Years ago, I started a Google document to keep track of ideas for meeting ice breaker questions and team-building activities. It became a mish-mash of various font sizes and formatting as I jotted or pasted quick ideas into it, so it was far from beautiful. I figured it was time to share the love. I created a free 12-page list of quick and easy ice breaker questions, creative video meeting-specific ideas, and bonus team-building activities for retreats.

There are few things that give me more satisfaction than the process of sitting down to write something to share with the world. This little space on the internet gives me a way to do that, and while it’s being viewed by millions, it has been visited by tens of thousands of people. That is meaningful to me.

This is the most popular content people read in 2020 here at jessicaeastmanstewart.com.

If you have a theme or word for your year, how do you honor it? How do you keep it front and center so that you’re not wondering by March, “What was my word again?”. How do you squeeze all of the goodness of that strong reflection, dreaming, and planning? Here are some of the things that have worked for me over the years - which might be meaningful for you?

Know who you are, but don’t let it keep you stuck. Feel your feelings. Be intentional.

11 ideas that I have learned about why goals matter, how to set them, and how to avoid the most common goal-setting pitfalls.

Once or twice a month, a friend or colleague will reach out to ask if I would be willing to connect with them or someone they know about the education landscape in Oakland or the broader Bay Area as they think about how they can best contribute in their own career. Here are my thoughts for people considering a career move, considering how to grow their skills, or wanting to build their network.

The truth is that balancing everything I want in my life (to be a great employee, a great parent, a great partner, a healthy person) is a daily struggle for me.

But I have also learned some things from experience and from the wisdom of others. Here are my thoughts, and I’d love to hear in the comments how else you find ways to align your priorities and make it all fit together.

As 2019 begins, and my 36th birthday nears in just a few days, I pulled up our list to see how much progress we have made and consider what we might prioritize next. With professional and personal life being a bit intense in these past few years (two kids joining our family, tragic losses in our family, me becoming a maternal near-miss survivor after the birth of our son, and job changes), I had assumed that little progress had been made since we haven’t checked in on the list in a while. I was pleasantly surprised to have completed more of the list than I had guessed.

I recently offered an incredible woman a job. Before I picked up my phone to call her with the offer, I jotted some notes for myself. I thought I'd share those notes with you today, with a little extra "behind-the-scenes" thinking.

If you did a search of my calendar right now for the words "due date", you'd get way more results than normal. It feels like so many people I care about are having babies soon! It's caused me to reflect on what I wish I had known, and what I was glad that others told me when we were preparing for welcoming our first child into the world just three years ago.

Management is a practice. It requires intention to do well. Some people are more naturally talented at coaching and supporting others, but none of us is going to be a truly excellent manager by winging it. Putting in systems is an important start.

A few months ago, I asked in a Facebook group in which I participate if people could share ideas and policy language for practices that organizations and companies can put in place to make their workplaces more equitable and family-friendly ("family", in this case, defined very broadly). Here's what I found.

In the midst of the busy lives we lead, taking time to clean things up, freshen systems, and invest in future ease can be challenging. Every professional should make time to take a week (or even just a few days) every year to “polish” their systems, which will pay major dividends in your productivity for the rest of the year. 

At my organization, we pride ourselves on doing what we say we are going to do. A big part of living up to that value is to be great at setting an ambitious vision for impact and then doing the day-to-day work to realize that vision. Below are practices I have seen our best project managers bring to their work on a consistent basis.

We all know that getting and giving good feedback to our colleagues and volunteers is a critical part of running successful organizations and winning our campaigns. It’s important to offer feedback regularly in our work – sometimes daily and weekly – to our colleagues. But we all know that structures can support us to be better than we might be without them.