Sketchnote Podcast: Sarah Greer and Adrian Peryer - S1/E3  🔗 **Source:** [Sketchnote Podcast: Sarah Greer and Adrian Peryer - S1/E3](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urqwruVtIRw) > [!note]+ Document Notes > tags: #design-centric-facilitation #visual-thinking #meeting-design #shared-vision-toolkit #devrel-facilitation > author: Mike Rohde × Sarah Greer × Adrian Peryer > source: Sketchnote Podcast S1E3 (YouTube) > reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urqwruVtIRw > date: 2026-05-19 > <!-- deep-read:sections start --> ## 🧰 Action Inbox - [H1] **Apply the "80% of effort is not in the meeting" principle** to WPCC board sessions, FAIR.pm working group meetings, or any high-stakes WordPress governance discussion. They run minimum 3 months of prep, sometimes 6-10 months, including anonymous voice-of-customer interviews. Translate this to: prep agenda + interviews + framework drafts before any high-leverage WP meeting. #facilitation - [H1] **Replace at least one recurring weekly team meeting with a redesigned version** — They explicitly noted their own weekly meeting was going stale ("aren't we meant to be the people with the mission to make meetings engaging?") and now continuously redesign it, measure it, run after-action reviews. Apply to GoDaddy DevRel weeklies or WPCC board syncs. #meeting-redesign - [H2] **Adopt the "modular wall content" pattern** — Sarah's insight: cut prep content into modular pieces, not big rolled-out sheets. Allows on-the-fly rearrangement when conversation goes 12 feet instead of the planned 10. Maps to: prep slide decks as movable cards/sections rather than linear flows. #facilitation-tools - [H2] **Build personal "icebreaker catalog"** — They rotate hosting and capture every icebreaker that lands. They're planning to release theirs. Apply to: WPCC meetings, training team workshops, any recurring community gathering. Childhood-themed icebreakers (treehouse exercise, Camp Ledgewood) "peel back layers of the onion immediately." #community-building - [H3] **Investigate Ron Westrum's culture framework** — They reference his typology often, built a simple survey instrument with him priced at $4.95/person to make organizational culture measurement affordable for non-profits/small teams. Could be relevant to WPCC culture work or open-source community health measurement. #culture-measurement - [H3] **Try the "alignment is the result of managing through conflict" reframe** — Adrian's distinction: leadership teams have legitimate opposing points of view; alignment doesn't mean agreement. Two or three really complex topics need face-to-face conflict management with a win-win frame. The pie isn't going to get bigger by fighting over it. #conflict-resolution ## 🎯 Bottom Line Sarah Greer and Adrian Peryer co-founded Shared Vision Toolkit after running a global facilitation practice inside HP for years (sponsored by then-CEO Meg Whitman after HP acquired EDS, which had a practice from British company "Group Partners"). Their thesis: meetings are mostly terrible by default, and you can transform them into "co-creative immersive experiences" with floor-to-ceiling whiteboard panels, no tables, rolling chairs, and pre-built modular wall frameworks — but 80% of the value lives in the prep, not the meeting itself. They're now teaching the practice and shipping affordable culture-measurement tooling because they realized big enterprises buy little design firms and "lock them in a box." ## 📖 Key Claims & Evidence ### The 80/20 prep principle - "What people don't see is probably 80% of the effort isn't in the meeting. Before we do a meeting, these things take minimum like three months from concept before the meeting happens, sometimes six months." - Large meetings get 8, 9, 10 months of planning. Customer advisory boards include anonymous customer interviews ("we're regarded as Switzerland — neutral") - "Sometimes the value is in preparing for the session and realizing you shouldn't do the session." ### The immersive environment design - Floor-to-ceiling whiteboard panels with 15% baked structure (or 30-40% for advisory boards) - No tables, just rolling chairs — removes the laptop hiding - Modular paper that can be cut up and moved (Sarah resisted this initially; Adrian was right) - "People come into the room and they go first time: wow. Second time they're invited, you never have a problem getting them to attend." ### The active-listening intimacy point - "The people that really listen to me deeply mean that I have value... there's a lot of follow-on implications. You actually paid attention. You can relate to me. What I'm saying is valuable." - Live visual capture is the deepest form of active listening — even with your back to people - "I don't think any AI is ever going to be able to do that. It's like cave painting. It's just there in us." ### The corridor-as-strategy-space story - Repeat client booked a hallway for 6 weeks specifically because they wanted to walk all the company leaders through the strategy in the context of the visual buildout - "They could walk and explain to everyone: here are our big strategic outcomes, here's where we are today, here's the vision, here's the journey, here are the key initiatives. It's all laid out. To do that on slides or in a document — don't do that. It's harder. People get smarter in those environments." ### The "make it affordable" pivot - Initially tried to teach/sell the full practice. Discovered companies "buy a little design firm and lock them in a box." - Pivoted to giving away modules for free or near-cost - Culture survey instrument with Ron Westrum: $4.95/person ("less than it would cost to buy really good coffee for everyone in the meeting") ### Three closing tips (each) **Sarah:** (1) Navigate "the shitties" — the creative process roller coaster, hang in there; (2) Challenge yourself often — get the new tool, throw yourself into deep end; (3) Find inspiration outside your daily practice — museums, plays, musicals, grandkids on the floor. **Adrian:** (1) Set the environment up right for yourself — figure out what gets you into flow state; (2) Find your wise mind every day, check ego at the door (his yoga journey); (3) Emotions are waves, they will pass — under pressure, pause. ## ✅ Logical Validity - **Strong narrative reasoning anchored to specific cases** — the hallway story, the customer advisory board origin at HP, the Mental Canvas/Procreate animations - **Appropriately humble about origin** — give credit to Group Partners (the British firm), Meg Whitman's sponsorship, Mike Rohde for the podcast itself - **Mild repetition** — same point about prep time made ~4 times; might be the conversational format - **One unexamined claim** — "people get smarter in those environments" is stated but not measured ## 🛡️ DARVO Analysis None. Generous toward colleagues, ex-employer (HP), and the practice's origins. ## 🚩 Areas needing further research - Whether the practice transfers to fully-virtual environments at the same effectiveness (they did pivot during COVID with iPad capture, claim it works, but it's worth scrutinizing) - Ron Westrum's culture framework and the survey instrument — independent validation - The Group Partners British company that originated the methodology ## 🌍 For DevRel / WordPress context This is directly relevant to (1) WPCC board facilitation patterns, (2) FAIR.pm working group sessions, (3) Five for the Future contributor program touchpoints, (4) GoDaddy DevRel team offsite design. The "modular wall content" and "redesign the recurring meeting" patterns are the highest-leverage takeaways. The icebreaker-catalog discipline is community-building hygiene worth adopting. <!-- deep-read:sections end --> 📄 **Full text:** ![[Full Document Contents/Articles/Sketchnote Podcast Sarah Greer and Adrian Peryer - S1E3.md|Sketchnote Podcast: Sarah Greer and Adrian Peryer - S1/E3 by Mike Rohde × Sarah Greer × Adrian Peryer (Shared Vision Toolkit)]] ## Highlights - delivering and doing those meetings and at the same time we're also spending quite a bit of time now you know building content and sharing that back to the world. >> Interesting. >> Adrian, anything to add to that? >> Well I I would say it what's unusual what people don't see is probably 80% of the effort isn't in the meeting. >> Mhm. So before we do a meeting, these things take minimum like three months to ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01ks1a6rr7bf9a0xx4f711z6zs)) - Note: The 80/20 prep principle for high-leverage meetings — minimum 3 months from concept, sometimes 6-10 months for big sessions. Directly applicable to WPCC board sessions, FAIR.pm working group meetings, GoDaddy DevRel offsites. - Tags: action/h1, wpcc-relevant, atom/literature/h1, 80-prep-principle, facilitation - exemplifying and and demonstrating the deepest form of active listening >> even with my back to people and sometimes I'll like turn around you know and make eye contact with them like did I capture that right or >> whatever but I think that there is something so magical in that quality and you don't have to be an artist to do that. Like, you just kind of have to ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01ks1a764tgztb0nx3m7b667v2)) - Note: Sarah Greer's reframe: live visual capture IS the deepest form of active listening — even with your back to people. You don't have to be an artist. The intimacy of being deeply listened to is the magic. - Tags: active-listening, visual-capture, atom/zettel/z1, facilitation - board. It was technology strategy and they said they showed us the space and I I I would describe it as a long corridor. I don't know what we use. >> Yeah, hallway. >> It was a hallway and we they said we're doing it in here. We said why are we doing it in here? And they said because we've booked this space for the next 6 weeks and our plan is that all the leaders of the of the company will be brought through in groups and we would explain the strategy >> in the context of this space. Isn't that smart? ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01ks1a7ngf6g0x1040v1yfssz7)) - Note: The hallway-as-strategy-space story — repeat client booked a hallway for 6 weeks specifically because they wanted to walk all the company leaders through the strategy in the context of the visual buildout. Pattern reusable for any high-leverage strategic communication. - Tags: facilitation, action/h2, strategic-space, atom/literature/h1, hallway-pattern - talk about this enough is you know I think people get uncomfortable but we recognize that sometimes particularly when we're working with leadership teams that alignment is the result of managing through conflict they are not all on the same page they have legitimate different opposing points of views there is no right single answer and you know we often say to leadership teams of sort of partly revealing you know what we're ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01ks1a83yqsdghb25awcsb0s3w)) - Note: "Alignment is the result of managing through conflict" — leadership teams have legitimate opposing views; alignment doesn't mean agreement. Two or three really complex topics need face-to-face conflict management with a win-win frame. Directly applicable to WPCC board, FAIR.pm steering committee dynamics. - Tags: alignment-conflict, leadership-facilitation, atom/zettel/z1, wpcc-relevant - So, we priced it at uh $4.95 per person. So, >> wow. >> Team of 10, less than $50, less than it would cost to buy really good coffee for everyone the meeting and get and get it that way. And the idea is, I think more and more that we want to put these modules out there in a very very affordable way, either free or, you know, sort of close to cost. Yeah. >> So that people can use it. >> Yeah. It's we just feel it's foundational. I I don't think we do meet ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01ks1a8khjarkknrab7r5yvhf0)) - Note: The Ron Westrum culture survey instrument priced at $4.95/person — a 10-person team gets organizational culture measurement for less than $50. Investigate for WPCC culture work or open-source community health measurement. - Tags: wpcc-relevant, culture-measurement, ron-westrum, action/h3, atom/literature/h2