As we step into 2025, I find it valuable to cast my mind back. Reflecting on what has been and gone helps us decipher what is truly important in our journey ahead.
During some much-needed downtime over the Christmas break, I began to think about the journey that Active Essex has embarked upon over the past 12 months, particularly focusing on our team’s learning experiences.
In 2024, we made a conscious effort to spend time reflecting, learning, and challenging ourselves, ensuring we laid the best foundations for fostering a robust learning culture across the team.
The metaphor I feel we’re trying to achieve is that of a rock-climbing centre. Each climbing hold represents different career pathways—side steps, back steps, or forward moves. The wall itself symbolises a culture of curiosity and bravery. The varying levels of experience highlight our diverse skill sets, offering continuous learning opportunities for all. Within this metaphor, team members support each other with harnesses and ropes, coaches help individuals realise their potential, and small groups work together to make progress. When you fall, and everyone will fall, you are caught by the team. The common shared purpose is not for everyone to reach the summit, but for everyone to progress up or along the climbing wall at their own speed, enjoying the teamwork, and the view below.
We have made significant strides by bringing together a small, committed team called “The Learning Huddle,” who has been instrumental in shaping our learning journey and areas of focus. It has helped deliver structured away days that promote reflection, collaboration, and learning in a safe and trusting environment. We have created a comprehensive learning and development guide that ensures a systematic approach to enhancing the team’s skills, knowledge, and competencies, resulting in better performance and culture.
The way we interact as a team has hugely changed over the past 12 months, whether that be online or face-to-face, but particularly at full team meetings. We are aware that everyone learns and wants to contribute in different ways, so we have made conscious efforts to ensure the environment in which we meet, allows everyone to feel brave, have their say, and learn in their own way. From setting the tone with a welcome task and a mixture of learning probes, to the right space for everyone and various speakers/voices heard, it’s been a really positive transition where I have seen a real difference in the ‘show up’ to our meetings.
New Year’s resolutions are notoriously difficult to sustain, so this year I’m taking a different approach—one that builds on the strong learning foundations we’ve already created and uses them as a catalyst for continuous development as we enter another exciting new chapter for Active Essex.
