Episode 3.10: Retrospective
THE PODCAST: February 16, 2021
A CHARCUTERIE OF MUSHROOMS AND MAGIC
The Outside commissioned a retrospective on the last 3 years of our work. We’re letting you in on all the things - what clients had to say about our work, our branding audit, and why we were compared with people who take mushrooms. It’s hot! Listen in with Tim and Tuesday.
Together, Tim Merry and Tuesday Ryan-Hart are THE OUTSIDE—systems change and equity facilitators who bring the fresh air necessary to organize movements, organizations, and collaborators forward for progress, surfacing new mindsets for greater participation and shared impact.
3.10 — SHOW NOTES
Tuesday + Tim: Today on the podcast, we are talking about our own learning about our work. This Fall we commissioned a retrospective where we talked to clients, we got a branding audit, we had folks come in and look at our finances and make projections - we dissected The Outside and our work in the past 2.5 years. And you get to hear why we were compared with people who take mushrooms.
Tues: Part of this [TO’s Retrospective] was started by a challenge laid down by our Developmental Evaluation Team whereby they asked if we are serious about what we say we do. Which is to say to clients: we do an experiment, we learn from it, we pivot and we do the next experiment. That requires really rigorous evaluation. And so this Fall, we undertook a rigorous evaluation, from an internal team, by talking with our clients about what they are experiencing - are we doing what we say we do? Talking with branders to say are we messaging and presenting to the world what we think we’re doing and then are we being responsible with our money?
Tim: The Outside has been a start-up for the last 2.5 years and we are getting to a point now where we want to institutionalize, to build stability around our work… it’s an exciting moment. There’s been a whole bunch of feedback from “you’re doing amazing” to “you sound like you’re on mushrooms.” It’s like a charcuterie of feedback.
Tues: I noticed that generally our clients were very happy with the work that had been done - they had built capacity, they had made significant change and had personal transformation, and they worked with folks different from them in a way that they didn’t know they could.
Tim: We pitch ourselves as doing systems change and equity and what came back from our clients was this is really significant change work but we’re not necessarily impacting the dominant systems around us… yet. And “yet” was part of the feedback too. That was hard for me to hear.
Tues: Part of what delighted me was that people said they could point to practical, tangible, measurable things that were impacted/shifted because of the work… and a sense that we had not shifted the larger system they were in. My response was that we can’t hitch our cart to ‘we are going to actually change a system,’ but rather what we do have is a systemic approach - that we think more broadly, that we consider issues of equity, race, structure, power, wealth, class, money - that’s all baked into the work so that the approach is really systemic so that’s what we’re standing for; not that we will absolutely impact to shift your system. For me, it opened back up what we might say yes to.
Tim: What is The Outside’s to do? What is the role that we play in the bigger picture of long-term, systemic change work? Is it reasonable to expect, in the role that we play, that we’re going to have that type of outcome where we are measurably transforming the system as a whole? Our role, in general, is up front and early. A role, as the guy at the World Health Organization said, “loosening the bolts.” Our job is coming in and creating the conditions to go launch a bunch of experiments and try things out. Our job is, in many ways, to build the momentum and build the belief and range of perspectives and the contributions towards getting something done over a long period of time. We’re on the very front-end of massive changes.
Tues: When we talk about “in the beginning” and “loosing the bolts” - just to name, any point can be a beginning for those in the systems.
Tues: The other feedback that we received, that was not unexpected, was the language piece - making our language accessible. It’s feedback we get back from every place and everywhere. That’s where the mushrooms comment came from.
Tim: The other thing that’s happened out of the Retro was that we need to centre the work, not you and I. This invites you and I to step back and create the conditions for The Outside and Outsiders to rise.
Song: “Lemon” by N.E.R.D & Rihanna
Poem: “Above All Things,” by Lemn Sissay
How do you do it said night
How do you wake and shine
I keep it simple said light
One day at a time.
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Find the song we played in today’s show - and every song we’ve played in previous shows - on the playlist. Just search ‘Find the Outside’ on Spotify.
Duration: 30:31
Produced by: Mark Coffin
Theme music: Gary Blakemore
Episode cover image: source