TITLE: Strategic Consultant, Aderonke Bademosi’s Appreciative Inquiry Innovation.
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It is such a pleasure today to share our platform with Aderonke Bademosi. We've been friends for many years. When I first met Aderonke, she was running a strategic consultancy with her brother. She's a photographer and artist in the breathtaking island of Bermuda where she lives, along with Laura, and she runs photography walking tours through local neighbourhoods for tourists. Aderonke introduced me to AI, that's the one that's been around for many years - Appreciative Inquiry, not artificial intelligence, although I would probably argue that it is a form of some kind of metaphysical intelligence, we'll talk more about that. And we’ve worked together on her co-creation, Flourish! I would consider Aderonke a serial entrepreneur. And I'm so looking forward to hearing more about your latest project. Welcome Aderonke to Resilient Entrepreneurs.
Thank you so much to both you and Laura, for having me. I really appreciate being here today.
Well, thank you for joining us, I love the term serial entrepreneur, because what it tells me is that you're a risk taker and you just go for it and take chances and create something new and keep moving in life. And I think that's really exciting. So I'd love to start by going back a couple years and know what your childhood was like, were you a bit of an entrepreneurial kid? Is that in your blood? And what were your parents like?
Wow, I don't think I was entrepreneurial as a child. I don't recall having any great ideas on businesses that I could start, but what I will say is that from a very young age I knew what I wanted to do. My childhood, I had two brothers that I grew up with and we lived between Bermuda and the UK. And in fact my brothers were born in the UK, I was born in Bermuda and so we got exposed to a wide variety of people, especially during our teen years living in London. And so I had some really wonderful opportunities to explore a city, and this is going to date me in the early 1980s while I was in High School, and having exposure to people from around the world, my school was literally a melting pot of nationalities, helped broaden my perspective. And I will say that at 17 years old I made the decision of what I wanted to do with my life - I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I wanted to be in communications. And it hit me like a lightning bolt as I lay in my bed as a teenager between doing homework and reading and listening to the radio, and I remember thinking to myself, I really want to be a part of an industry that keeps people up in a good way, that keeps people listening, that keeps people tuned in. And I really thought I would be in for the long term, radio and television production and direction, which is what I actually did study, along with corporate communications. But my career led me more and more into the corporate communications arena. But I've always retained my love for radio and television production, which gives me opportunities to really weave that into the corporate work and consulting work that I do. So I don't I don't remember setting out to be an entrepreneur or thinking that I'll be an entrepreneur as a child, I think that's something that I moved into as I got older.
So is there a possibility that you will be releasing a podcast of your own anytime in the future?
Well, I'm happy that you've asked that question. The answer is yes. Many years ago, back in 2010 - 2011, I produced a radio program called Heart of the Matter Radio. And there was a gentleman in Bermuda whose name was Ronald Lightbourne, he has since passed, and I asked him to be the host of the program while I was producer and he happily said, Yes. And I got the idea to produce, to create this program when I was actually in Kathmandu, Nepal, attending the world Appreciative Inquiry conference in 2009 and I was dazzled by the array of projects that people were working on using Appreciative Inquiry as their base. And so I came up with the idea, I can produce a radio program around Appreciative questions and so that's what I did. And the thing that differentiated the radio program is that we asked all of our guests the exact same questions. And we did maybe about 10 episodes and then we moved away from it. But recently, I've been thinking, I can really recreate that, now that technology has advanced. The original program was aired on the radio here in Bermuda and I have now created, recreated that with different questions, but with the same premise, using appreciative questions as the base and asking each and every one of the guests the same questions. And the other change is I'm actually the host this time and the producer and the communications person and the writer and so I'm doing everything for the podcast, which I hope to release in early 2024.
That is really exciting. Oh, my goodness! Can you just help me? Excuse my ignorance on this, what is an Appreciative Question? How do you find that?
So let me just step back and explain what appreciative inquiry is. Appreciative inquiry uses overwhelmingly positive questions to change human systems, whether it's an organisation a business, whether it's families, wherever people are. If you want to make change, if you start with an overwhelmingly positive question, what we do know is that the changes are positive and longer lasting And so an appreciative question looks at the strengths and successes of any entity with the view that we will use the identifying elements from those questions to help change in the future. So for example, if you want to have a team work better together, if you want to do team enhancement training, what you will do is bring the participants together and ask them about a team that they worked on, that they felt was hugely successful. And in pairs, they will interview each other and then after they identify and talk to each other about that team, what the elements of that successful team was and how they were able to connect with each other, in a larger group that is able to tease out the elements. And so the beauty of Appreciative Inquiry is that we recognise expertise is in the room, we recognise that as adults, people have wonderful experiences. And as a facilitator it's your job to help them identify those wonderful experiences and then apply it to the change that they want to make. So asking appreciative questions is asking overwhelmingly positive questions in order to facilitate a change.
And this would be a brilliant way of problem solving in an organisation because how often do we in organisations, particularly the larger ones, how often do we focus on the problem versus the solution? And here, I'm seeing a reverse approach.
And so we look for the solutions, right? So for example, if you said to somebody, So tell me what the problem is, tell me what's going on here, tell me what's wrong, or Who's to blame? That immediately sets up barriers, that immediately says, okay, so somebody at some point is going to try and blame me for this, that or the other. Whereas if you start with a question that says something like, tell me about an overwhelmingly positive event or activity that you've participated in this organisation, that gets people to start thinking about really great things that have happened, and get to express it. Oftentimes, because we aren't asked that question we don't get a chance to reflect or recall some really great events, and then not just recalling them but sharing them with others helps to surface that positive energy. And the question that I really like to ask during sessions, or get people to answer is, What would you like more of? And what that does is help people to identify things that will help make their job easier, or help them to manage or help them to look at things slightly differently in order to make the change. So if you ask somebody, Okay, so what's wrong? And they say, Well, these walls here are the wrong colour, and you as the manager say, Okay great, let me change the wall colour. And then that might be the wrong colour. But that might not even be the issue. But if you ask somebody, What would you like more of? and they say, I would like to be able to paint the walls myself, that's an example, you can find opportunities for that. If they say we would like more meetings, those are concrete things that you can put in place that will help change an environment as opposed to just asking questions that don't provide solutions.
It's really easy to be wired towards the negative, which I think most people generally are and I think it's a survival instinct because it protects us from the lion chasing us, we're always kind of looking over our shoulder, it's a natural human instinct, right? So it's easy to go Oh this is wrong, that's wrong but that doesn't, like you say, solve anything. And I like that it sounds to me and I know this is a superpower of yours, but it's the storytelling right? It's bringing out the story. So how else can you bring storytelling into entrepreneurship and into small business. How can storytelling help?
So as an artist, in addition to being a consultant, I'm also a photographer and one of the things that I've learned over the years is that people like stories, people like to hear how an artist came to be, or how they developed an image, or how they went on a trip and saw this image, and it defined their work. And so it helps people connect, it helps people to remember that person. And if a story is strong and compelling and resonates, because maybe somebody else had a similar experience or wants to have a similar experience, the story helps to solidify the information that is being shared. And when you hear a wonderful story, you tend to remember it and you tend to remember the person, you may not remember all aspects of the story but one of the things that you do remember is how the story makes you feel, and it changes how you view that person. And if we could share stories more, if we could take the time to really listen and hear each other's backstory, I think it makes for extremely wonderful connections. So imagine asking somebody an overwhelmingly positive question and then just sitting back and listening to their story, it creates so many connections and opportunities, I think.
Exactly why we do this podcast. It is so true and I love just asking the question and listening to the story and we want more of that. I think after going through COVID and being so separated I think connection is more important now than it's ever, ever been. So storytelling is just an amazing way to connect with people to understand how similar we all are because often the stories are more similar than we realise. And I think by being open and really listening and asking good questions, you can find out some really amazing things. And for entrepreneurs, often we're doing this on our own, we're figuring it out, we're creating businesses, you're trying to figure out how to be the accountant and the marketing expert. You can't figure it out on your own, you've got to ask questions, you've got to go find help and ask experts. And I think it's super valuable to just be able to listen, and let an entrepreneur tell you their story. Because in it, you're gonna find some nugget of wisdom like, Ah, that was a problem I was having and she's got a similar solution. How cool is that?
Yes. I agree. I agree, just taking time to talk and connect gives people opportunities to find similarities.
And Aderonke, talking about connecting with people, is there a mentor that has helped you on your way? Or have you found your own way through this journey?
There have been a lot of people that you rely on to bounce ideas off. There are a lot of people that I have tapped into, sometimes just once I’ve had that conversation with them, but there are people that I will go back to repeatedly to help. And I just want to go back to the woman that I absolutely consider one of my mentors, especially during the early stages of my career and as I was finishing college, she has since passed away. Her name was Dr. Barbara Wheeler. She was the creator of the Africana Studies program at my school, now Kane University in New Jersey and I remember she came during my last year of college and I was looking for a job on campus and somebody told me that she was looking for a student assistant so I dashed up to her office and immediately we agreed that I would be her assistant and she taught me so much. She taught me so, so much, not just about Africana Studies, not just about Afrocentricity, not just about a different way of viewing the world, she was an anthropologist, just in terms of anthropology and human nature and I just really loved being connected with her. And so much so that maybe about eight years ago, nine years ago, she came to Bermuda and that was her first visit to the island. And the first thing she said to me was Aderonke, I'm so upset with you. And I'm like, why? And she said, Why did you not insist that I come to Bermuda before this, and I was like, I was trying to tell you. And she came back, I think, again the next year. And so I always, always appreciated her guidance, I always looked up to her as one of my mentors, and have always appreciated the lessons that she taught me that have stayed with me throughout my career and throughout my life. Absolutely, there have been others, I think of my mother, who passed away in 2017, I think she was definitely my first guide and my mentor and really showed me the value of hard work, my brothers and I. She showed me the value of being steady and being committed and following through, and so much so that she raised three professionals for a large part of our lives as a single parent, I won't say the entire time that we grew up but definitely for a significant portion. And so she showed us how to be a whole person. It's not just about work, but it's also about family, it's also about being true to yourself and finding your own way and defining success for yourself. So I would definitely say those are two of the key mentors that I've had in my life and I will say that there have been others that I have looked up to that I have gone to for guidance but those are the two I want to think about.
Shout out to amazing single moms out there holding it all down. Incredible! I want to ask you about what you're working on now because I ran into Aderonke on Saturday at a vendor market and she's selling these incredible calendars and I want to know more about them and there's more to it than just the calendar I understand, so fill us in.
I keep telling people, it's a bit of a long story. I was at an event recently and a lady said to me, So what do you do? and she was sat across the table. I said, Okay, it's a bit of a long story so I picked up my chair and sat next to her so I could explain my work. So first of all, I am a consultant and I provide facilitation and communication services to organisations. Equally, I am a photographer and the type of photography that I love, that I really spend all of my time doing is abstract photography. And what that is, is I could look at and I don't know how I do it, but I'm looking around this room, I can look at something and see it through the lens of my camera in a slightly different way. And I tend to see things and it's gonna sound really weird, when I have the camera in my hand. I can’t explain it but once I have my camera in my hand and I'm really focused, I can see the shot so I will take the picture. And I've been taking pictures for years and now that I’m in this current iteration of entrepreneurship I've been really thinking a lot more about my photography and how to get my photography into more and more people's hands. And I had a thought early in 2023, Oh maybe I can create a calendar and that will get my art into more people's hands. And I thought about it more and I looked around and did some research. I'm like, There are some amazing artists here who have fabulous calendars and fabulous art, how am I going to make my calendar stand out? So I said, Okay, maybe I'll give each month a theme but that didn't that didn't say anything to me. A theme is a theme. So then I thought, if I could figure out some way to make it interactive I can create a blog around each theme. So then I hit upon the idea, well I'll put a QR code on each month. So I was like yeah! So if you scan the QR code it takes you to my blog, my blog will then give you an overview, a little bit more in depth about that month's theme. And then I thought, that's good I will get people to interact that way and have people post pictures online or on the website and get them to interact that way. But then I thought, what happens if I could create an opportunity for people to learn even more about that theme, so I came up with the idea of what I call 3C Gatherings. And the three C's are Conversation, Connection, Community. And I’ve found some really, really great professionals who will speak to each month's theme and so I'm going to have online meetings on the first Thursday of every month, we're starting in December 2023, the first Thursday is December the seventh and you have to register so if you go to my website abwilsonphotography.com and go to the blog calendar section, you'll find all the information. And so these subject matter professionals or 3C Gathering guides as I call them, will lead us in appreciative based conversations. They will give in depth overviews of the topic from their practice, from the information that they share with their clients with their network and bringing them to that month's discussion. And what I will also provide is opportunities for people to go into breakout rooms with maybe one or two other people where they get to explore the theme in detail for themselves in those breakout rooms. Now, each meeting is about 90 minutes and I think that gives us enough time to break below the surface of each month's theme. So I'm excited, it’s a first for me and people that I keep talking to they're like, I've never heard this. So maybe this is a first for the world, maybe!
The world's first interactive calendar, where you learn and apply appreciative inquiry, and I guess are educated and expand your perception of a new theme each month. Sounds fascinating! Who wouldn't want to be part of that?
Absolutely.
So Aderonke, what would you consider to be the most important concept for success?
I would say.. for me, it would definitely be more than one. It's first of all having a clear vision for what you want to achieve and sometimes the vision shifts as you move forward. And so like I just explained with the calendar, it was the pictures, and then this and then this… it was building on each and every time until I got absolute clarity around what I was doing. So having your vision even though it may adjust as you move on, that's fine, but once you get to where you need to be, staying focused on your vision.
And I think the second is, and I just did it, is taking a deep breath and pushing through because even though I came up with the idea of the calendar in early 2023, it wasn't printed until October 2023. And that's because I had already picked out the images, I took the time over the summer to write the blog posts, I had done everything but then I stopped because I had to get past my nervousness and my anxiety around producing the calendar. And well, what if nobody buys it? What if people think I'm crazy?! Getting past the doubt within myself about something that was so personal to me, this is my art and while I am a consultant and have been in communications my whole life, I can get my client out there and noticed and talked about, to do for myself! And I've always been, for the most part on the other side, the other side, it's always easy to get somebody else ready, but then to get myself ready mentally. So I would definitely say, giving yourself time to push forward, but then be committed to it, being forthright in your delivery and your belief in yourself. And get past the fact that not everybody is gonna like your art in this case and get past the fact that people... I remember this woman said to me, You have the wrong picture on the cover. (Laughs) I was like, okay, What picture do you think should have been on the cover? She said, The picture that's on the back. And I was like, Okay, that's fine so she helped me from the standpoint of how I display it, how I display the calendars, I have the front and the back showing. So I was like, Okay, that was good guidance. But if she had said, None of them, then I'd have been like, Oh, what do I do? But then still having the confidence to say, okay, that's just one person, you know 10 other people have said, have given me positive feedback, so to be able to hear any feedback that you get that rubs against your pride, but still push forward, still keep going. I think those are the two things that I would say.
And then maybe the third is seek guidance, seek guidance from those who have already done it. Or if it's something that hasn't been done before, aspects of what you're doing, seek guidance from people who have done aspects of it. So if it's in this case the calendar, what have others done around calendars, and then what have others done around online gatherings and then what have people done around blogs? So it's those three components coming together. So you're getting bits of wisdom from each place and then take it and make it your own, take the wisdom and combine it with what you know, to create a space for yourself.
And then I think the final thing that I would say, pass it on, pass on your wisdom, pass on your guidance, pass on your suggestions to others, because you never know where your feedback, and I mean the good feedback, the positive feedback, where your knowledge of x, you may be just the thing that person needed in order to move forward. So I would definitely say pass it on, be absolutely generous and share because I know the people that I've talked to, even if it's just once, people that have been so generous with their time, so generous with their knowledge, that I want to make sure that I'm in that same space if I can help somebody, even if it's just that one conversation to be able to say yeah, this is the knowledge that I have that I can share. So those would be the four things that I would say, but definitely seek guidance, be true to yourself, know your vision, and take feedback as feedback, and be generous.
That is such sage advice, especially for anyone in the launch phase of their business because I feel like everything you just said about the nerves, the hesitation to launch it, the feedback that could have thrown you for a loop but you just twisted it, it's okay, that's just a different way to market and instead of just marketing the front, maybe I'll market the front and the back and now people see both sides. And one might sell to one type of customer, one might sell to another type of customer so feedback is just that, feedback. There's people that love what you do, people that hate what you do, people that are indifferent, that's normal and it's okay. Because I think as an entrepreneur, we get so caught up in trying to be everything for everybody and making everybody happy and you just want to do the best thing you possibly can but you've got to accept that sometimes some people aren't gonna like it and that's okay, they're not your people. And that's the importance of understanding a target market and understanding who you're trying to help because you're not trying to help everybody. You're trying to help the people who need what you have, to give your wisdom, your guidance, all the lessons you've learned and all the connections you're offering them so that is just amazing. And it's such good advice. So please, if you're starting out, listen, it's about just keep going, get that guidance, don't give up, stick to it. That's it and that's resilience! And that is resilient entrepreneurs. That's what we're all about, that’s why we do this podcast and why we talk to people like you to gather that wisdom. And of course we always ask at the end of our episode, what your definition of resilience is, because it really is interesting how varied that definition can be for different people. So what would you say is your definition?
So my definition of resilience is getting up each and every day, just getting up and doing that one thing that will move you forward. I read a quote that was attributed to Shonda Rhimes and it said, You have to write everyday if you call yourself a writer. And so I took that as my photography, I have to take pictures every day. And while I don't get an opportunity to take pictures every day, it's being able to find the image even if it's with my phone and take a picture. And so resilience is not stopping, not stopping because there's a roadblock, or in some cases it could be a mental roadblock, right? Like for me just getting past that and it took time, it took time for me to get past it. But it's getting up every day thinking about your project and saying, Okay, today's the day I'm gonna do this today. Today I'm gonna do that! And it's just moving forward, it's just continuing day after day, day after day. And it's a level of consistency I think.
That was gonna be the word I was gonna say, consistency is key.
Yeah, and if you've read James Clear’s book, I think you guys have it as one of your Book Club books, it's doing a little every day. It's like going to the gym even if you go for two minutes, you're going and then while you're there you're gonna say, Okay I'm here, I'm gonna figure out something else. That for me is resilience, getting up every day and doing one thing towards your dream. If it’s a phone call, if it's an email, if it's a note to yourself, that's being resilient no matter what you just keep going past the real and imaginary roadblocks.
I love that and yeah, James Clear, Atomic Habits, awesome book we read in our Book Club. Aderonke’s in our book club, we read Oversubscribed together, you said that was a real game changer for you. So shout out to the book club, come join us in 2024. We're going to read a lot of amazing books. We're challenging ourselves to read one really good business book for our business and for us and our personal development as entrepreneurs going forward. So yeah, 1%, that 1% is what James Clear talks about, just 1% every day, it just compounds over time to create something incredible. So let's get out there and get it and go and create great habits and seek guidance and all this incredible wisdom that Aderonke brought to us today. Thank you so much, we appreciate your generosity, your kindness and your love that you shared and we really appreciate this conversation. Aderonke, thank you so much for joining us on Resilient Entrepreneurs and I will see you soon for sure.
Thank you so much for your time ladies, this has been wonderful.
Yeah, thanks.
