FTF258: From Surgeon to Facilitator: Dr Liz O'Riordan's First Workshop

In this episode of First Time Facilitator, I chat with Dr Liz O'Riordan about her leap from the operating theatre to the workshop room. 

After being diagnosed with cancer and leaving surgery, Liz turned to speaking, writing, and now — facilitation. With only days to prepare, she discovered my book The 2-Hour Workshop Blueprint, raided her kitchen cupboards for props, and built a session that participants called “brilliant — don’t change a thing.”

We unpack how she:

• Transformed complex cancer science into playful, prop-based learning (think Jenga and cupcakes 🍰).
• Used a simple structure to design a two-hour workshop in 72 hours.
• Sent pre-session videos that warmed up the room before she arrived.
• Managed nerves, energy, and the “silent moments” during activities.
• Built her social media presence to reach thousands with her message.

🎯 If you’re new to facilitation, or you’ve ever thought, “Where do I even start?”, Liz’s story will inspire you to pick a date, lower the bar, and just run the workshop.

👉 Subscribe to First Time Facilitator for more stories, strategies, and behind-the-scenes lessons on designing sessions that land.

🔗 Connect with Dr Liz O'Riordan on Instagram and LinkedIn 

If you're nodding along to today's First Time Facilitator episode, you're going to love my written companion: Work Fame — a weekly Spublication designed to help you stand out in your work, build your reputation, and get the opportunities others don’t.

📝 Subscribe for free at work.fa.me 

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Transcript

 I'm bringing back the first time facilitated podcast for this epic conversation. There's reasons why I bring back the show from time to time and to talk to people like today's incredible guest. Her name is Dr.

Liz o Ridden, and she's a surgeon who swaps the scalpel for the stage. So Liz is a speaker, author, and former consultant breast surgeon who has faced. Breast cancer three times herself, uh, that lived experience paired with her medical expertise makes her one of the most authentic voices I've ever heard or seen.

If you've gotta watch her videos on resilience, patient care, and education. Now in this conversation, Liz shares how she designed and delivered her very first workshop using cupcakes, Jenga, and a simple structure. She found in my book the two Hour Workshop Blueprint, that's how we connected.

Liz just did this amazing LinkedIn post sharing about her workshop experience, how she was planning it, and of course how she felt afterwards and tagged me in it. And it was just so cool to to see that and know that the book is having impact across the world. So if you've ever been asked to run a workshop and thought, you know, where do I even start here?

I think Liz's story will be really inspiring for you, plus you'll hear the enthusiasm and the cool stuff that she did in her session as well. And, uh, she's so excited to run even more workshops after this first one.

Enjoy the episode.

I'm so excited to welcome onto the podcast, Dr. Liz Oden. Liz, thanks for joining us today.

Thanks, Leanne. I can't wait to be here. Well, I mean,  the first time facilitate a podcast. It has run dormant for a few months. There's been no new episode, but I've reinvigorated it for today's chat with you, Liz, after seeing, uh,  your latest workshop success. Uh,  but before we start with that, can you share a bit of your career story with our listeners so we can set some context on the work that you deliver?

   📍  📍  📍  📍 Yeah, sure. So I used to be a consultant  breast surgeon, spent my life training to treat and reshape breasts and remove cancer. And then age 40, I got breast cancer myself, and it came back locally on my chest wall a couple of years ago, and I'm cancer free. But the side effects of surgery meant that I couldn't operate anymore.

I had to find a new way to help people, and that led to me. Talking and speaking and writing, and I do a lot of work trying to help people understand what cancer is. And someone asked me to do a workshop and I thought, I've never done one before. I dunno what to do. Where do I start? And I mean,  it is daunting, right?

That, that,  that's why the book was written because there's all these experts out there and you, you're known for your knowledge and your passion for what you do. And people think as well when you share that. And you are very prolific online. Right. So you're an educator, I would say. Yeah. Also entertaining.

You keep it real and relevant for people, and so you think, oh yeah, I can just run a workshop. Right. But it's a,  it's quite different. Did you find that as you were going through planning and designing your first Es. Yeah, I did. So I'm used to getting up on a stage and talking and I kind of riff it and you get that buzz of the audience.

And as a doctor, I was used to teaching on the spot, teaching people how to operate, teaching 'em to look at patients. But I thought a workshop needs planning. And it's not just me giving election in front of people. I need to get them to do things and how do I know what to get them to do and will they like it?

And it was like, I just dunno where to start. So where did you, I mean, like, so  this all led down to, uh,  before your workshop. Was it like  the, maybe the weekend before your workshop? I think you did a post on this is how we've just connected. By the way, this is the first time Liz and I have Yeah, yeah. A conversation and then you, you,  I dunno how you found the book, but I,  I get this lovely post from you about how you've been using it to design the session.

Yeah, so I went on ki um,  Kindle and I was looking for books, how to do a workshop, and I, I,  I read all the books and then Pal can do nothing. And, and  some of 'em were really complicated. And then I found yours like two hour workshop. I'm doing a two hour workshop, let's have a look. I thought, oh my goodness, I'm doing my workshop in three days.

I wish I'd found this a month ago, but suddenly it was a really easy structure to follow and it clicked and I'm quite good at doing things last minute. I almost need the,  the wind up my ass. I would say, you know,  there's a deadline, I'm gonna go and do it. I thought, wow. Okay. What props do I have in the house?

'cause I don't have time to get this. And there were so many things I hadn't thought about and I just thought, I've got a plan. I'm not scared anymore. I can do this. Uh,  so good. I love that. I,  I can feel that energy coming from you as, um,  because I saw, I think you did a video, like  video as well before and then after.

And actually I'm gonna commend you, you're doing that? Yeah. Because I'm very, I'm terrible at recording the content before and after. 'cause I'm so focused on the moment. Like,  how do you, how did you do that? I'm just curious. So I'd had two hours on the train into London to prep and it was about a 10 or 12 minute walk.

And again, I take a,  next time I'll take a suitcase to carry all the stuff. 'cause I had a rucksack, it was really heavy, but I thought, I'm just gonna do a little story for Instagram to say what I'm doing. 'cause people kind of like to see the backstory of your life. And I thought, this is my first time, I just wanna share, you know,  I'm nervous, I still get scared and I'll put them up.

I've got kind of used to doing it, but that after like, oh my God, I wanna do another one. This is amazing. Just having. A group of people in the room, they all knew each other. It was a small company, but just knowing that I could deliver it, and I'm sure I'll come on to this later, but at the end when they'd done it, I said, that was actually my first workshop.

And they went, no way. Don't change a thing about Oh, oh, okay. Leanne's plan works. So this is great. I think you're giving me too much credit. I think you've gotta like  the plan is good, but it's also. It was the little things like take sweets genius and different props and a video you said in your book to send a video to people beforehand to say, hi, this is me.

I'd never thought of doing that, but they actually said it was a really great way of, this is me, this is what I'll be talking about. This is what to expect. 'cause I know videos are often really more personal than getting a PDF. So just those little things to kind of  introduce me to them. I thought, I'm not scared anymore because they know me.

That's right. Yes. Because I think, um, and like  I don't really talk about like  the theory behind it, but as you said, it's really around just getting them familiar with you. Because how often, like  I know when I've gone to workshops and you don't even know the person, so you do your own strategic stalking.

Like  you look at their website and their videos. Yeah. But how nice to get a personal message that is, okay, this is what I'm in for, and I, I suddenly feel a bit safer and more trusting and you know,  you've done that legwork before you've even arrived. Exactly. And I think. Because I'm quite well known in the cancer space.

People are still often quite intimidated when they meet me because of who I am. So it was a way of just trying to break that down. I'm just, Liz, we're just gonna be chatting today. It's fine. So tell me about your workshop, because I know you used the, like,  tell me about the props that you use because I saw things like  what it cupcakes and Yeah, what these props that you brought in and really, I found like  I, I wanna go to this workshop.

The   📍  📍 workshop was all about explaining what  cancer is and how it happens and how breast cancer is treated and what needs people with breast cancer health because they're a digital platform trying to. Create a one stop place where you can get all your questions answered. And I thought I could do five hours on this.

So I, I had, I was gonna take cupcakes, um,  just to try and explain margins and breast cancer surgery. So you've got a bit of icing on the top of the cupcake. That's the cancer. Then the cake on the outside is, um,  the normal breast tissue, but it was so hot and muggy. I thought, these are just gonna melt. So the cupcake stayed behind.

But the first I had a conversation open, and then the first task was using Jenga,   📍  📍 and that was brilliant. Oh, I was kind of using it to explain how mutations happen by taking blocks away until it all falls down. And I had them split up into two teams and it was like a race. Who can keep the Jenga tower?

The highest. And it was really interesting  because one group took all the ones out the middle, so it was really,  really stable. But very quickly they realized it was gonna fall down 'cause they had to start taking the, one of the remaining two. Whereas the others were like  really more gung-ho and taking out the side ones.

And it was, it was  really great way of, wow, we're all buzzing. That was really, really  cool. And then I had. Um,  various cards and move the cards around and I, God, I can't even remember what the last prop was, but they were just really simple things I had at home that just kind of worked. And it, oh, it was amazing.

I, it, I mean, uh,  when you brought in that Jenga metaphor, I mean  there's metaphor is incredibly powerful and you know, the different pieces and then, and it's like, I, I  totally get what you're talking about. Even if I didn't know anything about cancer, I would get it immediately. And then I was also thinking at the same time, no wonder your rock sack was quite heavy.

You, you are lugging your. Jenga around London. We do geek out on like what, uh,  there's been a post on the flip chart Facebook group around what, you know, what bags that you have. And I've got Yeah, various types for, for things like that. And I, I'd imagine the group probably weren't even anticipating it was going to be like this.

I would imagine they thought, we've got this doctor coming in, she's going to, you know, throw her,  throw her PowerPoint on. They must've been really surprised. Did you find there's like an element of you disarming like their expectations? Yeah. I was like, right, can you get the tables moved and we're gonna be going here and going there?

And it was like, oh okay, this is like a proper workshop. This is not list giving us a lecture. I've learned I need to practice how to write on flip charts. And I now have huge admiration for my teachers who taught me by writing on a blackboard for hours. 'cause it's really hard. But post-it note sticking them all around the wall.

And that was just getting them,  getting them to stand up and put a post-it note on the wall and then sit down again. So there's that energy in the room, they're not sat. That was really,  really good at getting them to move and mingle. Um,  but the thing I loved, it was like, what can I do at the beginning, that conversation opener to get them.

Going and to introduce themselves and,  and get used to talking. 'cause you said people, I, I'm the geek who'll put my hand up. Me, me, me, me, me, me.  But other people don't want to. So we played an old drinking game called Concentration where you kind of pat your knees and clap and then click your fingers and said, right, there are 200 different types of cancer.

We're all gonna name one and see how far we can go. And you can fear the,  the stress of somebody's face. Oh my God, don't pick me first. But that worked really well. Yes, because I actually, 'cause when I, I wrote my book, I was,  I actually was like, do I take this out? But I'm like, the best form of icebreaker is a drinking game.

And yeah, because yeah,  it's easy to explain. People get it immediately. Um, it's a bit,  bit of an easy lift, but you've, this is what I love about what you've done, is you've taken a very serious and very sensitive topic, and you've made it something that people can engage with and talk about without feeling that resistance.

Um, yeah. Yeah.  I think I've learned to do that with a lot of my explainer videos about cancer because people like to see things, videos, visual, and they now will use fruits. I've got piles of lemons and oranges and grapefruits and syringes and pens to try and explain cancer. They get it. 'cause I can't afford to pay for AI and people doing fancy graphics.

Mm-hmm. And that's having to do this is really opened up my brain again from being a surgeon and how can I demonstrate things in a fun way that people understand. So it was quite easy to think, oh. How can I do this? And then also using chat GPT to help me come up with metaphors and props I have around the house when my brain is just getting stuck.

That's really clever. You know what you could even do? I'm just even like,  I love that use case of ai. I have never thought about it, but I could take a photo of, I've got this, like  the cupboard behind me. It looks, yeah,  you wouldn't know, but there's like a ton of props and post-it notes and things in that cards.

I could just take a video of that or photos, upload it to AI and be like, what could I use here? For my workshop. Yeah. So I just said, what can I use? I've got in the kitchen, got  around the house that I normally have to explain this concept. Give me five different visual metaphors. And I often use that for planning my videos.

If I can't think of a way to explain a cancer concept, I'll say, right, I like using fruit or I like using this. What can you come up with? And then I'll say, well actually they're very male orientated. My audience is mainly female, so I don't wanna talk about footballing. Can you gimme something else? And that's a really good starting point 'cause it's hard to think of stuff yourself.

It is. And I,  there is a real power in, in metaphor, like I was, I was  working with a group yesterday, we were talking about brevity and it's like the, the best way to,  to be brief is to use metaphor. 'cause people like, you know? Yeah.  It's relatable. People understand. And then if you've got the props, that adds even more weight as well.

Um, how does it, so. You are, I seem,  it seems like you're very creative and maybe you've had that your whole time, but like when I look, when I think when I, I guess my whole,  when I think of surgeons, I think highly intelligent, structured people, you know, it's a very compliance driven, high risk, obviously.

Yeah. How have you, have you always been creative or is this like a resurgence of this part of you that maybe was left dormant? I don't know. Were you creative when you were a surgeon? It's funny. I would say a surgeon. I'm not creative, but I'm technical. And I can follow a plan and I can do it, and you tell me what to do and I will do it because surgery is following the method.

But when I got into breast surgery, it's like tailoring and dress making and how can I take a gup breast and reduce it down to a DUP and do it. So I've kind of, that led to the creative bit. I've always done knitting and crochet and, and sewing and that kind of stuff, but this form of creativity, it's like I write books, but to write a novel to make something up, oh my goodness, that's scary.

I need a plan to follow. And so starting to talk and do workshops has opened up that side of my brain and said, okay, and being able to play. And I think by spending a lot of time doing videos, I've got used to getting my face. I'm used to talking to people and being vulnerable on camera, so it doesn't matter if I go wrong.

And I think that really helped to get in in front of a room of strangers and say, yeah, okay. And I make a mistake. It's fine. But it's been really fun to get creative again and play like a kid and write, here's a load of Play-Doh, what can I do with it? And it is been great. Think I'm 50 and I'm like mucking around with stuff.

That's so cool. Yeah, I think people often, I do think workshop design is a very creative, uh,  exercise. And like you said earlier, you had five hours of content. Often the most difficult part is like, what do I remove here? Yeah. And you, I wrote the blueprint and I still get in that trap of just wanting, you know, still thinking more content, more value.

How did you consider what you didn't actually share in that two hour session? What did you scale back? So I think one thing I've learned from doing my talks is it's not about me, it's about the audience. Mm-hmm. And having a really good prep call, what do they need to know and what does success look like for them?

And what do you want them to take away? And I thought, I can tell them everything they need to know about breast cancer, but actually they're designing a platform. So it was all leading up to. What does a woman in her thirties with breast cancer need? What questions is she asking? Getting them to get inside that woman's head, you know, from a physical, emotional, sexual, spiritual, what are her problems and issues, and then what are you gonna do as a company to help do that?

So it was like, okay. This isn't me telling you the problems that Williams of women have. This is how are you gonna use them to help and really getting inside the minds of what they needed. Because I can say, look, you can buy my books after you can.  You can get all the extra information you need here, but how can I help you?

So you've not just had a lecture or a workshop. You actually come away with a plan and that's the bit that took the time and the thinking. Yeah. And in writing we say, kill your darlings. You love talking about this. But they actually don't need to know 'cause they're not cancer scientists. You know, they're digital tech guys.

Who just wanna get the basics. Mm-hmm. And I think it's always coming back to what do they need to walk out of there thinking, yes, I'm buzzing, I've got a plan. And I think, um,  you know, I get a lot of questions around workshops in the future of workshops given ai, you know, we've talked about AI before and how it's been helpful with your design.

But I think for the moment, I would say for the next five years at least, workshops are still gonna be useful because of that use case that you talked about. But like  the empathy that you have, um,  for, for the topic, the, the life experience. And it's not about information because yeah, we've got that, you know, we can search for things.

It's, it's literally about creating that experience and in that moment creating some type of, um.  Shift, I would guess. I would imagine. Yeah. And I think you remember it when you are actually physically doing something with people, you actually remember  what you've learned. Whereas you can, you can scroll through chat GPT and read it, but it doesn't go in.

It's like with a book, I had to physically sit and make notes. I understand this now there's gotta be a process. I. Attached to the listening or the reading. Um,  and it was those little conversations that you have in the breakout bits and just being able to share and connect with people and that human connection, that feeling for you as the host, thinking, I've done something here, and they think, wow, we've learned something.

It's, I think it just gels it all together. Yeah.  So tell me about that, that post workshop buzz and did you go home and reflect on it or have you reflected on it a few days later? Yeah.  What was your process? So I think during the time I realized how silent it is when they're all writing for 20 minutes and I'm doing nothing.

And I was scrolling through my phone looking for a classical music playlist. So I would then have elevator music to play whilst they're doing stuff. 'cause that silence was quite distracting in a way. I was just, yeah. Yeah.  And I was just randomly talking think, am I distracting them? But I can't do the silence.

So I think that was something for me, how do I occupy myself? Because I'm so used to talking, it's like, I've gotta be quiet for 20 minutes. What do I do? And to get one of your gong things. 'cause how to,  how to subtly say, right. That's the end of it. The, the little, you know, the, the  little things I needed, but I just thought.

This worked. This was so much easier than I thought it was because I'm not doing anything. They're doing everything in a talk. You've got the prep and you're on stage, but here you are giving people the opportunity to learn. It's fun and I want to do more. And this worked. I think some of the stuff, I had a million post-its and I didn't have time to go through what the various causes of cancer were to give them feedback.

And it's like making a list of things I would send onto them. My tech didn't work. I wanted to share. Two videos of me on Instagram using oranges to explain a project. And even though I double checked in someone else's room, the videos wouldn't load. It's like, no, I'm gonna talk through but you can't see.

So just those. I wasn't very good at the post follow up. And I think having planned that, this is my post workshop. This is the PDF of everything you learn. This is where to go. 'cause I was doing it all last minute. Yes. But just that feeling of this isn't scary. And I can do this and I could do a workshop on anything.

Now I have this struck follow, um. Yeah. That's the, um, that's the plan. You've just frozen there. I don't now you're back. Oh, back. Yeah, you're back. You're back.  But that's the plan. 'cause like I was getting, I wrote it for me because I was getting asked to do all these different sort of topics that I knew stuff on, but then it's like, oh, how do I quickly put it together?

And I'm like, you,  I mean, I love you. I always say two weeks out, but really I'm,  I'm putting things together just to,  to make that happen. Um. I'm,  I'm curious about energy. 'cause energy is a,  a really big part of it and it's like sometimes I don't have the best night's sleep, but if you've got health issues, that's another thing as well.

And so I'm wondering like, how did you, like,  how do you manage that, your own energy? So I'm always tired on the cancer drugs I'm on. Um, yeah.  And it is trying to make sure that I don't have a busy day after or before, so I, I'm,  I'm not exhausted. Um,  I'm always drained afterwards from giving a talk anyway, but I think it's trying to clear the days before and after I didn't sleep brilliantly.

Um,  and I'm still going through, in my head, I've, it's,  I'm always that last minute, I've got to do this and this and this and  this, and panicking have I, because I want to over prepare. Yeah, but I think that can make it worse when you over prepare everything because you dunno what's gonna happen. And I had two hours on the train just to sit and go through the notes and then think, right, okay, I can do this, I can do this.

 And it's kind before you go into the room to kind of, it's like power posing. They say you need to stand like one woman, chest, back, shoulders out, take a couple of big breaths and think they've, they're paying me to do this. I'm amazing. Can do this, go into that room, say hi, here you are. And almost fake it until you make it.

Um, and  try to pretend you're in control. 'cause when it's a space you've not been in and you're, I got there half an hour early, that wasn't enough to set up the room and things. Ideally, I need an hour 'cause I'm still going and they're coming in, oh, I've not got my post-its ready. So it takes a lot longer to prepare, but in the hour you can just sit to think, right, okay, everything's where it needs to be.

They can come in now. So getting there early I think is really, really important. Mm-hmm. And it was. I,  it was just making sure that I ate and drank as well. 'cause it's really easy to forget to look after yourself when everyone's doing everything. I'm the worst at that. Like, I actually, I, I've  got another podcast called The Game on Demand, and I did an episode How I was I looking, I,  I hadn't prepared dinner and my husband's away and I was like, oh, I'll just go take out and yeah, it was just all a bit of a mess.

I was hangry, so I was like irritable. Yes. It wasn't because it's funny, during eight hour operations you don't eat or drink 'cause you're in the zone and then you come out and like someone get me a Mars bar. Oh. And it's kind of like that. So it's like,  yes, I thought we were gonna stop and have, I could go and get a really like  a McDonald's for lunch on the way home.

But no, I'm gonna stop and have a proper lunch and actually enjoy a nice lunch reflecting on what I've just done to give myself good food rather than just grab something to eat on the train. Yeah. Oh wow. So eight hours you can't eat when you're in surgery. No, but you don't, everyone else around you is bored, but you, you are just in the zone.

You have no idea what time it's, you're just going and then you stop and then it's suddenly, oh my goodness. Most operations aren't that long, but yeah. Yeah. The human body's pretty amazing when you can, you know. Um, and  the other thing, one question I have for you is just how prolific you are on social media and the audience that you've built is Yeah, absolutely outstanding.  📍  📍 

Do you have any tips for people like me, like  solopreneurs that have e expertise? Um,  all your content is really engaging, like your colors, your brand, everything about it is, I, I understand. Oh, so. I used to just be on Twitter just talking about triathlons and baking, and then I thought, everyone's gonna know I've got cancer 'cause I'm having chemo in the hospital where I used to work.

So that's when I kind of  started writing and blogging. But I started doing video content on Instagram when I wrote by memoir and publishers said, we can't look at   📍  📍 you until you've got 20,000 followers. 'cause without an Instagram profile, we can't market you. And my Instagram at the time was about rescuing hedgehogs and making my own clothes.

He said, you've gotta talk about cancer. And so I. I spent  six months just posting videos of pretty much every day. Wow. And working out what did people like, what did people want? And they like seeing my face. They don't care if I'm wearing makeup. I started wearing yellow. It was my mom's favorite color, and yellow just became my brand.

So my nails are always yellow. There's just a little bit of my color in every video. I played drama with different graphic styles and a couple of Instagram great kind of  coaches, just to kind of  do a one hour brief. This works, this doesn't, I learned. It's all about engaging and replying. To the comments that people make and responding to other people's posts so they get to know you.

And it was six months of really, really hard work. But I've kind of  grown this community, but it's replying and responding and saying hi and almost setting up half an hour a day to kind of  grow that community and saying, right. I've often batch film videos. Um,  I do two or three videos at a weekend and then I schedule them to post.

So just kind of  learning ways to make my life easier. The more you do, the better you get at it. The quicker ising, I'll just hop on a video and do this for Instagram, LinkedIn, I'm learning. That it's a different audience. 'cause LinkedIn's more kind of  like a speaking professional business profile, but it's kind of,  it's about me and that story.

Why do you care while I'm writing? It's not showing off and then engaging with people afterwards. Um,  you've just gotta start. But to realize it will take time. You have to reply. This is a community. You're growing and it's really, really hard. But I think having a color as your brand can really help. And using the same font or graphic or caption style, people get to recognize that's you and your brand.

 I was hoping you can tell me something that was a little bit easier, Liz. Now I don't, I don't think there is, and it's like, so Instagram grows pretty quickly, but I'm on YouTube and that can take like a year to grow 10,000 followers. They're all completely different audiences. I've had a video on Instagram, they've got a million views on a weekend.

You've got 2000 on YouTube, 2000 versus completely different audiences, I think. Unbelievable. It's copying what people are doing well and actually reaching out to, maybe I'll show you how to go on LinkedIn and using those tips. Um,  and then trying to streamline, streamline it to make it easier. I try not to look at social media until after lunch, so the morning I do what I need to do.

Otherwise, you go down that rabbit hole and repurposing posts. It's like every six months I can repost stuff because it's a new audience who won't have seen it before. And that can make your life easy, that evergreen content that you just keep reposting to reach new people. It's hard. It's really, really hard.

But your next two hour workshop is how to get to a hundred thousand four. I know I could do that. I could seriously, I could do that. Seriously  do that. Yeah. Having a brand pick a color you love and have something of that color in every video just to make the branding a bit easier can help. I love it.

Thank you so much. Now, because you're such a, like,  well, it feels weird calling you a newbie workshop facilitator because I just, I feel, but I feel like your whole life has been like for that moment. But, um,  if you can offer some advice to first time facilitators who are listening, I'm sure they're finding massive inspiration in your story and the fact that it's so relatable that this happened quite recently for you.

Um, yeah. Yeah.  What advice would you offer them? They want to learn from you and they are rooting for you to do well, and they don't know what you forget. If that's the thing, especially when you're talking, they dunno what you were meant to say because it's not on a slide. So it doesn't matter if you go wrong, you can bluff it.

Prep and props. Keep it really, really simple. Sweetss, lots of pens and cards. Kind of getting all that stationed beforehand was really, really helpful and just relax and have fun. You can say,  you can say, I'm having hot flush. Sorry, I forgot that bit. It doesn't matter. We'll carry on. It's not meant to be perfect, and then I think you can relax and enjoy it.

I set myself really low expectations that I've not done this before. I think it's gonna go about this well, so you're, you don't walk in there thinking you're going to be brilliant and then you're pleasantly surprised. I love that actually, Michael Bonday, Stan, your author of The Coaching Habit, who's been on this podcast, um,  his advice was just aim to be barely adequate.

 Yeah. Like, I think it resonates with what you are saying around Lauren, your expectations. 'cause you can't be that rockstar the minute out of the gate. So it sounded like you were Liz. So I'm very proud of,  very proud of you, and I'm so happy we've had this, this conversation today. Um,  where can Alice, uh,  where can they find you?

Reach out, uh,  connect with all your work? Obviously Instagram's one platform. Yeah, so the best place to find me is my website, which is liz.arden.co.uk. That's got links to all my books, my social media   📍  📍 profiles, my emails, so you can reach out and just, I think workshops are amazing and everyone should be doing them, and it's, it's it literally thanks to your book that got me out  the blocks and told me what to do.

So thank you. You're so welcome. I'm so, I'm so happy that it worked really well for you. The blueprint has had impact, you know, across the other side of the world. So thank you so much, Liz, for sharing your story and what you do behind the scenes as well. And, um,  look forward to sharing this podcast with listeners.

I'm sure it will absolutely resonate. Thank you.