make sure the company stay alive and survive this transition. And now that I've got a lot of things in place and I'm confident about where we are, I’ve started to pull back. And as I've done so, it's been great to have some of that time off and to be able to shut off and think about other things and come back to it. The other thing I've noticed is that it's a continuum. You know, if you look at a thermometer, if you put a thermometer into boiling water and you turn the stove off, it's going to take a while for that thermometer to get back down. You can't just go straight into the other mode. And so I'm just curious if you thought much about these, that it's around these kind of this rest time and even making use of it might require some transition. It's not just like, let's just go do it. Okay, I'm doing it. It's like I need to almost, like, train myself to be able to function in that mode properly. John: You threw the perfect slow-motion softball pitch to me right now. This is the whole thing that the backstory that led to Time Off. To answer this is, again, we put together these two words. I had not come across it before. Not going to be—I can't say I invented it. They're just two separate words that we put together. But rest ethic. So work ethic for me is like someone with a solid work ethic, they're not just carelessly driving themselves for no reason. They put high intention. They're good at prioritization, decision making, etc. They follow up with what they're going to do. Intentional work ethic, to your point, yes, to get the most out of rest, it's going to take some intention. And so those things you're feeling are real. And I learned, and I'm going to simplify it, and I think each person has to figure out their own transition art. But when I was at Animal Ventures, a firm that did prototyping with a lot of supply chain automation work, my two business partners were the ones that opened me up to this whole concept of time off. And our model of time on, time off by no means is copy, paste at other cultures. But based on how we worked and what we did, we were able to establish a model where everyone worked for three months. So think about a quarter. And then after that quarter, you had a month mini sabbatical, and we had to stagger those. And a lot of people hear that and they're like, “Oh, that sounds amazing.” Well, we had to really design that out and practice it. And before that month off, there was a lot of preparation, not just like, “Hey, I'm going to go away for a month.” You decentralized your functions as a person. Each person has responsibilities and things they handle, and those would be documented, and in a way, diversified across a few other people that would be still in their time-on mode. Or you would think about ways to automate it more. So we were all—again, it was this intentional thing you would do. It was like the time-off prep so that it wasn't like all of a sudden massive switch off and then shit falls through the cracks and things aren't operationalized. So a lot of intention. And then also—so then you’d go have your time off, and if you did that prep right—you really were off, and you didn't have to freak out during your time off because your functions were not only handed over, they were going to be upgraded because that was one of the points, is new people get a hold of those functions, and they're able to poke holes in it and be like, “Oh, that's not that efficient. We could do better.” Or a new technology comes out in your month that you're off, and the people upgrade the operations. And then, let's say I would come back from that that mini sabbatical. I had a re-acclimation period, sort of like altitude adjustment, where it wasn’t just like I came back on Monday, and it’s boom, full blow. The last one I had done at the firm when I was still there was a week-long acclimation period where I’m not necessarily back to work. I’m understanding what has changed. That was one category. The second of work was I was giving in sharing my epiphanies on how my position, my department, my product ownership, whatever it was, I mean, that time off gave me a lot of epiphanies. And so I would share, “Hey, here's how I think it could be better,” and we would workshop that. And then the people that handled my functions while I was gone would then report to me saying, “Hey, we ran your functions while you were away, and we upgraded it.” And so I had to now—I had literally an upgraded playbook for the position. And so all of us were upgrading the business-culture software through this time off. And so the ramp up and the ramp down is often never practiced. And that's important. And I think a beautiful analogy is you're an athlete and you warm up, then you do—well, in that case, the hardcore work, in this case, the hard core time off—and then you have a cool down, and you re-acclimate. And that's really important to do. One of the micro tips in the book that I'll give you an example of a mistake I made where I didn't take my own advice. We interviewed Tiffany Shlain. She came up with this concept called the Tech Shabbat, where, for a 24-hour period, you don't interact with any screens. And it's a really powerful exercise, especially given that we work in screens a lot. I find that it slows down time. In a way, I get bored on purpose, and it's just really fun what you end up filling that time with. And what's funny is the first time I did one, I did not take that advice of prep and then acclimate. And it was awesome. I was like, time slowed down. I’m enjoying no screen time for a weekend. And when I get back to my phone on Sunday, my iPad, and I open it up, I have, like, 25 missed calls and all these texts, and it was from my mom and her friends because my mom is so used to chatting with me on the weekends. She was like, “All his devices are off. All his phones off.” She thought I got kidnapped and was freaking out. And then that stressed me out. And so I could have easily prepped her. And that’s just a little micro example of, great, you have some intentional time off planned; make sure to prepare for it. And then, also, integrate yourself in a meaningful way back, because it is hard to go from a very rested rhythm and state and then suddenly just drop it in. It’s like you call it boot-up time in a lot of the meeting culture at work you do, Douglas. And I think there's boot-up time, but there's also—what would it be, boot down?— to also get prepared again to take time off. Douglas: Yeah. You had to open, explore, and close, right? John: Yeah. So that's something that can be applied on the micro and macro as well. And it's helpful, too, because in the time off, there's not only the gift of recharging and building your enthusiasm back up, but you're going to have—again, it's an important part of the creative process. It's called incubation. And then following incubation is illumination. That's the aha. That's the moment of clarity. That's like you've zoomed out peregrine-falcon-level view. You're looking at things differently because you're detached for once. And that's when we unlearn and rethink things. Douglas: Yeah, I love that. And it also reminds me of not only do we need to prepare ourselves, we also need to prepare others. So setting those expectations and making sure that others aren't going to be negatively impacted by—because if it's completely selfish, then it's not going to necessarily serve us when we go to do our deep work again, because we usually have to collaborate with others or others are going to be the benefactors of our work. And so I think it's really awesome that the book shows this path where people can be really, really intentional about their rest ethic, so how they help inform others, how they help prepare others. I think it's really wise. John: Yeah. And it's important, too, for leaders to—and I know you and I've talked about, especially in the art of facilitation, read the room and be aware. For I think leaders to feel more confident, I mean, just based on some of the early readers who’ve been reaching out to me that are in a position of leadership and influence, their biggest question after being won over on the importance of time off is, “Okay, now I need to work with my team to figure out what our more-detailed time-off strategies and operations are.” And that's awesome, and I'm glad that they're thinking about that, and they'll work through it, because until that intention and design is put forward, the time off and rest ethic in a business context is generally just a short little clause in vacation policy. Whereas it can be so much more manageable, I think, and smart, if it's a daily, a weekly, a monthly, it's not just this, like, “Oh, yeah, you decide when you take time off, and here's our policy.” To actually embrace it and to workshop it and to figure it out for the context of that business is something we hope leaders think about after they read it, because it expands that definition that time off is not just vacation and mai tais on a beach. I mean, our sub chapters are things like sleep, solitude, exercise, reflexion, play, which you and I talk a lot about. And then also our relationship to technology. And the last thing I'll say that I'd be curious to get your ping-pong, back and forth. I think the most mind-blowing thing that we uncovered in the opening section, which is called “Time Off Throughout History,” it’s like 100,000-foot view of humanity’s relationship to work and leisure, and we found we kind of knocked the dust off of this brilliant thought series from Aristotle, who talked about this concept of noble leisure. And actually, the word school, which goes back to, I think it was pronounced schola or scala, meant leisure. They looked at it as what we did in our leisure time, which nowadays we would call extracurricular or volunteer or play time or hobby time, that was the most respected thing humans did. It was noble because in those moments we would think to ourselves what’s possible, what’s a better society, we would share, we care about the environment. Literally, because of noble leisure, they invented mathematics and philosophy, these things that propel humanity forward. And why I got excited about that is he said that one day all of culture would have the opportunity to revisit noble leisure because we would eventually automate the mundane. And you and I think a lot about artificial intelligence and how that’s impacting the future of work. And we’re helping companies think about rescaling, retooling their teams to be more focused on these human skills, these soft skills, however you want to call them. But I just get excited because I agree that Aristotle, his advice of noble leisure, we're at a time in human history where that's not so much of a pipe dream anymore. You could argue that once, who knows, a decade, two decades from now, with automation—and you would know more than I on the accuracy—that real humanness, that noble leisure is kind of what’s left for us, the more that mundane is not only better suited for machines, but I think that helps humans get back to those quality moments. Douglas: So, John, when we’re thinking about how facilitators can make use of these concepts and maybe help teams perform better or work better together, what comes to mind? What recommendations do you have to have better meetings or to just be better facilitators, in light of what you've kind of uncovered in the book Time Off? John: So, I mentioned some of the sub chapters that are in there, of the components that make up a rest ethic, things like reflection, solitude, play. And I think that's really important to incorporate those types of practices into your workshop, your meeting, because in all of those activities that I just mentioned, you see people in a lot of joy. And for example, you and I have been in some workshops, and when I was working on the reflection chapter in the book, there was this question that is in there around, when was the last time you felt like a kid, or what activity do you do that you feel the most childlike while you're doing it? And when you ask that in a professional setting, people’s answers, they light up, and there’s that inner child that’s still in there. And that question—let’s say, we’re brought in. It’s a serious problem, and we've got to figure it out, and we're there to facilitate it and workshop it. And it's definitely serious, and we've got to do the work, and we're going to have an awesome workshop. We're going to produce a prototype. We're going to produce an artifact. We're going to drive outcomes. Pretty serious stuff. But if you sprinkle in these moments of what I'll call time off from the deep work, from the actual serious thing, it actually improves the overall process because, again, it goes down to that creative process. You're leaving some time for incubation and illumination, because then after that, you have verification, which is all about, okay, actually doing the work to see if that idea is worth a damn. And in the first one—I mentioned it was four phases—is preparation, which is also deep work as you prepare to do things again. And so if you implement time-off practices into any of your workshops, look at them as investments and illumination and incubation for your participants. And also, it helps them rebuild enthusiasm if you go for a walk or you just say, “Hey, we take breaks seriously,” because I've been around facilitators that I don't know what their reasons are, but they don't incorporate meaningful breaks and rest within the workshop. And you can tell when it's 3:00 p.m., 4:00 p.m., people are just like, they're done. They're checked out. It's like forcing someone to just continue hill sprints over and over. And so that would be the first thing is ask yourself what moments in our workshop could benefit from incubation and illumination? And have fun with it, and whatever vocabulary you choose to use, I think your participants are going to appreciate that time off, because I think when we think about workshops, meetings, seminars, conferences, the art of gathering, that can be tiring. And I think with facilitators that incorporate more rest, people can be less intimidated by it all. So that'd be the first thing, Douglas. The second thing is facilitators—and you and I are facilitators. We do a lot of facilitation, and we know people that do more facilitation than we do. It is hard, and it is a lot of energy that is used to hold space and pay attention and document and solve problems and deal with conflict. It is no joke. And you could look at time off as time management, but I've been thinking about it more and more as energy management. And so I think to do your best work as a facilitator, you also deserve those intentional moments of time off to not only make sure you don't get overworked and overwhelmed and burned out, but you'll benefit, too. Maybe by stepping away for once, you'll completely rethink one of your workshop modules; or you'll reflect on some feedback that someone gave you, and you'll level up, or you'll come up with an entirely new idea for a workshop or an activity. But I just wanted to make sure to say that, I mean, today you and I were wrapping up a design sprint and then doing prototyping, and there is definitely a part of me that's like, “Yeah, I still have a few more things to do. But my internal compass is also talking to me, saying ‘That was intense, and you can now go into the garden and cook a nice meal and rest and be back at it tomorrow.’” So those are two things I would think about, and try to reframe it in your mind from a place of starting to eliminate this idea that you're not effective if you're not working. I think that's something society is unlearning—I hope our book helps—is this whole concept of visible busyness. Just because you’re active doesn’t mean you’re effective. Whereas, I think a lot of people assume it’s true. And once you reframe and see rest as productive because it helps with recharge and illumination and incubation, you’ll start taking it as serious as your time on. Douglas: It's also, I believe, in the serendipity of if you can manage to do those things when you most need them, I think it'd be much more effective because it's timely. And it's sort of like eating before you. You're just ravenously hungry. And I found the co-facilitator has been an interesting way to have those micro moments where I can have some time off. I know how to be 100 percent on the entire workshop, and I found that to be, those workshops are much less draining. John: I’m so glad you remixed it to that. I've been thinking a lot about that lately, Douglas. You and I have co-facilitated a lot, and I think that’s a really important message for the future of work as facilitation becomes more and more relevant, especially now in virtual work, too. Just having multiple facilitators not only provides that time off but you have a skill set that gives you strengths in certain activities. Let's say there's a meeting narrative. Let's just go with the open, explore, close. There's parts of your personality where you're really great at the explore and the close, and maybe I'm just, like, a master of the open. And if we're aligned as a team of facilitators, each one of us can be in our zone of genius more. And not only does it allow us to have these interstitial moments of “in the zone” and then kind of backing off and relaxing, it allows us to just do our best work. And I know what’s been really cool when both of us are co-facilitating: in my time off from facilitating, I'm observing you, which I'm able to give you feedback that is through the lens of a facilitator. Likewise, you've done the same for me. And so if you’ve been going it alone as a facilitator, hey, hats off to you. Deep respect. But try out co-facilitating. Douglas: I think we’re at time, John, so I’m going to close it here and say thanks so much for being here today. It’s been so fantastic riffing with you. It's always fun chatting with you. And I think we should let the listeners know how they can find you and the facilitation work you do as well as where can they find the book? John: Totally. So if you want to talk about meeting culture and prototyping and the maker movement and all things running awesome meetings that are magical, voltagecontrol.com. You'll find me on there somewhere. And in terms of the book Time Off, if you just type it in Amazon or Google, I’m sure it’ll come up. Timeoffbook.com will send you to Amazon as well. And other than that, Douglas, it's been an honor to not only talk about this, but to stay in touch as friends and colleagues throughout many years now. So, I'm pumped you're doing a podcast, you ask really good questions, and I'm honored to be on the guest list. Douglas: Thanks for joining. And we'll definitely encourage everyone to get a copy of Time Off because it's really fantastic and it's super timely. John: Thank you. Outro: Thanks for joining me for another episode of Control the Room. Don't forget to subscribe to receive updates when new episodes are released. If you want more, head over to our blog, where I post weekly articles and resources about working better together, voltagecontrol.com.

Today I’m speaking with John Fitch who dances between design, engineering and conversations.  John believes time off leads to better quality work and talks about this on his podcast and in latest book Time Off. “I enjoy building technology through unlearning and the generous act of sonder.”

Today I'm speaking with John Fitch & Max Frenzel, the co-authors of the new book Time Off. We discuss the importance of taking time off for leisure and constructive rest, and how doing these things regularly boosts our productivity and creativity. About the Authors: Max Frenzel (Tokyo) and John Fitch (Austin) have both spent time working in software startups where many are worshiping the mantras that are so pervasive in our current working culture.  Max got his Ph.D. in Quantum Physics and has been an AI researcher. John is an entrepreneur and business coach.     After reaching breaking points in their careers, business coach John Fitch and AI researcher Max Frenzel both learned the critical importance of taking time off. Now these former workaholics are here to help you revolutionize the way you get things done.   Check out John and Max's book: Time Off: A Practical Guide to Building Your Rest Ethic and Finding Success Without the Stress reveals how history’s greatest minds, as well as some of the most successful leaders, thinkers, and creatives of today, found success by practicing a more balanced approach to work and life. Embracing their insights on how constant hustle can be your worst enemy, you will realize that time off means much more than just taking a break. By learning how to slow down, you will rediscover a more fulfilled and versatile version of yourself and unlock your true creative potential. Follow me on social @sausha.davis or on saushadavis.com and let me know what you think of this conversation!

This episode covers part one of a two-part series on the importance of taking time off and resting to enable you to show up as your best self. Rest ethic isn’t about scrolling social media or binge-watching your favourite show; it is about taking time to rest, recover, and reconnect with yourself, nature and the people around you in a meaningful way. By taking intentional time off, you can unlock your brain’s power and creativity.

We welcome author's Max Frenzel and John Fitch to talk about their new book "Time Off" available now at Amazon.com. Listen this is fantastic conversation about the importance of "Time Off" and your "reset ethic". 

This week we're joined by John Fitch and Max Frenzel, the authors of the brand new book "Time Off". John and Max present some challenging ideas around how we should rest as hard as we play - seriously! We loved talking to them about their book, their lives, the fact that we were in three different timezones and two different countries while we recording this, and more! Definitely a must-listen. After this episode, you'll definitely want to grab a copy of their book – pick it up at: https://www.timeoffbook.com/ Be sure to join us on the W.L.B. listener's lounge Facebook group to discuss episodes, issues, and more. If you want to connect with other like-minded, work-focused, balance-striving listeners, head over to https://www.facebook.com/groups/worklifebalancepodcast/ and join! Questions, comments, ideas for future episodes? Email us at worklifebalanceshow@gmail.com!

John Fitch & Luke Humbrecht Buzzsprout-3600277 Sun, 03 May 2020 11:00:00 -0600 1465 full false Vinelife ChurchMessages from Vinelife Church

Episode: 1866 Another first steamboat, the Charlote Dundas.  Today, another first steamboat.

subtracting to add value, unlearning, play as work, shallow happy vs. deep happy, doing what you want most Go subscribe at https://timeoffbook.com/#Podcast

subtracting to add value, unlearning, play as work, shallow happy vs. deep happy, doing what you want most Go subscribe at https://timeoffbook.com/#Podcast

In our first episode for 2020, state historian Walt Woodward interviews author and historian Tom Shachtman talks about his just released book, The Founding Fortunes: How America's Wealthy Paid for and Profited From America's Revolution. In this fascinating economic history covering the years from the Birth of the Republic to the end of the War of 1812, Shachtman asks an important question most historians don't consider: Who paid  for the war for independence? The answers come with some profound insights that still resonate in the present. Shachtman also helps us understand the national significance of a number of famous Revolutionary Connecticans, including Jeremiah Wadsworth, SIlas Deane, Eli Whitney, John Fitch, and Oliver Wolcott, Jr.  

Listen to the full length program Segments: One: Kentucky Women Writers Conference president Randi Ewing: more than one way to tell a story; WEKU's Wendy Barnett interviews John Fitch, EKU professor of broadcast and electronic media and creator of Painted in Stone, a documentary about the racially-charged mural in the University of Kentucky's iconic Memorial Hall. LISTEN Two: The Lexington Philharmonic begins a season-long search for its next music director and conductor. LexPhil executive director Allison Kaiser details an intense process. Tom Martin interviews finalist candidate number one, Thomas Heuser of Idaho Falls, LISTEN Three: It was something entirely new and different for historic Keeneland: hosting a music festival. UnderMain's Art Shechet debriefs Railbird Festival local producer David Helmers. LISTEN Interviews: Randi Ewing, President, KY Women Writers Conference Wendy Barnett interviews documentary filmmaker John Fitch Lexington Philharmonic Executive Director Allison Kaiser LexPhil finalist conductor candidate Thomas Heuser UnderMain's Art Shechet with Railbird Fest producer David Helmers ______________ People like you value experienced, knowledgeable and award-winning journalism that covers meaningful stories in Central and Eastern Kentucky. To support more stories and interviews like those featured in this edition of Eastern Standard, please consider making a contribution.

Listen to the full length program Segments: One: Kentucky Women Writers Conference president Randi Ewing: more than one way to tell a story; WEKU's Wendy Barnett interviews John Fitch, EKU professor of broadcast and electronic media and creator of Painted in Stone, a documentary about the racially-charged mural in the University of Kentucky's iconic Memorial Hall. LISTEN Two: The Lexington Philharmonic begins a season-long search for its next music director and conductor. LexPhil executive director Allison Kaiser details an intense process. Tom Martin interviews finalist candidate number one, Thomas Heuser of Idaho Falls, LISTEN Three: It was something entirely new and different for historic Keeneland: hosting a music festival. UnderMain's Art Shechet debriefs Railbird Festival local producer David Helmers. LISTEN Interviews: Randi Ewing, President, KY Women Writers Conference Wendy Barnett interviews documentary filmmaker John Fitch Lexington Philharmonic Executive Director Allison Kaiser LexPhil finalist conductor candidate Thomas Heuser UnderMain's Art Shechet with Railbird Fest producer David Helmers ______________ People like you value experienced, knowledgeable and award-winning journalism that covers meaningful stories in Central and Eastern Kentucky. To support more stories and interviews like those featured in this edition of Eastern Standard, please consider making a contribution.

John Fitch, the Founder of Worship on the Rocks; a business man, minister, and lover of people, has some awesome input applicable to everyone about not neglecting our spiritual self and giving your all to whatever you do.

Creating the world's first vessels of powered transportation was no joke. Several competitive inventors put everything on the line to be the first to build profitable steamboats. For most of them, the pursuit ended in failure. It was the most unlikely one – an American painter – who got the job done, and in the process, changed the course of world history.In this episode we'll cover Denis Papin's destroyed steamboat, the Marque de Jouffroy d'Abbans and his Pyroscaphe, William Symington and his Charlotte Dundas, the patent war between John Fitch and James Rumsey, and the life and times of Robert Fulton.

Episode 21 TopicsUFC St. Petersburg RecapUFC Sunrise/Fort Lauderdale PreviewBellator 220 PreviewListener Questions & More!Available on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, Google Play, Buzzsprout, Soundcloud & More!Follow Us:@Split_Podcast@Philthemmadude@TheFightGeekMMA

John Fitch from Animal Ventures talks with us about how Blockchain is driving innovation in categories well beyond cryptocurrency.If you love The Frontier, we bet you'll love our weekly newsletter, the Wayfarer. You can subscribe here. We promise to make you laugh at least once. Gun.io is only freelancing service that engineers actually use to hire other engineers. Interested in getting in touch? Meet us here. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week is a little different from our usual, Jonathan couldn't make it. So instead Jake is bringing you and interview from another show that he's just been on, talking about his new book 'Make Time'. You've heard us talk a lot about "buy Sprint", well soon you will be able to buy Make Time, so here you'll get your first in depth glimpse of what the book is all about. The interview is from a Podcast called 'Time off' and the host is John Fitch. Find out more about the Master-Class here;

 AJ&Smart + Jake Knapp Official Design Sprint Master-Class: https://ajsmart.com/masterclass Follow Jake Knapp on Twitter: @jakek Follow Jonathan Courtney on Instagram or Twitter: @jicecream Write into the podcast: pbc@ajsmart.com Podcast editing by Jason Sanderson: PodcastTech.com Show Notes (fan made): https://medium.com/product-breakfast-club-links-unofficial

Max and Dave call up John Fitch again and discuss his last fight.  Hope you enjoy! Stay #LockedInn With are sponsors  Richie Veit @ Pep-Boys Daytona Fit Meals Follow us!  Twitter - @Locked_inn  @Max @Dave Facebook & Instagram & patreon. Call or text us! (386) 516-0495

Mixer streamer John Fitch (ShakkaPanda) drops by the podcast to talk about independent web comics, dealing with the beginnings of celebrity, aggressively doing nothing, the lost art of sitting on a couch playing video games with your friends, live streaming, keeping his language PG-13, swapping 'politically correct' with 'polite', adversarial politics, petting the shark backwards, being punished for using spreadsheets to do his math homework, the modern separation of work and play, the life of a samurai, religious absolutes, staying home to care for his dad in his final months, the decision to not become bitter, and the end of Jet Li's Hero.    Find him online at: http://mixer.com/shakkapanda or https://www.youtube.com/user/shakkapanda   Or follow him on Instagram: @shakkapanda

Simply put, blockchain technology is going to be a major disruptor -- but the possibilities for its use in the home tech universe are incredible. Our guest this week is at the leading edge of this development: John Fitch from Animal Ventures.

Jala Prendes and John Fitch are joined by Mark R. Rhainer and Nikita Pigasov of Lostwood Games to discuss their game, "Leviathan: The Last Day of the Decade." LINKS OF NOTE: Lostwood Games (thelostwood.com/) Indiegogo Campaign (igg.me/at/ldod/x) Leviathan Fanart Archive (vk.com/album-38534069_174259150) John Fitch (www.shakkapanda.com/)

In this message, John Fitch talks about what it looks like to "pray without ceasing" and live our entire lives in the awareness of the Presence of God.

In 1955, tragedy struck the prestigious Le Mans 24-hour race in Northern France when a car crashed into the crowd at more than 100 miles-per-hour. The accident killed 83 spectators and the driver, and led to an overhaul of safety rules in motor-racing. In 2010, Claire Bowes spoke to the American driver John Fitch, who took part in the race. PHOTO: The aftermath of the Le Mans disaster (AFP/Getty Images).

Chris Szwedo has over 25 years of experience in videography, writing, and editing. He’s the recipient of national and regional EMMY nominations and a category winner of The Motor Press Guild Dean Batchelor Award for excellence in automotive journalism. Along with work in a variety of fields Chris has created automotive videos on Ralph Lauren’s automobile collection and signature works for Public Television distribution including Lime Rock park: The secret Valley of Racing and A Gullwing At Twilight: The Bonneville Ride of John Fitch.

This episode covers a variety of topics including: Sounds of the early morning and late evening of Dawn of Dawn of Promise Farm My experiences with the Ultimate Reset, a 21-day gentle cleanse from Beachbody (up to Day 16 for this recording) An interview in Rhyno's Gym with trainer and coach, Mo Amin, who specializes in training fighters in mixed martial arts and people from all walks of life who want to improve fitness. He's had great fighters train with him including John Fitch! A story from my mom, Lucille Maris, about WWII and bringing a Cocker Spaniel, Blondie, home from England. She had been the mascot for Dad's bomber crew. She boarded in England in a kennel with General Eisenhower's dog, as they waited for a ship and the care of a ship's butcher during the boat ride back to America. You can find details at http://www.heartsongfit.com  

George and Kevin discuss UFC 153: Anderson Silva vs Stephan Bonnar! October Giveaway