The 2023 Grey Swan Guild Craft-Building Series

8 min readJan 14, 2023

Improving our professional craft with our Guild series of events from K-to-M in 2023 … because learning has no finish line

In the true spirit of Guilds, the Grey Swan Guild is driven by improving the professional craft our members. Last week, we announced our set of twelve feature city Town Halls for 2023, this week we cover off our dozen Craft-Building Series events.

Craft-Building Series Purpose & Context: In a world of high uncertainty, the person with the widest range of skills and perspectives and strongest network, stand to be in great favor. Dramatic marketplace, technology, work, cultural and societal change tends to upset the apple cart of the specialist more than anybody else. This means acquiring the broadest possible knowledge base, stronger depth & breath of experience and an expanded latticework of skills to respond effectively to the constant shifts of the world around us.

Craft-Building Series Intended Outcomes: Usually hosted on the second or third Tuesday of each month, we invite experts, members and prospective members to our 2023 Craft-Building Series (CBS) set of events to acquire new tools in their professional arsenal.

Craft-Building Series Relevance: as voted on in our Grey Swan Guild General Assembly, the #1 and #2 motivation for Guild participation this year was deemed to be “collaboration” and “learning”. That’s exactly what we do in CBS.

Craft-Building Series Format: The events are designed to be part expert commentary and demonstration and part member interaction and Q&A. We will usually invite three-four experts into the fold with a roundtable conversation and invite questions from our audience in the second half of the event (although sometimes we do experiment with format). Audaces et sapientes fortuna iuvat — “fortune favours the bold and wise”.

What’s Different in 2023:

We are tweaking our offering in 2023:

below you are seeing our free member events but we will be rotating in some paid premium craft-building events
last year, we did a number of these in Clubhouse, whereas we liked the ease and conversational aspect of the audio medium, it was tough to curate conversations, some of the people we met and stay on topics — this year our first three events will be on LinkedIn Live, but we may do these as Discord audio, standalone streaming or virtual worlds/Metaverse events later in the year
in the back half of the year, we may end up curating these for our library and also landing some title sponsors to extend the reach of our series

Want to be Involved?:

To attend, these are member-only events, so please join our LinkedIn page or more officially, take our member profile form.

To be an expert host or panelist for one of our events, contact us directly.

For additions or changes to any of these events, go to our Grey Swan Guild Craft Building Series official page or calendar.

Here’s our roster for 2023, we are climbing the skill tree alphabetically, this year our free Craft-building Series is focusing on topics from K -thru-M:

2023 Craft Building Series Schedule

January — Knowledge Management, Mastery and Models

CBS #53 — Tuesday, January 17th 12pm ET/5pm UTC, Linkedin Live
Knowledge Management (Part One)
Knowledge Management (Part Two)

March I — Kinesthetics, Physical Learning, Embodiment & Muscle Memory

CBS #54 — Tuesday, March 27th 1pm ET/5pm UTC, Linkedin Live
Host: Sean Moffitt

March II — KISS (keep it simple stupid), Simplicity & Minimalism

CBS #55 — Tuesday, March 28th 2pm ET/6pm UTC, Linkedin Live
Host: Matt Ferguson

April— Know-How, Craft & Intuition

CBS #56 — Tuesday, April 11th 3pm ET/7pm UTC, Channel — Linkedin Live
Host: Joanna Dehn
Pre-register: Click here

May — Leadership: Fantasy, Reality & Theory

CBS #57 — Tuesday, May 16th 10pm ET/2pm UTC, Linkedin Live
Host: Anna Hummel Gumaelius
Pre-register: Click here

June— Learning, Unlearning & Relearning

CBS #58 — Tuesday, June 18th 5pm ET/9pm UTC, Channel —LinkedIn Live

July— Lying, Cheating & Half Truths

- CBS #58 — Tuesday, July 11th 6pm ET/10pm UTC, Channel — TBD

August — Listening, Filtering & Comprehension

CBS #60— Tuesday, August 16th 7pm ET/11pm UTC, Channel — TBD

September— Meaning, Semantics and Semiotics

CBS #61 — Tuesday, September 12th 8pm ET/12am UTC, Channel — TBD

October — Multidisciplinarity, Interdisciplinarity and Transdisciplinarity

CBS #62 — Tuesday, October 17th 11pm ET/3pm UTC, Channel — TBD

November — Mood, Arousal and Receptiveness

CBS #63 — Tuesday, November 14th 10pm ET/3pm UTC, Channel — TBD

December — Motivatation — Hedonic, Cognitive & Growth-Based

CBS #64 — Tuesday, December 12th 9am ET/2pm UTC, Channel — TBD

The Craft-Building Formula & Past Events

Previous Craft-Building Series Events:

GSG #52 — Joy, Pleasure & Rewards, December 13, 2022

GSG #51 — Juxtaposition, Contrast and Linking, November 15, 2022

GSG #50 — Judging, Anchors & Acceptance, October 17th, 2022

GSG #49 — Jokes, Humour and Memes — October 7, 2022

GSG #48 — Influence, Persuasion & Advocacy — Sept 30, 2022

GSG #47 — Insight, Discoveries & A-Ha Moments — Sept 23, 2022

GSG #46 — Innovation, Business Models & Ventures — Sept 16, 2022

GSG #45 — Identity, Tribalism & Pluralism — Sept 9, 2022

GSG #44 — Hypnosis & Suggestibility — Sept 2, 2022

GSG #43 — Heuristics, Probability and Mental Shortcuts — Aug 29, 2022

GSG #42 — Game Theory, Risk & Reward — Aug 29, 2022

GSG #41 — Hindsight & Retrospection — Aug 19, 2022

GSG #40 — Growth, Development & Mindset — Aug 12, 2022

GSG #39 — Groupthink, Conformity & Polarization — July 29, 2022

GSG #38 — Forecasting, Prediction and Modelling — Aug 5, 2022

GSG #37 — Flow, Synchronicity & Happiness — July 15, 2002

GSG #36 — Framing & Reframing Problems — June 24, 2022

GSG #35 — Futures Thinking, Possibilities & Wild Cards — June 17, 2022

GSG #34 — Emotional Intelligence & Quotients — June 3, 2022

GSG #33 — Emerging Technologies & Convergence — June 3, 2002

GSG #32 — Experimentation & the Power of Doing — May 27, 2022

GSG #31 — Economics, Choices, Incentives, Value & Costs — July 15, 2022

GSG #30 — Data Science & Analytics — May 17, 2022

GSG #29 — Decision Theory & Decision Making — May 15, 2022

GSG #28 — Design Thinking, Desirability, Feasibility & Viability — May 13, 2022

GSG #27 — Divergent Thinking & Originality — May 9, 2022

GSG #26 — Complexity & Systems Thinking — May 6, 2022

GSG #25 — Cognitive Science & The Mind — May 4, 2022

GSG #24 — Creativity & Imagination — April 29, 2022

GSG #23 — Change & Transition — April 28, 2022

GSG #22 — Biomimicry & Biophillic, Natural Design — April 8, 2022

GSG #21 — Behavior & Attitude -April 12, 2022

GSG #20 — Belief & Dogma — April 10, 2022

GSG #19 — Bias & Stereotyping — April 14, 2022

GSG #18 — Ambition & Drive — April 1, 2022

GSG #17 — Ambiguity & Managing Uncertainty — April 1, 2022

GSG #16 — Attention & Concentration — March 29, 2022

GSG #15 — Adaptability & Flexible thinking — Mar 25, 2022

GSG #14 — Complexity, Sensemaking & Systems — Sources of Inspiration — March 18, 2022

GSG #13 — Futures, Foresights & Forecasts — Sources of Inspiration — March 4, 2022

GSG #12 — Applied Sensemaking — Knowledge Map, Threat Detect and Opportunity Assess with Situational Awareness Feb 18, 2022

GSG #11 — Actionable Futures — Anticipate, Innovate and Act on 3, 10 & 20 Year Futures Feb 4, 2022

GSG #10 — The Five Whats of Sensemaking — Understanding, Synthesizing, Interpreting, Giving Meaning and Sharing Insights Jan 21, 2022

GSG #9 — The Six Whats of Futurism — Explaining, Exploring, Considering, Determining & Quantifying Futures Jan 7, 2022

GSG #8 — The Daily Habits of Sensemakers, Critical Thinkers, Change Agents & Liminalists Dec 17, 2021

GSG #7 — The Daily Habits of Futurists, Foresighters, Trendoids & Strategic Planners Dec 3, 2021

GSG #6 — Making Better Sense in a Fast Changing Liminal World Nov 19, 2021

GSG #5 — Nurturing Futures & Foresight in a Short Sighted World Nov 5, 2021

GSG #4 — How Tos & Approaches in Sensemaking & Critical Thinking October 22, 2021

GSG #3 — How Tos & Approaches in Futurism & Foresight October 8, 2021

GSG #2 — The 20 Reasons Why Sensemaking & Critical Thinking Matter — Sept 24, 2021

GSG #1 — The 20 Reasons Why Futurism & Foresights Matter — Sept 10, 2021

Grey Swan Guild —Improving Our Craft Together

Visit our Craft-Building Series page.

In the interim, here’s what you can do in the Guild:

Learn: https://www.greyswanguild.org/
Read: https://greyswanguild.medium.com/
Attend: https://www.greyswanguild.org/calendar
Become an Official Guild Member: https://bit.ly/gsgsmemberform
Go Deeper: https://bit.ly/lofsenseform
Join a Venture: https://bit.ly/gsgventures

Participate in 2023 Guild events & projects: https://bit.ly/gsgparticipationregister2023
— —

Do more than belong: participate. Do more than care: help. Do more than believe: practice. Do more than be fair: be kind. Do more than forgive: forget. Do more than dream: work.