Key insights 

1. The Dual Identity Challenge: Organizer vs. Learner

Arun discovered a fundamental tension when running the study group: he was both the organizer (whom participants looked to for direction) and a learner (wanting to learn alongside others). This dual identity created confusion about expectations and leadership. His key learning was that having a co-facilitator would have helped separate these roles, allowing him to be more vulnerable as a learner while maintaining the organizational structure the group needed.

2. The Power of Explicit Value Propositions

One of Arun's biggest lessons was the importance of clearly articulating what participants would gain from the study group. While the broad goal of "learning journey management" brought people in initially, the lack of specific outcomes led to declining attendance. For future study groups, he emphasizes the need to define concrete takeaways upfront so participants understand exactly what they'll achieve by the end.

3. Cultural Dynamics Shape Learning Expectations

Arun observed how cultural perspectives influenced participation. In some cultures, the person who creates a group is automatically seen as the teacher and expert, not a fellow learner. Additionally, the word "presentations" created anxiety even in a safe space, as participants felt pressure to be experts on topics they were just learning about. This cultural sensitivity is crucial when designing any collaborative learning experience.

4. Psychological Safety Transfers to Client Work

The study group taught Arun valuable lessons about psychological safety that he now applies in Service Design projects. He learned that people don't resist change—they resist how they're being asked to change. When working with stakeholders, he now explicitly clarifies his different roles (learner, expert, facilitator, change agent) and ensures teams understand how their input will be used, especially when sharing pain points with leadership. This transparency builds trust and encourages honest participation.

5. Study Groups Work Best for Emerging Topics

Arun identified that study groups are most valuable for exploratory, newly evolving topics that lack established courses, books, or thought leaders—like AI integration with Strategic Foresight, career transitions, or new methodologies like journey management. They provide a low-stakes space for experimentation and collect

Transcript of the webinar

## Teaser

**Arun:** Collective learning opens up new ways of discussions and perspectives. 

Everyone wasn't expert. Everyone was a beginner. 

So you have this two personas. One is the organizer and facilitator of the group, and second is the learner. And what really happened was. There was a conflict between these two personas.

Even though this was a study group and it was a safe space. I think the word "presentations" really made people a little anxious.

There is a gap in the journey management universe in terms of listening to actual stories of practitioners.

I had to literally say no to quite a number of people because I intentionally wanted to keep the group small.

I think the key insight for me: 

People don't resist the change. They resist the way they're being asked to change. 

## Introduction to Today's Topic and Guests

**Daniele:** Let me introduce you to the topic of today and to the lovely guests that we have for today. We are here for the topic of learnings from Prototyping, a Journey Management Study Group with the one and the only. Arun, Joseph Martin. This is really your occasion to learn how you can create strong group dynamics and how you can create your own study group that can help you in your Service Design, or design, career in general. 

## Meet Arun: A Lighthouse in Service Design

**Daniele:** Arun is a Service Design enthusiast. You will see that, and also a co-founder of the Service Design book club community. Arun is working at the moment as a senior service designer with Sun Life, a leading Canadian financial service company.

Earlier Arun had worked in global organizations like IBM and Ernst and Young and so on. But one thing that's is very special about Arun, he's one of those lighthouses in the Service Design community. He's someone that people look up to for directions. He's really one person that has helped dozens and dozens of individuals know how to, survive in the high seas of Service Design.

So it's my pleasure to welcome you on the stage, Arun. Welcome, Arun. 

**Arun:** Thank you so much Daniele for the wonderful introduction.

It is just lovely to hear your words. And I would echo the same. I would say you are one of the leading lighthouses of the Service Design community. And thank you once again for the wonderful opportunity and the invite to share my learnings from the study group. 

**Daniele:** Thank you so much for joining and so we'll get right into it.

## Arun's Journey Management Study Group

**Daniele:** Can you tell us a little bit about this study group, about journey management? How did it start? Why did it start? What is the cryptic thing that happens in this session, in these sessions? 

**Arun:** Definitely Daniele. So before I get into the what and the how of the group, and I'll just give a little more context in terms of what was the idea or the spark that led me to the creation of this group? So a few of you on this call may know that last year, I was not working, I was looking for job opportunities, and as I was applying for job opportunities, I was, I realized that I had some extra time on my calendar.

And I wanted to learn about journey management. So I was directed to few documentation sites of few journey management tools tool companies. And I read the documentation and I found it a little hard to follow and understand because my familiarity with the topic was very basic. So I realized perhaps can I create a group where.

I have few members joining in and more or less everyone's at the same level in terms of journey management. You're talking new to Journey Management. We could all do research on specific journey management topics and then present and learn from each other, so that was a spark that led to the creation of the Journey Management Study Group.

Now, the Journey Management group. Had two versions. Version one oh was this closed group where we had around nine to 11 people from US and Canada, where we used to meet biweekly from July to October of 2024. And we had the attendees present different journey management topics, for 30 minutes so that people could learn.

So that's version 1.2. And now. We have version two, two where that closed version is closed and it's more of a community event where I host monthly events and I bring in a journey management practitioner who speaks on a topic for 15 minutes. And then we have q and a for remaining 15 minutes. It's recorded and shared with the, with all that, and indeed we put that in a Google folder.

So that's version 2.2. So for the purposes of today's conversation, I would be specifically focusing on version 1.2, which was. My, which is a close group, my learnings around that. And yeah. So that's what I would be discussing. I'll not get into specifics. Daniele, I'm sure you'd be bri with a lot of questions, so I'm happy to answer them all.

Yeah. 

**Daniele:** Already curious about three. Oh, what would B 3.0? 

**Arun:** It's two. Do it's too early. I'm. The reason why I'm not thinking about version 3.0 is like at some point after my field that like even version 2.0 is taking a little bit of time and capacity. So I'm just thinking, okay, maybe let's roll with version 2.0 as much as I can and then see if there's a need for me to move to version 3.0.

**Daniele:** Let's come a little bit back to this version one. That's, oh you're a brilliant man, so I know you can learn by yourself. And i'm curious, why make the decision to say, I'm gonna do this learning bit in a study group and it'll have to organize stuff that this happens. Instead of taking a book, reading a po reading something, doing a course by yourself, why that decision of going for study boot format?

**Arun:** Sure. 

## Challenges and Learnings from the Study Group

**Arun:** Daniele, that's a great question. So there, there's this learning, in, in learning has two perspectives according to me. One is you're an individual learner, and second is a group leader, group learner. So some people prefer to learn individually, like they, they learn, they understand, they get feedback, and they improve the mastery.

And the second is like learning in a group. So this was a totally new topic to me. Point number one. Point number two, as much as I am of an individual learner where I can learn from courses and books, since I couldn't find the relevant learning content, it was a little bit of a struggle for me and the content I had, the content I had access to, I mean without me without paying for anything, was more around journey management written from.

The perspective of tools and not from the practice perspective. And I realized that if, so I had two options. One was create a study group with experience journey management practitioners where you know, they could come and share their knowledge and wisdom. That was option one. Option two was like create a study group with fellow learners or fellow peers who are probably in.

Who are in the same bandwidth or mental space as me. And the reason I chose option two was one, people would be more open to learning and asking questions and show their vulnerability compared to option one, where people are more, they're more experts and for them time is money. And not everyone wants to share their knowledge of wisdom for free.

So just to summarize, I chose this group because. Collective learning opens up new ways of discussions and perspectives. And that's the reason I ended up creating this study group. And when I created, it was more like, okay, let's meet, let's learn. And that's it. I never realized that it would evolve into version two, two.

Yeah. So it was just a Prototype, 

**Daniele:** I'd be curious about the specifics. You said it's a, it was a 30 minute session from every two weeks. How did you decide or manage who comes with what topic? So I imagine there is some sort of calendar or way of managing who comes with what, how did you manage these aspects of the study group?

Because you were not the one coming and saying. Now I am the master teacher and you guys learn, but you were in, in a bit of a different format. So how did you manage that format? 

**Arun:** Great question, Daniele. Before I answer I'm gonna share two perspectives. One is what worked and the second is what I learned.

I think the second perspective is gonna be more useful for the attendees because if you are going to start a study group of some sort, I think that that part is gonna be more important. So I'm gonna touch on two perspectives. The first is like, how did I go about doing it? So the first session we all met, we did some collective brainstorming in terms of what are the topics we wanted to learn, and that was on a Canva whiteboard.

And then we all voted on what. Topics we wanted to learn. And when we say the topics, like we, everyone wasn't expert. Everyone was a beginner. So everyone put their topics, what they really wanted to learn, but we had no a clear learning pathway in terms of how do we get to that.

But that was a start. And then. Once we had these topics prioritized, I would say it was a little bit tough getting everyone, or at least 80% of the group to present, because as I mentioned, like probably I was the only person was not working. So had more time on my calendar. Everyone else was working full time, nine to five, and these presentation sessions were scheduled on a 6:00 PM Eastern on a weekday.

So by the time you. Get to your evening, you, your energy is totally, you're totally exhausted and you wouldn't have time for, to make an additional presentation, right? So I had to reach out to individually, to a certain participants check for the availability and also create that safe space so then they could present.

And they were also a little hesitant because they were also new to the topic. So they were not really sure okay. How polished the presentations could be, should be. So I said it's a safe space. You could just. Share what you want. Just have q and a and that's it. And I think for the first couple of sessions we recorded and then we decided we, that we are not recording it so that people feel more comfortable, so that was how this presentations were structured. As I mentioned, I'm just, I wanted to share my perspectives on what I learned. And I think the biggest takeaway for me was that. There was a conflict in terms of my identity for the group, right? So I created a group which meant that I was a organizer and I, there was another identity, which was I wanted to learn from others, right?

So you have this two personas. One is the organizer and facilitator of the group, and second is the learner. And what really happened was. There was a conflict between these two personas because the group was looking up to me as a facilitator to guide these discussions, whereas I was more looking to the group to collectively learn.

So there was a little bit of a tension between these two personas, like me being the facilitator and. The learner, and I think the key learning was for me was probably I should have had a co-facilitator so that I could have been more vulnerable in terms of saying that it, as I'm organizing the group, but at the same time I'm going to be a learner, so how could we all collectively learn?

That was point, that was my first learning. The second learning was also, I was expecting everyone to do a presentation for 30 minutes. Because that's how I would like to learn, but I realized that. Different members in the group had different ways of learning. Like some people would prefer to read, some people would prefer to have a discussion.

So I did not really factor that. So my second learning is like maybe I should have done a better job of understanding the learning needs of everyone in the group, and then probably designed a learning style that ac that could have accommodated everyone's learning styles rather than me saying that, okay, let's have a presentation biweekly for 30 minutes.

## Group Dynamics and Psychological Safety

**Daniele:** It's it's impressive to me. This project has the same quality than any Service Design project, where often it's not into the logistics that lies the devil, but it's in the social dynamics, the group dynamics, how people make the commitments, is the commitment clear, is the commitment on clear, the expectation management and all of that.

So I imagine with a group like that. It was any group, there are ups and downs. There are moments where people are very engaged, moments where people are less engaged. And I'd be curious to hear from your side, what did you learn about, how to handle a group dynamic of a learning group, which is very different.

From what we are used to do as workshop facilitators where it's about, generat generating ideas, getting knowledge from people here, it's about making a moment where everybody learns. Did you do some learn? Do you have some precious learnings to share around the group dynamics? Maybe? 

**Arun:** Oh, and you definitely, Daniella.

I think the key learning for me was. At the start of the group, we had this broad statement that we wanted to learn about journey management. So that's why everyone said, okay, let's learn, let's, I'm interested in learning, so I'm gonna join this group. After the first couple of sessions, I saw that the number of attendees attending these presentations, the number dipped.

And initially I thought, oh, perhaps, attendees are busy, they have a nine to five job. They don't have the time. They have, they don't have the energy to attend these presentations. So that's why, they are dropping off or not join me. But on deeper introspection, I realized that.

I did not do a good job of articulating the value proposition of the study group. So as I mentioned, yes, we are here to learn journey management. Okay, that is good. But at the end of this four month study group, what were the specific object user outcomes? And I did not do a good job of framing that. That was probably because I was new to the topic and the participants were looking up to me to give that vision.

And I think I did not really I could have improved on that, so that was one the value proposition was not clear. Then. I also felt that like this group was more like a systems in a way where this group is a system. And I am the, I'm the main stakeholder in that system and I was setting the rules on how this system should behave.

And I, what was interesting was I noticed a reinforcing loop in this system's behavior. So the behavior was, presentations were happening. There was a low turnout, and then again, presentations were happening. And again, there was a low turnout. So what happened was that loop was just going over and over again, and I did not take any steps to correct that loop because at some point of time what really happened was people were busy and, the number of participants really dropped.

So if I were to revisit that loop, what I would do is. At the end of each session, I would probably start a new feedback loop with all the attendees saying that, okay, what's stopping you from participating in these sessions and how could this help you? So that was one of my biggest takeaways for me.

As much as I would like to say good things about my group, I'm also trying to share my learning so that, if anyone wants to create a new group, I hope these learnings would help you. So that's why I'm focusing more on the learnings rather than just saying good things about my group.

**Daniele:** And you wouldn't be here if that group didn't have a. Success and and I think it was a group that, that has worked quite well, especially because there is even a V two now and a V three coming up. And so definitely I appreciate the fact that you had the lights on what we can learn from your experiments.

I'd be also interested to hear from you, so obviously. Whenever we learn something from one context, we can then transfer it to another context. So I'm sure there is things that you learn from the group dynamics of the learning group where then you said, oh, that's quite good to know for the next time I'm gonna handle a group of stakeholders or a group of colleagues.

How has that changed your way of working? 

## Practical Applications and Broader Impacts

**Daniele:** Then the work life and not just in learning life. 

**Arun:** Definitely. Dan, a great question. Before I answer that question, I also just wanted to share one more key learning that really I was able to realize it only later and now as I mentioned in a group, we had around eight to 10 people and I think 90% of a group were people of color.

And. Now the group in this group, since I organized, or since I started the group, the attendees perceived that I was an expert and I knew the answers. And I would probably give a structure, but deep inside, even I'm a learner. That's why I created the group. Now what I realized that from a cultural perspective, especially when you're working with especially when we are coming from certain geographic countries, someone who creates the group is perceived as a teacher and others are perceived as students.

In my study group, everyone started, or everyone started perceiving me as the teacher. Whereas on the other side, I was actually a I, I am actually a learner now. I created the group, so I wanted to learn from others, but the people started seeming as a teacher and I felt that there was a little bit of the tension.

That was point number one. The point number two was also I think my request for presentations. Was probably seen as okay, we have to be an expert to do the presentations. Even though this was a study group and it was a safe space. I think the word presentations. Really made people a little anxious saying that, okay, I am new to this topic.

I'm not an expert, but now Arun is asking me to do a presentation on a topic that I'm not familiar with. That also probably could have, impacted the load turnout on those meetings because, oh, if I joined this meeting, maybe, Arun's gonna call out my name. For the next presentation, so probably there was a little bit of that cultural sensitivity.

Sensitivity there, which I was not aware of and I couldn't, catch at that moment. So Daniele, to answer your questions in terms of how did this manifest my learnings to my Service Design project, I think a couple of things stood out. One is making the value exchange relevant. So just going back to my early example of, okay, in the study group, there was this broad vision of, okay, let's learn journey management.

But when you're working with Service Design stakeholders, one has to be very explicit. Okay, you have to be very clear in terms of why is it that you want to run a workshop. What are the outcomes, right? So I've been a little more clear in terms of, okay, how this outcomes is gonna help a specific stakeholder.

So that's my first learning. The second is also that psychological safety, because that's going to determine what you learn. I'll give you an example. A service designer is probably a service designer, wears multiple hats, right? You could be a learner. Because you're doing research, you wanna understand your customer's pain points.

You could be an expert because Service Design, process of tools, right? Then third, you could be a facilitator trying to bring different teams together. Fourth, you could be a change expert where you're trying to change or move, help moves to help move, help teams move to a transmitter way of working.

Now based on. How you are perceived, the teams will accordingly follow you. If I come across as an expert that, okay, I know service blueprinting this thing, then teams defer to you for that advice. And now, and I'll give you one more example. So let's take the hat of a learner. So when I say learner, let's say I'm doing research with an internal team, trying to understand the pain points that internal users have with the tool.

I understand their pain points. I summarize and I go back to the leadership team and say that, okay, this tool has a, B, c pain points. Now what happens is the internal users I spoke to. Now they are a little worried because now they feel that like I've taken their team's name and saying that, these are some pain points.

And now again, if I go to the same team for a second round of research, I think they would probably not trust me because earlier I had listened to the pain points. I had taken the pain points and shared with the leadership team, and another leadership team feels that okay, this team could be responsible for the pain points.

So a potential solution in terms of creating psychological safety set. I could have gone to that earlier team research the internal team and said that I am collecting pain points. No way. The names of individual part individual team members would be shared with the leadership team. It is, no, it's not a problem with the people or the team.

It's probably a process or a systems issue. How can we go about. Solving it. So having that conversation upfront gives the psychological safety that, okay, our here is to help solve pain points and not audit my team or the processes in a way that, that's traced back.

Because what I've seen Daniele in big organizations is that why teams are hesitant to share the thoughts is that they don't want. Their names to go up to the leadership team because for various reasons. So just to summarize, creating that psychological safety is something that I'm still working on.

But I think that's one key learning I've got from running this version one word of the group. 

**Daniele:** Yeah. I really appreciate this aspect of the role setting and especially how the change of role, from the guy who is listening. Then the goal, the guy who is advising to the leadership and feel, like a mask reveal to people.

And I think this exercise, of saying very clearly, these are the two masks that I have and today I'm playing with that one with you guys, but later I'm gonna play with that one. So these are the two that I have. And I think that's a very brilliant way. To ensure that people understand like now we are in this setting where I'm the idiot in the room who is learning, but then that idiot in the room will be the one that will be listened to.

By maybe a management team. Yeah. And the summary of the idiot will then be used. And so I think that's a very smart way to reveal already the different roles and and I think that's a beautiful thing, and that's the thing that we should do more and more. I think there is a switch of role also.

When am I switching roles? I see that also as a, as I'm. In mentoring and coaching, where sometimes I say to my students and learners, I say, okay, now you're asking me a question as a mentor, not as a coach. So shall I, shall we switch the conversation to mentor? It's a very different thing you're asking me for.

You're not asking me to help you find out the answers. And so in this. Which of role is something that we should maybe be a bit more, creating a bit of rituals around it, so that people see the transitions. That's a beautiful element. 

**Arun:** Yeah. Thank you so much. And if you can just add one more point.

I think the key insight for me, what I realized is people don't resist the change. They resist the way they're being asked to change. So just to give you an example, I could host a journey mapping workshop with some personas and future state artifacts with an IT team, but IT teams are, they always look at information in a very concrete way.

So for them, journey maps and personas are a little abstract and fluffy. So perhaps, they don't give much value to it, right? So what are the solutions? What are the opport ways to have a stronger engagement with them? Perhaps maybe we could have a journey mapping workshop where they come in and map the systems architecture or the technical architecture.

Bringing their value into that workshop would be a greater way. To increase the engagement. Often as designers, we have our own set of artifacts and say, okay, this is how things ought to be. But every technical architect, they have their own ways of visualizing information, and the key is how can we bring them together?

So I think the key is when we ask people to say, okay, you have to attend my workshop, and then look at the artifacts I've created. People may. People may not be on, people may not be on board, but the moment we say, this is how we could co-create, I think change is gonna happen a little more fast.

So 

**Daniele:** My last question to you before we get to the nitty gritty of the community will be. Who do you think will benefit of creating similar study groups, and what is maybe your one tip that you will give to someone who says, that sounds interesting.

Now this is one tip that I can use tomorrow to start it. 

**Arun:** Sure. Daniele, that's a great question. I would say study group would be suited for topics. That's more exploratory and newly evolving, right? For example, we see a lot of discussion around ai, integration of AI into workflows, right? I would say the study work group is a place where you can do experimentation or prototyping on a low, I would say on a low scale.

A couple of topics could be like maybe how can Strategic Foresight and AI work together because foresight is trying to identify the potential signals and right. And can AI tools be a part of that? The second could be AI and I would say strategy, no. There are other topics which I could share.

One is someone who wants to improve their facilitation practice, right? Someone who wants to be a good facilitator, how can they improve? Or someone who wants to probably, let's say someone is a, individual contributor and wants to move into a manager. So maybe, this individual contributor can reach out to his network and say, Hey are there any, not on a, or not on through a LinkedIn post, maybe they reach out individually and say, Hey I see that you're a manager.

And he reaches out to his network, reaches and maybe. Contacts, three or four managers, and then they could create a small study group and say, okay, I'm trying to transition from engineer contributor to a manager. So can we have a study group in terms of how do we figure that transition pathway, so I would say study group is meant for topics that do not have any online courses or books, or too many recognized thought leaders.

**Daniele:** You so much. So I'm excited to hear your questions.

## Audience Q&A and Final Thoughts

**Leili:** Hi. 

**Arun:** Hello. 

**Leili:** Thank you all for running monthly event. Of studying groups because I benefited a lot from this group study group. But I'm cur curious to ask you that, have you ever had this concern of documenting this knowledge that are reproduced in the sessions, especially in this study groups, the version two, two, iib.

Because when I attended to them, I realized that different experiences that are unique are shared between people or maybe some question and answers. Yeah. 

**Arun:** Yeah. Just wanted to understand your question. So your question has the version two point of the group. Every speaker brings in a different level of expertise and sometimes.

Be it may not be super useful for the participants. Will that, is that a question? 

**Leili:** No. No. It was super useful. But I mean that, do you have this concern to like the document, the knowledge that were produced from that sessions after the decisions every sessions? 

**Arun:** So my, the reason I.

W created this group was like, everyone should have quick and easy access to knowledge, irrespective of where, wherever they are, so that's why, the sessions are being recorded. And even before every session I ask the speaker if they are comfortable in having those sessions recorded.

And then I share that in a Google folder. And, anyone can access it. And so that is with the consent of the speaker. And what I see is that there is a gap in the journey management universe in terms of listening to actual stories of practitioners. And that's what this version 2.2 of the group is aiming to fill in at least to some extent.

Yeah. After the. Recordings are being shared with the attendees. Definitely, I'm hoping a lot of people find some value, but outside of that, I really don't know how that knowledge is consumed or shared in from shared with other people or how they perceive it.

Thank you for the question.

**Lita:** So you were mentioning, you found that it would be important to articulate the value proposition of the study group and what are the expected outcomes and as you're asking, what might hinder you or hinder, me from starting a study group, that was the first thing that came to mind is how would I articulate the value proposition as a learner as well.

I would. I think I would feel a little bit intimidated by that. So yeah.

**Arun:** Yeah. Thank you. And I forgot to introduce Lita. So Lita was one of the few lucky people in the group. I don't know. So in, in the study group. So thank you for joining. So I hope whatever I've shared is a honest representation of what's happened in the group.

Yeah.

**Daniele:** Okay. And I'm curious on your side, Arun what would be an interesting alternative to study groups? For now we, we've worked with that in, with the lens of, the study group that you organized and the learnings of that study group. But obviously we know from Service Design, always we say this, it's, we should not see everything from one tool, particularly because other, otherwise everything then starts to be a nail, if we just see the hammer.

What are other alternatives does you see and that maybe you have experienced that are interesting ways to learn? Maybe not alone maybe in group or also, sure 

**Arun:** Daniele. I would say it, it depends upon the most fundamental question is like, what are you trying to learn in journey management, and why is that relevant to your current role?

Because when I started a study group I was not working. So for me it was learning about journey management. There was nothing, there was no kind of an. Motivation to say that, okay, I'm going, if I'm gonna learn this is how I'm gonna apply to my work project next week. So it was more of an exploratory learning.

But now if I were to revisit, I would ask this question like, what is it that I want to learn specifically for journey management? Because I have some little more, better knowledge about journey management. Why is it, and why is it I want to learn? So perhaps what I would do is I would probably start writing a blog post on a Medium article saying that in the past two years, this is what my learning journey in journey management has been.

This is where I feel still they could, the gaps are. And I need to get some answers clarified. So is anyone up for a kind of a virtual coffee chat or some sort of an email conversation? So I would probably start at a very low scale approach and then take it. That could be another alternative to the study group.

If I were to go back in 2024 and, restart.

**Guest two:** Thanks I it's always great to hear from you. I've got two curiosities one's on journey management specifically, and the second is on more about, the practicalities of running a study group.

I might go straight to the study group question. I'm gonna ask you about 2.0 because that's the one I know well. How have you found people to be when you've approached them to present at the study group? I know you mentioned that, 1.0 could be a little bit challenging but.

Speaking about 2.0 are people just willing to share their time and experience when you just reach out to them? Like you, you must have had some success there. And do you wanna share your learnings around that process? 

**Arun:** Sure. I so the presenters who are part of the version 2.2, they're part of my LinkedIn network.

They know that I'm running this Journey Management group and I have interacted with them in some capacity few years ago, and I think my past experience running the Service Design book club events, I think they've seen that. So when I reach out to them and say, Hey, would you like to be a guest speaker?

I think. I've got a send person, a success rate except for one person who's initially said yes, and then it was, I think later that person declined. So I think the key is two things. One is they trust me the second I leave it up to them to decide what is it they want to present. All I say is we are looking for a 15 minute presentation or talk where you bring in your view of a specific journey management topic.

That's it. So I just give that broad structure and except for one speaker who said, okay, can we have a session to discuss on the potential topic for presentation for all of the speakers. They just gimme a topic and an overview probably a few weeks about the presentation and that's it.

And I trust them. I trust their competence in what they're presenting, and that's how version 2, 2 2 is running so far to, yeah. I, that answers your question.

**Daniele:** There is one question which asks, how do you put the group together in the first place? Was the diversity of professional backgrounds, criteria, or mainly the level of seniority? 

**Arun:** My short answer was when I was trying to put the study group, I didn't have any criteria in mind because I was totally new to the world of journey management.

So I was in no way to determine like, who is a senior, who's an expert, so I just put out a LinkedIn post saying that I'm looking to create a study group and had many people reach out and. I had to literally say no to quite a number of people because I intentionally wanted to keep the group small.

The only consideration I was looking at was like, are these people in the same time zone? So that becomes easier for us to meet. And just to give you the kind of the composition of the group. I think in a group of around 10 to 12 people, I think the 80 percentage of the group was a combination of service designers, UX researchers, and UX designers.

So they were more comfortable with journey mapping and design thinking, so it was a little more easier to talk about journey management. We had few, couple of participants who would not have a design background, but I think. Their participation was also limited. Yeah. Just to summarize, I'd not really look at the diversity of the participants in advance.

I, all I was looking for is someone I was looking for people, who wanted to learn journey management. And we are all based in the same time zone. Yeah. 

**Daniele:** One in the chat is, I find study groups extremely helpful. But don't have a network you mentioned and of group and of course a group will all needs to benefit.

So that poses the difficulty of who will provide some guidance. So the question may be behind that statement is, how do I find people when I don't have the network and how do I ensure that there is that everybody benefits in that group. 

**Arun:** The short answer is tag Daniele in the LinkedIn post with an ask.

And he will do the magic. That's a short answer. I would say if for some reason you feel that you don't have the network perhaps reach out to a Service Design Network community in your geographical area and say that. I want to learn something or I want to create a group on this topic.

Do we know anyone else who might be interested? That's the best way to get started. The second, as I mentioned, is, put out a LinkedIn post saying that I'm looking to create a, study group. I'm looking for people who want, who would like to join me. Now I think the key here is you have to be really specific in terms of whether you want this to be a virtual group or a in-person group.

When you have a virtual group, you get more people joining you from different parts of the world, but then there's a high possibility that you wouldn't have an active engagement because they have other priorities. Versus if you're having an in-person study group, let's say in your city every two weeks, you meet at a coffee shop like on a Friday or a Thursday for two hours I think you get a little more closer collaboration.

And that, I think could be a great starting point. And of course, you could start on a topic and if you feel that within two weeks or three weeks, if you're not getting value. Feel free to pre pivot to a one-on-one chat or maybe, some other format of learning that really works. So yeah.

So there are different approaches. The third, as I mentioned, is, reach out to Service Design community leaders like Daniele who knows a lot of people around the world. So perhaps based on where you are in the world, Daniele knows one or two people. He can make that interaction and that.

A person could probably open more doors for you 

**Daniele:** and without a joke. If you are interested to create a study group, or turn LinkedIn message. And I'll add you in one of the many land newsletters that we can find. And then we'll advertise it for sure. But as I think as you say Arun, I think the ask needs to be very clear so that people can say yes to easily.

Being already clear on this is the format, this is the time, this is how much, how many times we, we meet so that it's, you remove all the questions and it's just yes, I want to part. And I think that works quite brilliantly. We have another question and I'm looking at the time, so we'll try to keep it 

**Arun:** short.

No worries. Generally, like I can stay back for additional five to 10 minutes if that's needed. Yeah, no worries. 

**Daniele:** So how did you take into account to multicultural dimension of any type in your study group? 

**Arun:** Sure. I know multicultural dimensions is it's a very broad word, but what I could try to answer is that as I mentioned, we had quite a number of people of color in our group and and so I had a fair understanding in terms of like how they would respond.

So there's a big culture shift, right? If you're coming from different geographies presentations are probably seen the best way to learn. And in other parts of the world, presentations mean that you are an expert. So what I did was, at the start of the study group, I created a LinkedIn group chat.

Where I invited all the members of the group and we used to have this asynchronous communication saying that, okay, this is what we would like to do in the next few weeks. Whoever is interested can volunteer. So to answer your question, I think I made sure that there was an asynchronous form of communication to accommodate everyone's needs, and I respected everyone's time.

So if people were not responding. I did not really follow up with them because I knew that they had a life outside the study group. So I just made sure that I respected that safe space and that's how, I went about hosting this study group. Yeah. 

**Daniele:** A big thank you to you, Arun. Please give a tsunami of love and appreciation in the chat for Arun. Have a lovely rest of the day wherever you are, and it was a pleasure to meet you.

Have a lovely time, and thanks you again, Arun! 

**Arun:** Thank you Daniele, for leading such a wonderful conversation. And thank you attendees for asking amazing questions.