Wrapping up the year with some reflections, questions and love for the future.
As with last years review, here’s my assessment of 2022:
CLIENTS
A hearty year coming out of 2020/2021 even though COVID devastated my event activity income stream. So very grateful for the variety of clients which contracted me to collaborate this year.
I crunched the numbers on how many gigs fell into which category (‘speaking’ includes talks as well as my ‘purposeful storytelling’ beginners and advanced full-and-half-day masterclasses for leadership groups) and here’s the results:
Also did the same for how much income each category pulled in as well:
So speaking is coming out as the top earner and as promised last year my in-person MCing is finally closed out as a service I offer.
Here’s what some of the clients said about what I delivered for them:
“DK delivered a brilliant session for my team, giving us all accessible, understandable and effective advice on how to present engagingly. The training worked for those with extensive presenting experience as well as those with little exposure to public speaking. It was also very practical and encouraged us to embed our learning by doing. Highly recommended!”
Emma McLean, Engagement Lead, Engagement Lead, Accenture The Dock (Dublin)
“Engaging, smooth and professional. DK delivered his ‘Presenting Engagingly Online’ session to some of the sport sector in Wales. He keeps you locked in with his presentation, exhibiting exactly what he’s preaching with all the best tips and tricks for online delivery in the age of working from home. A top man who I highly recommend. Diolch, DK!”
Matthew Davies, Digital Marketing Lead, Sport Wales
“I cannot recommend DK highly enough – we just had our second very well attended event with him “Presenting Engagingly Online”, which has received fantastic feedback from all the participants. After the first event on “presenting with purpose” with DK last year, our whole team gained a new level of confidence and know how, and it was so popular we just had to offer another session with DK. From the perspective of events organisation, the whole thing couldn’t have been easier – Having all the content and information provided in advance, easy set up made our jobs so much easier.”
Julia Hahn, Wellington Branch Manager, German New Zealand Chambers of Commerce
So nice!
PRESENTING ENGAGINGLY ONLINE
I launched my own online course under the ‘Presenting Wisdom’ banner (accounting for a little over 10% of my income this year).
Developed from an offer I had been delivering from the previous year as so many clients transitioned to the online medium to speak at conferences globally and I noticed nearly everyone do it so badly.
I had two other ideas to add to the offers which I still might do but for now, if you’re still sharing your screen and reading from a script to present online, first of all, don’t, it’s so bad for the folks watching, and secondly take my course and you will never present that way again plus engage with the participants in ways which excite and ignite emotional reactions.
CURATED / CREATED
As evident in the #47, #46, #45, #44, #43, #42, #41, #40, #39, #38, #37 digital breadcrumbs offerings—the good stuff I tweet collected into cohesive and more snackable monthly blog posts—my curiosity is still raging.
Had also a strong offering of blog posts this year also which included:
- Creative Welly Benchmark | The Experimental Journey Continues
- New Mac, Old Workflows | What I Use
- Exploring My Playful Innocence | Creativity Webinar
- Leaving To Return / Returning To Leave | My Recent Europe Adventure
- Intersecting Influences | Looking For Collaborating Opportunities
- Time With Rilke | A Rhapsodic Swiss Side Quest
- People, Time, Place | The Erratic Elements Of Life
- Returning To The Fatherland | Dod yn ôl at fy nghoed
- I’ve Been Tweetmailing For 15 Years | How The Twittersphere Has Changed
- One Month After Launching My First Online Course | What Has Happened, What I’ve Learned & What’s Next
- My ‘Presenting Engagingly Online’ Course Is Live | REGISTER NOW
I also started a new series ‘for those who want to tell better stories: few chosen narrative examples, to uncover forms, inspire the soul and stir the creative spirits’:
- #7 | Consultation, Hwyl, & Budgets
- #6 | Painting, Hearings & Sampling
- #5 | Macbeth, Climate Change & Poetry
- 4 | Amadeus, All The Jedi & Leadership
- #3 | Eulogies, One-Buttock-Playing & Peacemaking
- #2 | Wood Block Carving, Intimation & Family Secrets
- #1 | Death, Poetry & Puppets
On a more human scale, I continue to gather humans in conversations via Creative Welly, which is now up to 39 episodes—read the recent blog post benchmark review—it offers fuel for my spirit and stretches my cognition into new realms whilst satisfying my desire to learn in analogue form.
TEDXNELSON
I did a TEDx talk. A distillation of my 16 years as a paid speaker, 10 years as a facilitator through the TEDx licenses I held and the past 6 years paying my rent as a bona fide speaker coach. I’m now trying to write a companion guide based on this talk to publish early next year.
Till then, if you got an important presentation or pitch coming up and struggling to prepare, this will help (or your money back) and please share on if you find it of use.
It received over 10,000 views in just under a week of going live!
CREATIVE LEADERSHIP NZ
My little creativity conference for leaders never made a return after COVID (did mention it last year as a potential project to reignite). Am thinking someone needs to take it on if there’s someone who wants to…
LESSONS LEARNED
…but what we make.
Or more eloquently put: Amor Fati / the love of ones fate.
Especially if framed through a proactive lens of defining ones path and embracing the journey of discovery through intention.
Half the battle here is knowing thyself so recently invested in a couple of coaching sessions and spent time talking to wiser souls than I, to uncover the characteristics which I can’t see of myself (thanks Shazia, Neil, Tim, Mary)—what’s interesting is that they all came to similar conclusions of where I should be devoting my time.
This was further reinforced via the CliftonStrengths Assessment (thank you Antonia) which really helped to both define and validate the elements to amplify along with giving me the language in which to craft a path forward. These are my top 5 strengths from the assessment:
On a more personal level I keep coming back to: Can I choose gratitude in this moment? Can’t remember where I came across someone saying it although they had ‘happiness’ rather than gratitude in their question. When asked it activates a depth of connection with the world which I haven’t felt for a very long time.
2023 STRATEGY
Simply, pages are being turned.
New unexplored paths are being pursued with hope and vigour.
I feel energetic, focused, full of potential and aspiration. And as I put in my Intersecting Influences | Looking For Collaborating Opportunities blog post, am hungry to build, to collaborate, to put my unique-action-biased skills to use.
For now I will continue to offer my speaker coaching and creative producing services, however, will start to transition with a more calculated strategy for my future so watch this space.
So, how was your year, what are you feeling grateful for and what do you have lined up for your fate in 2023?