The Future of Work

Narrative Interview Reflection

Frank TremainLeave a comment

For my BCM313 narrative interview, I decided to chat with my mentor and work colleague from AUD’$, Matthew Craig. Born and raised in Melbourne, Matt and his brother Junor started AUD’$ in 2016 and it’s since become Australia’s number one hip-hop connect. I joined their small team at the start of 2020 as a way to exercise and improve my skills, build a journalistic portfolio and help with the globalisation of Australian hip-hop and R&B.

In the subject of ‘The Future of Work’, we’ve studied our own and others’ values in the workplace and how they portray these through their storytelling. Our interview discussed Matt’s career, the challenges he’s faced and how these experiences have shaped and strengthened the most important values to him, which he lists as “community, culture and growth.”

For anyone who’s had a conversation with Matt, it wouldn’t be hard to guess considering every decision embodies these values both personally and professionally. Even during my presentation, peers utilised the practice of outsider witnessing to guess his top three values within the first couple of minutes (Carey & Russell, 2003). Using Michael White’s map of outsider-witness, I reflected back on when I first met Matt and realised that the way I had identified these values in him was through the category of embodying responses which refers to the expressions that resonate with the outsider witnesser and become an identified part of their own values (Carey & Russell, 2003).

In BCM313, I’ve taken a lot of inspiration from Kate’s interviewing style that we were lucky enough to see in action while she interviewed UOW’s Vice-Chancellor Patricia Davidson (BCM313 Week 7 Workshop, 2021). Her therapeutic style of interviewing is something I adopted in my interview with Matt and will continue to experiment with for future interviews I conduct through my work alongside him. The emphasis on active listening and the absent but implicit enriched the conversation and allowed me to dig deeper than the stories I had already heard from Matt, creating a more thoughtful and rewarding experience for both the talent and myself (Freedman, 2012).

From the interview I conducted with Matthew Craig, I gained a better understanding of Matt and the AUD’$ values and how these were formed from his determined work ethic and influenced by the hip-hop culture he’s been a part of for most of his life. Delivering the presentation allowed me to articulate the AUD’$ future, the relationship between myself and Matt and the shared love we have for the work we do.

Frank Tremain.

References:

Bowles, K & Davidson, P 2021, ‘BCM313 Week 7 Workshop’, University of Wollongong, accessed 31 October 2021, available at SOLS.

Carey, M & Russell S. 2003, ‘Outsider-witness practices: some answers to commonly asked questions’, The International Journal of Narrative Therapy & Community Work, accessed 31 October 2021, available at <https://narrativepractices.com.au/attach/pdf/Outsider_Witness_Common_Questions.pdf>.

Freedman, J. 2012, ‘Explorations of the absent but implicit’, The International Journal of Narrative Therapy & Community Work, accessed 31 October 2021, available at <https://dulwichcentre.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Explorations-of-the-absent-but-implicit-by-Jill-Freedman.pdf>.

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Observing Stories of Professional Value

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“The self is made, not given” – Myerhoff, 1977.

During the final weeks of BCM313, we’ve closely observed the choice of words from three guest speakers reflecting on their personal professional values. Our subject coordinator Kate describes Dakota Feirer’s interview with Layne Brown as a conversation “about relationships, management and how to do self-work that helps navigate work in a right way.” Reflecting on the values I recognised from the experience, Layne’s commitment to community and knowledge of self is what resonated strongest with me. 

Layne told a story about a colleague who was gaining people’s trust and friendship by handing Tim Tam’s out. In theory, it’s a thoughtful way to engage with others and begin a narrative between two groups but as Layne said, “if that gift doesn’t come with follow up and genuine authenticity, it becomes useless.”

This value of authenticity and genuine intention is constantly practised in my professional life through my work at AUD’$. Being a third-person witness to Dakota and Layne’s conversation, I believe I’m similar to Layne in the way he hopes to make contributions to the community that can form generational changes and culture shifts. With his powerful knowledge of self and deep connection to his Indigenous ancestry, this value is also present in Layne’s personal life.

“Just because I don’t drink doesn’t mean I automatically got rid of the behaviours that my had passed down to me through generations, it just isn’t assassinated by alcohol anymore,” Layne explained. 

Through the reflective practice of Outsider Witnessing, this understanding of identity and commitment to self-work is something I’ve been working on throughout the last lockdown in Wollongong. An outsider witness is a third party invited to listen to and acknowledge the preferred stories and identity claims of the person. This is based on the fundamental assumption of Narrative Therapy that our sense of self is socially constructed and exists in our relationships with others (Carey & Russell, 2003). 

The framing of the sense of self was already interesting to me but when paired with introspection and Michael White’s idea of the Absent but Implicit, it becomes apparent that “we can only make sense of what things are by contrasting them to what they are not,”  (Carey, Russell & Walther, 2009). 

To use this framework in Layne’s Tim Tam story, it’s less about the gesture of handing out chocolate and more about what they could be doing. A Tim Tam is not a solution to a problem (unless hungry), it’s the start of a conversation to solve it. Deconstructing Layne’s value for authenticity, I realised that I’d like every action in my professional and personal life to convey a similar message of support, honesty and accountability.

Furthermore, from what I’ve learned in BCM313 I’ve started to actively apply outside witnessing to all the songs I review and artists I interview, validating their identity claims and allowing them to share stories through the lens of their most important values. While this was something I was mindful of in the past, Layne’s statement about following gifts up with genuine authenticity highlighted the main goal of AUD’$ and my professional life.

Working in the music industry with often disenfranchised and underrepresented groups, I have the responsibility and privilege of accurately representing the identity and values of those artists. Layne recognises that community support must extend further than the initial gift but to action that truly benefits the community. This is becoming more common with the prominence of social activism among younger generations and at AUD’$ and many other publications, it’s an essential priority and value of our brand.

Frank Tremain.

Narrative Reflection

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Re-membering: The commonly used therapeutic practice that provides “opportunities for people to re-engage with experiences of their life which would otherwise remain neglected.” (Russell & Carey, 2000).

For the past year and a half I have been working with AUD’$, a Hip-hop music publication based in Melbourne, Australia. Reflecting back on when I first started, it was a massive change to the journalistic work that I was used to producing. At the time, I was starting my second year studying a Bachelor of Journalism and a Bachelor of Communications & Media, so I felt as though I had this pre-conceived, stagnant and somewhat outdated and vague understanding of journalism.

Working with the small team at AUD’$, I began to develop a better understanding of my writing and the nuanced future and flexibility of journalism in the Australian music industry. While this isn’t the main change I’ll be detailing in this narrative reflection, I think it’s important to note that this was the first time I noticed the difference between what I was told working in journalism was like to what it actually entailed.

Prior to spending nine weeks stuck inside my house for lockdown, I was able to visit the AUD’$ team at our studio and office space in Melbourne. On my first day physically working alongside them, we started with a morning debrief where we outline our individual and group objectives for the day/week, say something we’re grateful for or that we recently learnt, and check on everyone’s mental health and personal life. Before this, all of the journalistic work I had done was online and, although we compromised with Zoom meetings, texts and calls, there lacked that physically energy you get when face to face. Starting my morning of work like this really aligned with my constant to-do lists and monthly planners, but also made time and space to talk about important topics like mental health which is something I forget to check on when working independently. Experiencing that change from isolated and independent online work to more interpersonal and physical work is the main change that I’d like to connect to narrative self-development in relation to my professional values.

Michael White’s theory of the ‘absent but implicit’ refers to the meaning we take from experiences, through the comparison and contrast of previous experiences (Carey, 2000). This approach to narrative storytelling allows individuals to reflect on the stories we retell to uncover its deeper and unspoken personal value and meaning. Instead of focusing on the problems, failures or pain of an experience, individuals are able to enter a gateway to the realm of experience where “people’s most cherished hopes, aspirations, and commitments live and breathe,” (Freedman, 2020).

Through this lens of narrative storytelling thinking, I can understand that I value the flexibility that working by distance provides me, however, physically interacting with co-workers and clients is an invaluable experience that cannot be replicated online. Another value that I think I highlighted in my story is the importance of community and family building in a workplace. AUD’$ is a relatively small team so it’s easier to build this rapport, but it’s still something I value highly. Allocating time to interact as friends instead of co-workers and providing a platform to discuss our personal well-being created a welcoming, motivating and comfortable environment for me to work in, and hopefully will continue to do so for years to come.

Reflecting back, I can now acknowledge a time when I demonstrated the importance of these values to me in a professional setting. About two months ago, I received a job offer from one of the biggest companies within my field. The reason I chose to decline the role was because I value the experiences I’ve had at AUD’$ and despite the pros to accepting this job, it didn’t align with my professional values.

The process of self-reflection through Michael White’s work has enabled me to understand the importance of storytelling in learning the discussed and implied values of ourselves and others. In regards to my future of work, having an enriched understanding of my professional values has provided me with a clearer roadmap to my career and has proved vital in achieving a deepened sense of professional identity and a balance between a healthy mental well-being and a rewarding and fulfilling career (Carey, 2002).

Frank Tremain.

References:

The Only Skill You’ll Ever Need

Frank TremainLeave a comment

“My best skill was that I was coachable, I was a sponge and aggressive to learn.” – Michael Jordan.

For those unfamiliar, my name is Frank Tremain and I’m currently studying a Bachelor of Communications and Media. By the end of the semester, I will graduate with my degree and major in Journalism and minor in Digital and Social Media.

Throughout my tertiary education, I have worked in the Australian music industry as a writer, curator and social media manager for AUD’$. There are countless necessary and invaluable skills I’ve learnt throughout my career but the most important one is the skill to consistently adapt, improve and learn.

Possessing the skill of being ‘coachable’ has allowed me to take on new challenges, learn and improve on the go and create opportunities for myself that I initially didn’t think I deserved or could do. What I’ve found most beneficial though, is that this skill has given me an advantage over my competition and it’s inspired by a quote from former MLB star, Derek Jeter:

“There may be people who have more talent than you, but there’s no excuse for anyone to work harder than you do – and I believe that.”

The skill of being coachable demonstrates an unwavering obsession with learning that I think is one of the most important values in life. We always hear that we never stop learning, and while this is true, it doesn’t mean we’re always willing to learn. By willing to learn and wanting to improve, I don’t see a ceiling to my ideas or aspirations, and that’s exciting.

As I now begin to venture into the workforce without university next year, I will continue to place this skill at the forefront of my arsenal.

PSA. My blogs won’t usually have this many sports references/quotes. For that, follow Jed.

Frank Tremain.