As part of my commitment to growth and belief in the importance of self-reflection, I'm adding a new component to this blog, newsletter, and podcast: retrospectives.
The purpose of the retrospective is pulled directly from Agile Methodology. As stated in the Principles from the Agile Manifesto:
At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.
I'm adopting the retrospective to look back on what worked, what didn't, and collect some thoughts on future actions.
Starting with this post, the retrospective will be my last post each year. Now, every year my blog, newsletter, and podcast for Becoming Superhuman will start with My Three Words and conclude with the Retrospective.
I encourage you to do this retrospective exercise for yourself either in private, or in public on your own blog or newsletter. If you don't have a blog or newsletter and would still like to publish your retrospective, feel free to leave it in the comments. I'm always interested to learn more about my audience.
This is the last post of 2021, it's primarily an exercise that I'm doing for myself, but I'm doing it publicly to share my process. I hope you enjoy it.
What I did well
My second full year of solopreneurship has been a resounding success. Here are a few things I'm particular proud of.
I've maintained a 4-day work week schedule. I use Monday as a planning and content day, Tuesday through Thursday to work with clients, and I take every Friday off to be with my daughter, reading books, watching cartoons, playing with blocks, dolls, and various singing and musical toys. I'm proud of the consulting and coaching I've done to help clients work through challenges in Brand strategy, marketing, sales, and productivity.
This year also marked the start of really getting back into public speaking. Something I'm extremely proud of was delivering my Becoming Superhuman Keynote as the opening for a conference on Heroic Leadership to 500 high school students.
2021 has also been the year where my greatest professional accomplishment was realized. I began working with Page Two publishing to bring my book, The Lovable Leader, into the world. Having gone through the entire editing, proofing and design process, I can honestly say that I'm unreservedly proud of the final product. The book will be released January 25, 2022. You can join the waitlist for the pre-order here.
I read 27 books so far this year, which a new record for me.
Finally, this has been an excellent year for content. My blog became both a newsletter and a podcast as I muddled through a few different email marketing solutions and finally pulled the trigger on an audio version. I'm proud of what my content platform has become. I'm also very proud of the content that I put out this year and think it represents some of my most useful and thoughtful insights and explorations.