Timestamps

00:00:00: Introduction
00:00:45: How to be a changemaker
00:01:57: Theory of Change Model
00:04:52: 5 Ps
00:06:40: P1 Projection
00:10:27: P2 Personal
00:14:55: P3 Progress
00:21:22: P4 People
00:26:18: P5 positive impact
00:32:32: Final thoughts

Interview Transcription

Sarah Ellis: Hi, I'm Sarah Ellis.

Helen Tupper: And I'm Helen Tupper.

Sarah Ellis: This is the Squiggly Careers podcast.  Every week we chat about a different topic to do with work and share practical ideas and actions to help us all navigate our Squiggly Careers with a bit more control and confidence.  This year we're really proud that we've been selected as one of LinkedIn's 2021 Changemakers and we're alongside some incredible people who are pioneering really important change in the world of work in areas including equality, mental health and sustainability.  We're going to come back to how you can hear from those people, because there really are some inspirational stories.  We've had those conversations already and I can't wait to share them with you.

Today, we thought we would start in typical Squiggly Career's style with talking about how to be a changemaker.  We think of changemakers as anyone who's got an ambition or is already making change happen.  That change can be small, you might have really big and significant changes in mind; all and every change matters.  The thing that we really want to help people with is just to realise that potential as a changemaker. 

I think sometimes when you get these labels as like changemakers, that can sound quite daunting or overwhelming or out of reach.  Even today I was looking at something and I was thinking, "Wow that person has done this incredible thing and I don't think I could ever do that".  I think I probably would have thought the same about where we are today seven or eight years ago, when we first started.

We really want to bust some myths about what it takes to make change happen, by essentially sharing lots of things that we've got wrong, which we're going to talk a bit more about, but also some practical tools and questions and ideas to think about if change is top of your list of something you want to spend more time on this year.

Helen Tupper: Regular listeners will know that I love a framework and one of the things that I do outside of the work that Sarah and I do together, and all things Squiggly Careers related, is that I'm a trustee of a charity, it's called Working Families.  One of the things that we talked about on Working Families is we were relooking at how that charity identified with the people that need that charity and the people that that charity wants to influence with something called a Theory of Change Model.  It wasn't something that I was familiar with, because I'm not experienced in working in a charity and I learned so much from the other trustees and it was something that somebody else had proposed as looking at this model.

The Theory of Change Model is effectively a structure for how you go about thinking and approaching a change you want to make.  What we've done is we've taken some of the insights from the Theory of Change Model that we use in that charity, and that actually you can google and find yourself, and maybe we'll include it in the PodNotes for this episode as well so you can have a look at it.  But we've taken some of that structure and we've really thought about how do you take it from something that a large charity can use into something that you as an individual can apply to a change that you might want to make.

So, we've created our own Theory of Change Model and you'll be able to download it, we'll put the links into the show notes so that you can do that, but that's effectively going to be how we're going to structure this conversation about how you can be a changemaker in your career.

Sarah Ellis: What we've done to bring this to life is use ourselves as a live case study.

Helen Tupper: A bit of a dangerous thing to do, Sarah!

Sarah Ellis: All it made me realise was how much we've still got to do and what we've not done, it's sort of created a to do list for me which is not what I'd imagined when I first started thinking about this.  Hopefully, by sharing some of our examples and stories, that will just make it feel more relatable and you can see how it works, or perhaps sometimes where we've not done some of these things, how it's also held us back.

One thing I did want to mention before we dive into that framework is the rest of this week, you'll be able to listen to daily short extra podcasts with the other changemakers, and they will share their stories and their insights for how they've been a catalyst for change.  As I mentioned, those conversations are just amazing.  We've already recorded them, I was so blown away from all of them, I'm actually really looking forward to listening back to them.  I don't really like listening back to myself, but I am looking forward to listening back to them again, because I think there's just so much that we can learn from those people, so lots of borrowed brilliance to be inspired by.

To get us started with a bit of a quote, because I do really like this sentiment from CS Lewis where he says, "You can't go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending".  Hopefully, with that little inspirational start there, we can now dive into all the practical details that we've put together for the framework.

In summary, there are five areas, five Ps, that we're going to talk about.  I'm going to give you the overview of the five Ps now and then we're going to dive into each of them.

P number one is about projection, so this is really about setting your vision.  What is the change that you want to see in your world in "the" world?  That's the first one.

Second one: personal.  Why does that change matter to you?  What's your connection with that change?  Why is it important to you?  There's loads of changes that we all think are important, but why is this change particularly relevant or resonating with you?

Number three: progress, how are you going to start to make that change happen?  Obviously, we're very action focused, we really care about this one, so how do you start not just thinking about this change or perhaps even caring about this change, but actually doing something about this, about the problem or about the change that you're hoping to see.

Fourth area is people, who will you help and also who will help you?  Really important, I think, to look at both sides of the help coin there, as you're thinking about change and how you're going to be a catalyst for change.

Then the final area is positive impact.  When and how are you going to know that change is happening.  What does that look like?  How are you going to measure it?  It doesn't necessarily mean numbers, it can mean lots of different things, but is important to be able to have a sense and a feel for what that positive impact might look like.

They're the five areas that you'll see on the downloadable template, and for each of those we've got some coaching questions and some examples, and you'll see those coaching questions on that framework if you want to download it.

Helen Tupper: I'm going to start with number one, which is all about this idea of a projection of the change that you want to see in the world.  I think there are two coach-yourself questions that are worth reflecting on here.  The first is what is, the problem you're trying to solve?  Maybe don't rush on from that question too quickly, because sometimes we're like, "Well, it's this thing obviously, it's this", but actually, I think really thinking deeply about what are the problems and which is a priority problem for me, and which is the one that I can make the most difference with; sit with that question, the what is the problem that you're trying to solve, for a little bit of time.

The second coach-yourself question around this idea of projection is, what is your vision of success?  If you were to project forward 5, 10, 15, even more years, what would good look like?  Who is affected by it?  What are they doing differently?  How does the world look differently as a result of this impact that you've had?  Take yourself there and try and describe it; it makes it really rich for yourself and for other people as well.

When we looked at ourselves as this live case study, as Sarah said, we thought about, "How well did we get clear on the problem that we were trying to solve?"  "How effective were we in having a vision of success?"  The theme that we'll get to is, we've learned a little bit along the way, because where we started probably wasn't as clear as we would have like to have been. 

When we started, honestly, we probably had a few too many problems that we were trying to solve at the same time.  Some of the problems that we were sitting with and trying to solve were about career advice feeling a bit too vague, and sometimes it was either too academic or otherwise it was a bit too aspirational, that whole love your job whilst sitting on a beach and a laptop and just not worrying about the rent or your mortgage.  We also recognised that people spent a lot of time at work but lots of people didn't enjoy the work that they were doing and that was another problem we wanted to solve for.

We also recognised that we'd had loads of amazing career development that didn't seem accessible to people and it felt like we were trying to solve all of these problems for everybody at once.  That was potentially too hard to get started with.  So, I think really getting clear on what is the problem you're trying to solve specifically is an important thing for you to consider.

For us, the thing that we thought felt specific and something that we could move forward was this idea of letting go of the ladder.  The problem that we could solve was that people were so attached to the ladder that they couldn't even move into the squiggle; that was something that we needed to change.  Letting go of the ladder has become such a big thing for us and that means changing language, changing the tools that people have, changing the stories that people have about what a successful career can really look like. 

It became so motivating for us, when we had that sense of clarity about a problem that felt specific and doable and relatable for us.  That's kind of where we landed on the problem that we were trying to solve, but honestly, we started with a much bigger, less specific place that sometimes meant that we didn't feel like we could make as much moving forward as we wanted to with it.

So, I think the main insight here is that it is okay to take time exploring the ins and outs of the problem.  It doesn't necessarily come immediately; you might want to experiment a little bit with it, but get to something that feels specific and meaningful for you and it will help with the rest of the things that we're going to talk about.

Sarah Ellis: To build on that point that Helen said, so meaningful for you.  The second area is about personal.  This is making sure really that this is a change that you really care about, so asking yourself questions like, "Why does this matter to me?"  "What can I do to affect or to implement this change?"  "Why does this feel important to me?"  "Why does this feel meaningful for me?"  Because I think the thing that probably out of the framework that we're going to talk through, the single thing I think we have always got right for Amazing if, the one thing I will take credit for, is that we have both always really cared about helping people with their careers and their career development.  That has always felt really motivating and meaningful for both of us.

Even when we first started and we were testing out different ideas and we didn't really know what we were doing, we were very clear that we wanted to be practical and useful and really action focused, and that worked so well for us, really quickly.  Though I often do reflect on how far we've come since we first started, there are still so many seeds that have stayed the same.  I think those seeds all come from this area of our personal connection to loving learning, really caring about careers and other people's careers and then bringing that to life in a very practical way.  We very much have that in common between ourselves.

I think it's really important to say as well that starting small is absolutely fine, because we definitely did.  Even though we'd got 5 million problems we thought we were going to try and solve, at the same time apparently, the thing that we did get right is we did just start to take action.  This point really reminded me of when I interviewed Anne Boden, who's one of the founders of the Starling Bank.  I asked her about advice for potential entrepreneurs and she was just so clear, she said, "You've got to stop thinking and you've got to start doing".  She is very black and white and she's very clear-cut about, you've just got to take action.  You don't change anything, I don't think, by just thinking about it.  Thinking is useful and crikey, I'll think all day long and reflect forever, but it is only when you start doing that actually you start to see that change in action.

Even though when we started, we were trying to solve too many problems and we'd not got a lot of things in the rest of the framework that we were going to talk about in place or perhaps we'd not even thought about, I think the two things that we did do well is that we had connected to something that we really cared about, and we started small because starting was better than doing nothing; we cared enough to try something. 

The insight here on the personal one, certainly for both of us, is that you know you've got this right when you feel really energised by taking any action that's related to this change that you're trying to make.  I really feel this, and I feel this now, and I've felt this eight or nine years ago, because even after a ridiculously hard day at work, or it's really late at night or you're feeling really overwhelmed, ever since we started recording this podcast, it's always been something that I've enjoyed.  Ever since we started our very first, very small workshops that were basically full of our friends, I always really enjoyed those evenings.  They just gave me a sense of energy and motivation and meaning that I just had never had that sense of connection in the same way anywhere else. 

I think just look out for and spot those moments where you just feel that surge of energy.  We talk sometimes about this idea of doing an energy audit and I think you need that when you're creating change, because change is hard, and we'll talk about that more.  So, if this piece of the puzzle is missing, I think it's really hard and when I've tried to change other things in jobs and in companies without this, I think it takes an incredible amount of effort and can feel just really draining rather than energising.

Helen Tupper: You can still be passionate about a change that someone else wants to make, but if this is something that you want to be committed to, I do think you have to find that personal connection.  It probably is going to take time and effort and energy that you need to give to it to make it happen and so you do need that sense of personal connection in order to achieve that, on top of probably the 101 other things you're juggling in your day-to-day life.

Onto that feeling of connection and juggling and feeling like it's moving forward in some way that feels meaningful, the third P is all about progress.  This is about feeling like the actions that you are taking in relation to the change that matters to you, that feels meaningful for you, is moving towards that projected vision for your future; you're taking an action today that is having a meaningful impact for something in the future.  We've got a few different insights here, I think.

There's a really good coach-yourself question, which we ask ourselves which is, "How might I?  How might we?"  The reason this is important with this particular area is sometimes progress can feel hard; you'll get clear on that problem you're trying to solve, and you know why it's meaningful for you, but sometimes you can get stuck with getting started.  So, asking yourself the question, "How might I or how might we move this forward, look at this differently, make a change over the next 12 months?" just using that question can sometimes unlock a bit of thinking about what are some of the small, but potentially significant actions that you can take.

The next thing that I think that we have learned is, just get started!  It's like the thing that Sarah talked about with Anne Boden, and it's reflected in our own experience.  We started our business with this launch, which would have been January or February 2013, and we got about 60 people, we crammed this room in London with 60 people who really believed in us.  We believed in what we were doing, we'd got that personal connection and they probably believed in us, and we just launched something.  We didn't even really know what that thing was, but one of the things for us in terms of progress was getting started. 

Sometimes I think that people focus so much on where you want to get to, the change that you want to ultimately make, that you lose sight of getting started today.  That makes a really big difference, just doing something, whether it's a website that you publish or a blog post that you write or for us, an event that we invited lots of people to for an organisation that we had no idea what it was going to become.  But I think, one of the most meaningful things that you can do to make progress, and it's a bit of a cliché, but is to get started in some way; to put your flag up that this is something that you're committed to and that you're going to invest some time and effort and energy into.

My second insight from our experience is to adapt as you go and not fix too fast.  I quite like having a clear plan and I'm like, "Right, this is what we're going to do over the next 12 months, and this is what we're all about".  For me, Sarah is a thinker so she's always going, "Well, but is that the right thing to do?"  "Do we have to commit that soon?"  "Should we keep our options open?"  For me, that has enabled us to adapt as we go and adapt as we grow and take advantage of different opportunities that might have come to us that we couldn't have expected. 

That just get started and adapt as you go or adapt as you grow would probably be the insights that I would take away from this third area, this P for progress.

Sarah Ellis: The other thing I would say on this idea of not fixing exactly what your progress has to look like too hard, is being really open to listening to but also spotting the signs of feedback in terms of when you might be thinking your progress will look and feel a certain way.  To be able to adapt, sometimes you have to read the signs of, you might think something is a really good idea, but if other people don't and if other people aren't particularly interested, or not saying yes, or are not taking you up on whatever the idea is or the change seems to be stalling, try a new direction.

You don't need to give up on your projected vision or the fact that you care about it, you just need to try another way.  We'll talk a bit about, persistence is a really important characteristic of any change.  That's the other thing that I think has worked well for us is, we never got too downhearted along the way, where we were trying to make this change to how people thought about their careers and approached their careers.  We got loads of different thoughts about what that could look like and would look like, and we definitely spent time planning our progress and thinking about that.  Then sometimes those things just didn't work out. 

I really remember our idea of writing a book that was going to be all about Squiggly Careers and so many people just not being interested.  You could just tell that there just wasn't the appetite at that time for that book to get published, and even worse you could tell a few people were pretending to be interested but then not really following through.  Those moments can feel a bit disheartening, because you've got to invest in them and because you care, that does feel difficult, but I think then just having that ability to then just think, "That's okay, it's knowing when to let go and when to give it one more try". 

We've always been okay at thinking, "We still fundamentally believe in that idea, but we're okay to come back to it in 6 months' time, 12 months' time, maybe even 3 years' time".  Because I do get quite gritty, which Helen will tell you about certain things which I believe will end up being useful things for our business, we don't forget them.  I feel like I have an ongoing reel in my brain of things that I'm never going to forget and that at some point, I am going to find a way to make happen.

I feel like if I just come back to it enough and then leave it alone for a while and then come back to it again, ultimately those things you can make them happen, but sometimes just the time isn't quite right and that's okay too and you can do something else in the meantime that can still help you to make progress on that change.  So, don't worry if your initial plans for progression don't quite work in the way that you'd anticipated.  There's always another way, go round, go through, find a different person to talk to, find a different organisation to chat to.  Keep persevering, would be my insight.

The fourth area is all about people and these two questions that I mentioned earlier when I was outlining the framework, who are you trying to help; and who can help you?  Who are you trying to help; I think this is really interesting, because often when we're thinking about change, and certainly this is the way we think about careers, is we want to help everyone.  That's brilliant in terms of our ambition and we have a really clear purpose as a business to make careers better for everyone. 

That everyone point really matters to us and we grappled with it for a little while in terms of thinking, "Do we need to be more focused?  Is it okay to want to work with people who work in companies, but also to work with some individuals?"  We also want to do things like podcasts, and we could definitely, from the outside in, look like we do too many different things.  There's always loads of advice, isn't there about, "Focus on one thing and do that one thing really well", which is not really how we run our business, but I'm sure could be quite good advice.

What I think we've worked out, or the nuance to who are you trying to help, is that it's okay to think big.  Actually, it does work really well for us to think, "We do want to make that change accessible for everyone in terms of career development, regardless of life stage, geography, experience, but you probably want to start small".  So, think big but start small and start in the most obvious place.  Who are the people who are the most interested in the change that you're trying to create?  Who are naturally already in that area that you're interested in and most likely to be allies or advocates?

For us, it was who were those people who are going to come along to our first ever workshop?  Who are those people who are going to listen to those first ever episodes of our podcast?  Go to those people first.  It's the cliché about people talk about the low hanging fruit, but those are the people where they will give you momentum.  It's that snowball effect that is important when you are trying to, I think particularly start a change, you are maybe taking action for the first time.  Maybe you're trying to influence and persuade to make a change in your organisation on a certain area.

You don't have to go to the most difficult people or the people who are going to be the hardest to persuade first.  Go to those people who are on your side, who are going to be supporters, sponsors, champions and cheerleaders.  I think that gives you really good traction, those people have got ideas, they want to get involved and they will improve where you already are. 

I think that was the biggest insight for me, is that even though there has always been two of us, sometimes there is a tendency to think whether you're by yourself or you're working with one or two other people that you have to do everything yourself, almost you have to have the weight of the world on your shoulders, which for any kind of change can feel like a really big obligation and can feel really tough, so involve people.  The more you involve people just the more you will learn, the more you will grow.

To the second question of who can then help you, those are the people who will help you first.  Those are the people who will help you in that way where they will just give without expecting anything in return.  I think when you're getting started, those people are so pivotal, because they're giving just because they're good people and they want to help.  I always feel like there are definitely people who helped us early as we were starting Amazing if, where there was absolutely nothing in it for them really.  We weren't offering a lot other than saying, "Thank you", probably, maybe sending a nice thank you card.  

Those people were doing it because they could see that they could be useful and back to how we always described networking as people helping people, reminding yourself people do really enjoy helping other people.  If someone has got the opportunity to feel like they can give you their expertise, maybe make a connection on your behalf, point you in a useful direction, our experience is in the main, people will do that, particularly if they are also connected to that change that you're trying to make in some way. 

They don't need to be as immersed or as involved as you are, but if you can spot some of those people that have perhaps been interested in similar areas in the past, or just are naturally good at sponsoring people who are trying to make change happen, don't forget to ask for that help that you need because if you don't ask for the help, people won't know how they can help you.  Such an important area I think, particularly maybe in those early days where you think you don't know what you don't know and just a few people supporting and surrounding you can make all the difference.

Helen Tupper: Also a way that you can support other people as well, you can do that for other people, instead of driving change yourself, or as well as driving change yourself.  I think it's a big difference you can make to people.

Our very last, our final P is all about positive impact, and I hesitate with us doing this one because this is probably the one that we've got the most work to do on at the moment.  Let's start with a few coach-yourself questions that we ask ourselves on this area.  The first one is, "How will you know if you are making progress; what does that improvement and impact look like; and, how are you going to measure your impact?  What are the metrics that matter to you?" 

There are so many conventional metrics, but I think the ones that are most meaningful are the ones that you make up; the metrics that are most specific to you and your change.  So for us it might be, "How many people have we helped to reach?"  Or, "How many people have shared Squiggly", or whatever it is, but they're metrics that are only personal to us and our business, but I think they're ones that make our impact really meaningful and specific to us.  Find out what those are for you and start to think about how you can track them.

One of the things that I think that we have started to do well is that we now have this one page, it's a PowerPoint slide, that has our objectives and our key results on that we refer back to, relatively regularly, that talks about some of those meaningful metrics for us.  We look at how are we tracking against that and do we need to do anything differently.  It helps us to have a conversation about our impact. 

I don't think that measurement and metrics are everything, but they do help you to have that conversation about impact that makes all that effort that you're making that can sometimes feel hard, it makes it really meaningful, and it helps you to see that progress as well.  The insight for us here and that I think might help other people is that change takes time.  When I look at some of the metrics that are meaningful for us, that does not change overnight.  It doesn't change the one podcast, it doesn't change the one book, it doesn't change the one course; it changes with five years and maybe more of continual persistence, the word that Sarah mentioned.

Change takes time, maybe even a lifetime, so just be prepared that it will probably take some persistence and perseverance, but I think the really important thing is to recognise all of the small wins that you have along the way; that event that went well, that email that you got from someone where you made a difference.  That might not be on your list of meaningful metrics, but gosh when you get that really nice review, or that really kind email, it makes a difference in the moment. 

So some of those metrics might be big and meaningful and significant, and some of that impact might just be what you needed right now, here in the moment and I think they're equally valuable and you need to have a balance of both.

Sarah Ellis: I still get so much satisfaction and also pride from every podcast review that we get.  I saw a couple of new ones this week because they come through to our email.

Helen Tupper: I haven't looked yet.

Sarah Ellis: You probably won't have seen them, because Helen is half on holiday at the moment.

Helen Tupper: Officially on holiday.

Sarah Ellis: Sort of.  I read those and just thought, "That feels so meaningful for me.  That feels more meaningful for me than some of those, on the surface, big metrics like how many people might have downloaded your podcast.  Those things can be important too, but I find it really interesting to see what's your reaction to the different impact that you're having, and also what feels important to you.  That's only one example, but if you'd like to leave us a review, I would be very grateful, partly because I enjoy reading them!

Helen Tupper: That wasn't where we intended to go!

Sarah Ellis: No, it wasn't, but that was genuine, somebody wrote a really nice very kind of personal review this week and I thought, "That's how we know it's worth it.  That's how we know we are making change".  Sometimes, it might feel like that change is literally one person at a time.  I definitely sometimes, particularly when we were first starting Amazing if, felt like you perhaps you were impacting two or three people or you were doing a really small workshop and perhaps one of those people would go back to their organisation and they'd share a bit about what you talked about, and people would find that interesting; and slowly but surely, it just felt like you were notching up those small wins and making a bit of progress.

Taking the moment to just celebrate those small wins really matters.  It's the fuel, I think, that keeps you going and that also helps you in the tough days and in the hard weeks where perhaps you don't feel like you're making the change that you were hoping or perhaps you are starting to deal with difficult people who don't agree with you.

We all know that any kind of change is always really hard, so I think some of these things that we've talked about today is also about surrounding yourself with the right people, the right process to actually help you to succeed and survive your way through trying to make change happen.  I think the other important point I'd want to make is this is not a linear process, so when I think about this for us, I think coming back to each of these five areas regularly, some of which we've done definitely more intentionally than others, has been really helpful. 

As we said, we're better at some than we are at others.  I don't think this is about, "I've got to do each of these brilliantly or perfectly, each of the Ps perfectly, and then at that point all the change will follow".  But I do think it's a really helpful way to just give yourself some structure to approach the change that you're really passionate about and that maybe it's been a niggle, maybe it's been more than that, maybe it's just been something that you just feel like, "I really want to do this, but I'm not sure how to get started", so you're perhaps just feeling like you're stalling or a bit stuck.

What I hope we've done today is given you lots of questions to ask yourself and tools and techniques to think about, but I also hope by us sharing a bit more of our story, which we don't do quite as much on the podcast, because really, it's all about you rather than all about us, but I hope that we've shown that to be honest if we can do it, I definitely think everyone could be a changemaker.

Helen Tupper: We've talked about quite a lot, but we really want to give you some practical tools to take away with this, because I feel like that's the thing.  As well as sharing our story and our experience, that's a thing that we can really help you with.

So, we have got for you the PodSheet which has lots of the different ideas for action that we have shared, some of those coach-yourself questions, that's all on the PodSheet; and we've also got the template that you can download with the 5Ps so that you can start to really think through the change that you might want to make and how you personally can make it.

You can get the links to those things by going to the description of this podcast, so you'll find it all there, or going to amazingif.com and then go into listen and you'll find all the resources against this episode.  If you get stuck and you're thinking, "I still can't find it, Helen and Sarah, where have you hidden these things?" just email us.  We're Helen&Sarah@Squigglycareers.com and you can email us and we'll make sure that you get what you need to make the change that you want to make.

Sarah Ellis: So that's all from us this week, we hope you found that helpful and a useful listen, we'd love to hear your stories of starting change, of progressing change, so please get in touch and let us know.  Also I'd really recommend listening to some of those changemaker conversations that we'll be releasing over the next few days, because they will be time very, very well spent.  For now, that's all from us, and we'll speak to you again, soon.  Bye for now.

Helen Tupper: Bye everybody.