Transcript
00:00:05 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m Joanna Lindenbaum, a coach, ritualist, and all-around transformation nerd who is obsessed with helping clients go deep to create more change and results with their clients.
00:00:19 Joanna Lindenbaum
I created the Coaching Revolution Podcast to share with you coaching skills, tips, and advice, as well as a deeper understanding of human behavior and of yourself.
00:00:30 Joanna Lindenbaum
so that you can do even better client work and group work, grow your business organically, and know that you’re making a real difference in the world.
00:00:41 Joanna Lindenbaum
This is about creating a revolution in the transformational industry so that more practitioners feel amazing about what they do, and so that more of our clients experience life-changing shifts.
00:00:55 Joanna Lindenbaum
Let’s get started.
00:01:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
Welcome back to the podcast, everyone.
00:01:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
Today’s episode, I created it in honor of opening the doors to Curriculum Lab, which is one of my most beloved Done With You programs.
00:01:15 Joanna Lindenbaum
Inside of Curriculum Lab, I support course creators and leaders step by step by step,
00:01:22 Joanna Lindenbaum
to craft a curriculum and group program that wows your participants and helps your participants love your program and get the most out of it.
00:01:31 Joanna Lindenbaum
And so for today’s episode, we are toe dipping into how to design online group programs that actually create transformation.
00:01:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
not just note-taking online group programs, not just group programs that share interesting ideas, but group experiences that activate real inner and outer change.
00:02:00 Joanna Lindenbaum
Now, we all know probably what I’m about to say next.
00:02:05 Joanna Lindenbaum
The world of online learning has shifted dramatically.
00:02:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
The old model of I talk, you listen, thank goodness that model is done.
00:02:20 Joanna Lindenbaum
People don’t need more passive information.
00:02:25 Joanna Lindenbaum
They need integrated learning.
00:02:28 Joanna Lindenbaum
And of course, this is something that I’ve been teaching for decades now, not how to give presentations, not how to give talks.
00:02:39 Joanna Lindenbaum
but how to create experiences with your content.
00:02:44 Joanna Lindenbaum
And before I go any further, I feel like I have to mention that I can hear the irony in my own words, because
00:02:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m saying the days of I talk, you listen are over.
00:03:02 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m saying them on a podcast where I am very much talking and you are very much listening.
00:03:09 Joanna Lindenbaum
But here’s the thing.
00:03:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
Podcasts or experiences like TED Talks, they’re not designed to be transformational containers.
00:03:21 Joanna Lindenbaum
Podcasts are meant to plant seeds, to open your heart,
00:03:26 Joanna Lindenbaum
and to give you something meaningful to think about as you go through your day.
00:03:30 Joanna Lindenbaum
On the other hand, a group program is where the hands-on transformation happens, where the nervous system, the emotions, the body, the practice, the community all come online.
00:03:50 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s where change gets anchored
00:03:53 Joanna Lindenbaum
and not just interesting ideas get discussed.
00:03:59 Joanna Lindenbaum
So yes, here on the podcast, I do talk a lot, but the work we’re discussing today is all about what happens when you bring your ideas together into a live, relational, high touch space and group program.
00:04:21 Joanna Lindenbaum
So in the episode today, I’m going to give you some important distinctions and principles to help you build online group programs that are effective, that are high retention, and that are deeply transformational.
00:04:37 Joanna Lindenbaum
We’re going to talk about programs that really help people learn and grow.
00:04:44 Joanna Lindenbaum
and create results, and how you can create those types of programs so that your participants are thrilled with the work that they do with you, so that you retain them as clients versus having them fall off halfway through the program, and so that they also send referrals your way.
00:05:08 Joanna Lindenbaum
And of course, the biggest reason to create deeply transformational programs, I think, is so that you make bigger impact in the world and so that you feel deeply in your purpose as a teacher, as a leader, as a change maker.
00:05:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
So I’m excited to
00:05:31 Joanna Lindenbaum
dive into all of this today.
00:05:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
And before we dive in, I want to make sure that I tell you this now so that I don’t forget later.
00:05:41 Joanna Lindenbaum
I am doing something different that over the last almost two years of this podcast, I haven’t done.
00:05:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
And it didn’t really occur to me to do this until a few weeks ago.
00:05:58 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m taking a short break from the podcast, not a long one.
00:06:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s kind of like a season break.
00:06:08 Joanna Lindenbaum
So we’re going to take, this is going to be the last episode for 2025.
00:06:13 Joanna Lindenbaum
And then we’re going to take the month off of December.
00:06:18 Joanna Lindenbaum
And we’re going to come back the very first month of
00:06:23 Joanna Lindenbaum
of 2026.
00:06:24 Joanna Lindenbaum
So we’ll drop our next podcast after this one on January 5th.
00:06:31 Joanna Lindenbaum
And it’s so funny that it didn’t even occur to me until recently that podcasts don’t have to go on and on and on and on, week after week after week after week, that there can be a break, that just like TV shows, there are seasons and then there are breaks and there’s time for renewal.
00:06:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I’m so happy.
00:06:53 Joanna Lindenbaum
I realized it.
00:06:54 Joanna Lindenbaum
I love putting together this podcast.
00:06:58 Joanna Lindenbaum
It brings me so much joy.
00:07:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
It brings me so much joy when I hear from all of you.
00:07:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
We get emails and notes on, you know, how deeply everything that I share here impacts you.
00:07:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
And at the same time, it is, it’s work.
00:07:16 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s work to put together the episodes.
00:07:19 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m very thoughtful about it.
00:07:20 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m very intentional.
00:07:22 Joanna Lindenbaum
about it.
00:07:23 Joanna Lindenbaum
And especially now with all of the holidays coming up, I don’t know if I can stick to the schedule of getting things done, because I’ll tell you a little secret.
00:07:33 Joanna Lindenbaum
Even though I would love to be the kind of person who gets their podcast episode done and recorded weeks or months in advance, the truth is, ever since my mother passed away, I’ve been on a schedule of getting these
00:07:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
episodes recorded just the week before we drop them.
00:07:56 Joanna Lindenbaum
So I don’t even have any in reserve.
00:07:58 Joanna Lindenbaum
I think I need to take some time off so that I can bring even more amazing things to you in 2026.
00:08:06 Joanna Lindenbaum
Now, if you want to hear from me and you want to hear my voice during December, sign up for our newsletter.
00:08:17 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’ll put a link in the show notes.
00:08:21 Joanna Lindenbaum
because I will still continue to send the newsletter out to the community during December.
00:08:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’ll be sharing contents and tips and stories there.
00:08:35 Joanna Lindenbaum
Okay, so let’s dive in on to how to do online learning differently.
00:08:42 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I’m going to share, like I said, a couple of distinctions and principles.
00:08:47 Joanna Lindenbaum
And here’s the first one.
00:08:49 Joanna Lindenbaum
Don’t create courses that prioritize content only.
00:08:56 Joanna Lindenbaum
Instead, design exercises that activate transformation based on content.
00:09:07 Joanna Lindenbaum
So here’s something I want every course creator to deeply understand when they go to create their curriculum.
00:09:18 Joanna Lindenbaum
Information doesn’t create change.
00:09:23 Joanna Lindenbaum
Experience does.
00:09:24 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m going to say that again because it’s so important.
00:09:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
Information isn’t what creates change.
00:09:32 Joanna Lindenbaum
Your expertise, your ideas, no matter how incredible they are, that’s not what actually changes
00:09:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
or helps create change fully for your course participants.
00:09:49 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s the experience that you provide inside of your program that does.
00:09:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
So cognitive science has shown for decades that we remember only about 10% of what we hear.
00:10:08 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m going to say that again because it’s kind of mind-blowing.
00:10:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
Cognitive science has shown that for decades, we, this is decades of research, that as humans, we only remember about 10% of what we hear.
00:10:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
And when I say hear, I mean what we hear or what we read.
00:10:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
That being said, what research has also shown us is that we remember 70 to 90% of what we do, of what we interact with, of what we discuss, or of what we emotionally engage with.
00:10:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
Just think about that for a moment.
00:10:58 Joanna Lindenbaum
Only 10% of what we hear, what we read, but 70 to 90% of what we do, what we interact with, what we engage with.
00:11:09 Joanna Lindenbaum
So experiential learning theory and neurobiology and adult learning research, they all point to the same thing, which is that the brain needs more than content to encode long-term memory.
00:11:27 Joanna Lindenbaum
and change.
00:11:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
So in other words, if your course or if your workshop is kind of like, here, let me tell you a bunch of great ideas and concepts, people may really like it.
00:11:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
They may think it’s super cool and it might create momentary inspiration, maybe even a little bit of action, but it won’t truly help them create change
00:11:56 Joanna Lindenbaum
or reach their goals.
00:11:59 Joanna Lindenbaum
So what I’m suggesting here, number one, is exercise-driven learning.
00:12:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
Taking your content and making sure that you have really great exercises for your pieces of content
00:12:22 Joanna Lindenbaum
so that 70 to 90% of it can be retained versus 10% of it can be retained.
00:12:28 Joanna Lindenbaum
And for those of you who are listening, who have been through Curriculum Lab with me, you know that one of my obsessions inside of Curriculum Lab is to support course creators to not only get crystal clear on what your content and concepts are,
00:12:48 Joanna Lindenbaum
but to also help you craft deeply resonant transformational exercises so that your students can deeply engage with and integrate and take action on your content and on your concepts.
00:13:07 Joanna Lindenbaum
And here’s another important piece about the exercise thing.
00:13:10 Joanna Lindenbaum
We could go on and on about how to create exercises.
00:13:12 Joanna Lindenbaum
I won’t today, but I do want to say this.
00:13:16 Joanna Lindenbaum
And you have heard me say this before if you’ve been listening to this podcast.
00:13:21 Joanna Lindenbaum
This is something that my curriculum lab students know forward and backwards.
00:13:26 Joanna Lindenbaum
My sacred depthers know this forward and backwards as well.
00:13:30 Joanna Lindenbaum
We don’t want to create just any exercises.
00:13:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
Inside of your curriculum and programming, you want to create exercises that activate what I call the four levels of learning and processing.
00:13:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
So not only
00:13:45 Joanna Lindenbaum
the level of the cognitive, which a lot of, that’s what a lot of presentations are, right?
00:13:50 Joanna Lindenbaum
That’s what a lot of talks are, is it activates the cognitive, the intellect.
00:13:55 Joanna Lindenbaum
Yes, of course, we want cognitive learning for sure.
00:14:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
But again, research shows that cognitive learning isn’t enough for long-lasting learning, for long-lasting motivation.
00:14:12 Joanna Lindenbaum
for long-lasting action-taking.
00:14:16 Joanna Lindenbaum
We also want exercises that activate the emotional level of learning and processing.
00:14:22 Joanna Lindenbaum
We want exercises that activate the body level of learning and processing.
00:14:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
And we want exercises that activate what I call the spirit level of learning and processing.
00:14:33 Joanna Lindenbaum
This doesn’t have to be a religious thing, but it’s
00:14:37 Joanna Lindenbaum
activating connection to and trust something bigger than the ego.
00:14:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
So if you want to learn more about the four levels of learning and processing, I go through them in an earlier podcast episode.
00:14:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
I should have brought the podcast, the episode number with me, which I didn’t, but I’ll put it into the show notes for you.
00:15:00 Joanna Lindenbaum
So when you activate more than
00:15:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
just someone’s prefrontal cortex.
00:15:08 Joanna Lindenbaum
When you include the emotional brain, the limbic system, the body, the senses, et cetera, that’s when learning sticks even more.
00:15:20 Joanna Lindenbaum
Okay, so there’s lots that go into crafting really powerful transformational exercises.
00:15:26 Joanna Lindenbaum
That’s one little tip for you.
00:15:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I really, again, I want you to remember
00:15:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
to not prioritize content only, to really think of your curriculum as content, and then you go deeper on the content with exercises and content, and then you go deeper with exercises.
00:15:50 Joanna Lindenbaum
So for example, let’s say you’re teaching about boundary setting.
00:15:55 Joanna Lindenbaum
Don’t lecture for 45 minutes straight on tips for setting boundaries.
00:16:03 Joanna Lindenbaum
Instead, talk less and include, for example, exercises or experiences where folks can really get into their fears or blocks to being able to set boundaries or where they can go deeper to actually transform what’s holding them back from sitting.
00:16:32 Joanna Lindenbaum
aligned boundaries, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
00:16:36 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I’ll just, I’ll take this a step further.
00:16:39 Joanna Lindenbaum
We’re gonna talk about this a little bit more in the episode, but I’ll just share this now.
00:16:44 Joanna Lindenbaum
Let’s say you have a class inside of a program that’s 60 minutes long, or you’re giving a workshop that’s 60 minutes long.
00:16:54 Joanna Lindenbaum
This might sound really out there, but go with me here for a moment.
00:17:00 Joanna Lindenbaum
Out of 60 minutes, I want you to consider that you shouldn’t really prepare more than 30 to 35 minutes of actual lecture content.
00:17:16 Joanna Lindenbaum
So what do you do the rest of the time?
00:17:21 Joanna Lindenbaum
Think of the 60 minutes as sharing some content for people to sink their teeth into
00:17:30 Joanna Lindenbaum
And then doing transformational exercises to really get it, to connect to it more deeply, to start embodying and integrate it.
00:17:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
Sprinkle exercises throughout so that your participants can make the content their own so that they can apply it to themselves.
00:17:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
So a little content, a little exercise, a little content, a little exercise.
00:17:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
give opportunity for deeper learning and integration.
00:18:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
So that relates, all of that relates to the second distinction that I want us to take a look at today for creating really transformational programs, doing online learning differently, and that is create engagement, belonging, and safety.
00:18:27 Joanna Lindenbaum
And when you simply just deliver a talk, you’re not truly creating engagement, belonging, and safety.
00:18:37 Joanna Lindenbaum
So having the content and then the transformational exercises is so, important, but it’s actually not enough.
00:18:50 Joanna Lindenbaum
Your voice as the facilitator, as the teacher,
00:18:56 Joanna Lindenbaum
shouldn’t be the only voice heard in a group.
00:19:00 Joanna Lindenbaum
And in fact, the most successful group programs are the ones where the leader makes a lot of space for sharing and engagement for other voices to be heard.
00:19:18 Joanna Lindenbaum
This is a big, big distinction between being a presenter and being a facilitator
00:19:27 Joanna Lindenbaum
really, really having your people engage.
00:19:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
So inside of your curriculum, you want to intentionally build space for engagement.
00:19:46 Joanna Lindenbaum
You want to have lots of opportunity for sharing, for Q&A.
00:19:53 Joanna Lindenbaum
You want to be intentional about how you use the chat if you’re using it, right?
00:19:58 Joanna Lindenbaum
And use the chat so that it’s a place for people to engage and connect and to have their voices heard.
00:20:06 Joanna Lindenbaum
Now be intentional because some people also don’t love the chat.
00:20:10 Joanna Lindenbaum
They get overwhelmed by it.
00:20:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
There’s inside of curriculum lab, I teach all of the ins and outs of how to use sharing, voice to voice sharing, chat sharing, all of that.
00:20:23 Joanna Lindenbaum
Think about how you’re going to use breakout rooms.
00:20:26 Joanna Lindenbaum
There are really masterful ways to use breakout rooms so that people can take their learning more deeply, so that they can feel a sense of community, so that they can get more ahas and motivation.
00:20:45 Joanna Lindenbaum
Think about other ways that you can activate
00:20:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
engagement.
00:20:53 Joanna Lindenbaum
And not only engagement, but as I said earlier, belonging and safety.
00:20:58 Joanna Lindenbaum
They really, they all go together.
00:21:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
So I don’t want you to think of your programs as a program.
00:21:09 Joanna Lindenbaum
I want you to think of your programs as a community, even if it’s a one-time workshop.
00:21:18 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s kind of like a pop-up community, right?
00:21:22 Joanna Lindenbaum
But not like just a collection of people.
00:21:26 Joanna Lindenbaum
And it’s so important because when people feel that they’re in community, when people feel that they have a seat in the community, when people feel that their voice matters,
00:21:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
in the community.
00:21:45 Joanna Lindenbaum
When people feel that others want to hear what they have to say in the community, that’s where more belonging is created.
00:21:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
That’s when more safety is created.
00:22:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
When there’s belonging and safety, there’s more engagement.
00:22:05 Joanna Lindenbaum
When there’s more engagement, there’s more belonging and safety.
00:22:10 Joanna Lindenbaum
And
00:22:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
All of these things lead to more learning and to more investment in the program, more emotional investment in the program, more cognitive investment in the program, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, which is going to lead to better results for your participants.
00:22:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
So
00:22:36 Joanna Lindenbaum
Again, lots of opportunity for sharing, for Q&A.
00:22:40 Joanna Lindenbaum
Use the chat, use breakout rooms.
00:22:42 Joanna Lindenbaum
And then depending on your program, there are so many other types of strategies you can use for engagement and belonging.
00:22:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
For example, inside of Sacred Depths, we have
00:22:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
meet and greet sessions where people get to just connect and network and get to know each other.
00:23:03 Joanna Lindenbaum
And people love that.
00:23:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
Inside of Sacred Depths, we have small group discussions.
00:23:10 Joanna Lindenbaum
People have the option to have practice partners, et cetera, et cetera.
00:23:15 Joanna Lindenbaum
All of this helps so much.
00:23:19 Joanna Lindenbaum
So I want you to think about also with all of this, is an important piece.
00:23:28 Joanna Lindenbaum
how are you starting your program off so that people want to be vulnerable, so that people feel that they’re part of the community, so that people want to share and engage?
00:23:46 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I also want you to remember that the power of a group program is the group.
00:23:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
So one mistake that I see a lot of group leaders make is that they have the belief that the most important relationships inside of their group programs are between them, the facilitator, the leader, and each individual person in the group.
00:24:22 Joanna Lindenbaum
But the truth is,
00:24:25 Joanna Lindenbaum
Again, the power of a group is the group.
00:24:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
The most important relationships inside of a group are the relationships among the people and the relationship inside of the group itself, right?
00:24:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
So you always want to be thinking, how are you leveraging the group?
00:24:48 Joanna Lindenbaum
All right, let’s keep on going.
00:24:50 Joanna Lindenbaum
I know I’m moving through these pretty quickly.
00:24:53 Joanna Lindenbaum
Of course, inside of Curriculum Lab, we go deep into all of the details and the how-tos in this.
00:25:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
But there are a few other things that I want to share today.
00:25:05 Joanna Lindenbaum
And so the next distinction is, or I guess distinction or principle that I want you to be thinking about with your groups,
00:25:15 Joanna Lindenbaum
drop the one-size-fits-all program model and instead design multiple levels of support.
00:25:27 Joanna Lindenbaum
Now, to be clear, before I start to explain about this, what I don’t mean
00:25:33 Joanna Lindenbaum
necessarily is to have different tiers of a program, right?
00:25:38 Joanna Lindenbaum
So we sometimes do this, and I’ve seen a lot of this out there, like if you pay this much, you get this much support.
00:25:46 Joanna Lindenbaum
And then if you pay this much, you get more support.
00:25:49 Joanna Lindenbaum
That’s actually not exactly what I’m talking about.
00:25:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m talking about within any tier of a program,
00:25:59 Joanna Lindenbaum
don’t approach it as one-size-fits-all.
00:26:03 Joanna Lindenbaum
Because if you approach it as one-size-fits-all, they’re going to be students or participants that get left behind.
00:26:12 Joanna Lindenbaum
They’re not going to get what they need.
00:26:16 Joanna Lindenbaum
So research shows that adult learners vary widely in terms of executive functioning, motivation,
00:26:28 Joanna Lindenbaum
emotional needs, learning styles, and also accountability preferences.
00:26:36 Joanna Lindenbaum
So if you design a program where there is just one singular path to success, it’s probably not going to work for everyone.
00:26:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
Instead, you want to design a program that has
00:26:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
various paths to success.
00:27:00 Joanna Lindenbaum
And by the way, this isn’t just true of adult learners.
00:27:05 Joanna Lindenbaum
We see this inside of, with kids inside of schools, like some of the latest strategies, cutting edge strategies inside of schools is that different kids get different types of support inside of a school setting.
00:27:27 Joanna Lindenbaum
And for the schools that are doing this, they’re seeing incredible success.
00:27:35 Joanna Lindenbaum
So inside of your group programs, it’s important to know that some of your participants are going to absolutely 100% thrive with only a weekly training and then doing homework.
00:27:56 Joanna Lindenbaum
For those people, that’s great.
00:27:58 Joanna Lindenbaum
That’s all that they need.
00:28:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
But for other people in your programs, in order for them to thrive, they may need other support.
00:28:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
They may need maybe co-working sessions, or they might need accountability pods, or they might need optional office hours, or supplemental materials, or check-ins, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
00:28:28 Joanna Lindenbaum
The possibilities are endless, and I’m not suggesting to put all of these into your programs.
00:28:35 Joanna Lindenbaum
But what I am suggesting is
00:28:38 Joanna Lindenbaum
I want you to think about who are your ideal clients for any particular program that you’re putting together.
00:28:44 Joanna Lindenbaum
And remember that the ideal client is not a singular person, right?
00:28:49 Joanna Lindenbaum
There is variation, there is a spectrum there for the ideal client.
00:28:53 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I want you to think about what might they need to help them be successful in the program, what some of them might need, what others might need, and then match that up with what you’re willing to give.
00:29:08 Joanna Lindenbaum
and provide.
00:29:10 Joanna Lindenbaum
We do this inside of all of our programs.
00:29:13 Joanna Lindenbaum
So as an example, inside of Curriculum Lab, we have our weekly training sessions with exercises and there’s Q&A that’s built in to those sessions.
00:29:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
And then on top of that, for people who want it, every week,
00:29:36 Joanna Lindenbaum
we have a get it done curriculum session where people come for 90 minutes and they work on their curriculum in real time with me or someone on my team.
00:29:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
And we’re there to answer questions as they work on the curriculum, their curricula in real time.
00:30:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
We are there to just help support them in accountability.
00:30:05 Joanna Lindenbaum
They step into the container.
00:30:07 Joanna Lindenbaum
Somehow, all of a sudden, they overcome their writer’s block, you know, the way we set it up, et cetera.
00:30:12 Joanna Lindenbaum
Now, not everybody inside of curriculum lab comes to the get it done sessions.
00:30:19 Joanna Lindenbaum
They don’t need it.
00:30:19 Joanna Lindenbaum
They can, they do it on their own, you know, they know, and that’s great.
00:30:25 Joanna Lindenbaum
But
00:30:26 Joanna Lindenbaum
For the people who need it, wowee, it is such a huge support, right?
00:30:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s a, people have different learning styles and different success styles.
00:30:41 Joanna Lindenbaum
Another example inside of curriculum lab, it’s kind of wild that I offer this inside of curriculum lab, but I do.
00:30:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
You can submit your curriculum to me
00:30:56 Joanna Lindenbaum
as many times as you want during the six weeks.
00:31:00 Joanna Lindenbaum
The full curriculum, pieces of the curriculum, your homework, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
00:31:05 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I will read every single word and then give you ideas, feedback, help you brainstorm, help you go deeper, et cetera.
00:31:15 Joanna Lindenbaum
Some people inside of curriculum lab, they only submit once, right?
00:31:20 Joanna Lindenbaum
They wait till towards the end,
00:31:23 Joanna Lindenbaum
And they submit.
00:31:24 Joanna Lindenbaum
And that’s what’s great for them.
00:31:25 Joanna Lindenbaum
Like that’s what they need.
00:31:28 Joanna Lindenbaum
And then others in curriculum lab submit to me multiple times.
00:31:33 Joanna Lindenbaum
They need a little bit more.
00:31:35 Joanna Lindenbaum
They need a little bit more hand-holding, right?
00:31:39 Joanna Lindenbaum
So we don’t want to do, if we really want our students and our participants to be uber successful in our programming, we can’t do a one-size-fits-all.
00:31:53 Joanna Lindenbaum
We need to know that there is a range in terms of our people.
00:31:59 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I, really believe it’s important for us to be committed to meet our people where they’re at.
00:32:10 Joanna Lindenbaum
All of this helps increase completion rates in our programs, satisfaction rates in our programs, and results in our programs.
00:32:20 Joanna Lindenbaum
And so this relates to the next piece that I want to share, which is make your program high touch.
00:32:31 Joanna Lindenbaum
So I don’t know, there was a trend in the coaching industry for a number of years, which I did not participate in.
00:32:40 Joanna Lindenbaum
because it was never my style, but there is a trend of programs are just a factory of anonymous numbers, right?
00:32:49 Joanna Lindenbaum
Like what are our numbers?
00:32:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
Let’s get as many people as we can.
00:32:54 Joanna Lindenbaum
And people were kind of treated as numbers.
00:32:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
And it didn’t work.
00:33:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
A lot of people dropped out of programs because they weren’t
00:33:06 Joanna Lindenbaum
high touch enough because people felt like numbers.
00:33:10 Joanna Lindenbaum
People don’t want to just be anonymous heads on a Zoom screen for the most part.
00:33:17 Joanna Lindenbaum
Every now and again, maybe they do, right?
00:33:19 Joanna Lindenbaum
But for the most part, no.
00:33:20 Joanna Lindenbaum
They want to be seen.
00:33:24 Joanna Lindenbaum
They want to feel your presence, your warmth, your care.
00:33:30 Joanna Lindenbaum
They want to feel that you want to know them.
00:33:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
They want to be known.
00:33:38 Joanna Lindenbaum
Research from online education shows that learner retention skyrockets when students feel recognized by their instructor.
00:33:50 Joanna Lindenbaum
We know this is the case for school children.
00:33:53 Joanna Lindenbaum
This is the case for adults as well.
00:33:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
Now, I want to be so, clear.
00:34:01 Joanna Lindenbaum
When I say high touch,
00:34:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
I do not mean overgive and burn yourself out.
00:34:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
So what I do mean is be intentional about personal moments.
00:34:22 Joanna Lindenbaum
And this is something inside of Applied Depth Institute, me and my team, inside of every one of our programs,
00:34:32 Joanna Lindenbaum
We just take this so seriously.
00:34:35 Joanna Lindenbaum
We are high touch, high touch, high touch.
00:34:38 Joanna Lindenbaum
I genuinely want to know my clients and my students, whether they’re with me for a year-long program or whether they’re with me for a one-day program.
00:34:54 Joanna Lindenbaum
I am in it for the people, for holding space for
00:35:00 Joanna Lindenbaum
the people.
00:35:00 Joanna Lindenbaum
Like that’s the glory for me is the relationships and the supporting others to be known and for them to know that I’m here to support them.
00:35:13 Joanna Lindenbaum
So high touch can look lots and lots of different ways.
00:35:20 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’ll just name a couple of ways right now that we institute in our team
00:35:28 Joanna Lindenbaum
So number one, if I haven’t seen someone around in a little bit in class, I’m going to check in with them.
00:35:40 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m going to reach out to them.
00:35:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m going to see how they’re doing.
00:35:48 Joanna Lindenbaum
Another thing we do inside of Sacred Depths is a couple weeks after
00:35:56 Joanna Lindenbaum
the program starts pretty soon after the program starts.
00:35:59 Joanna Lindenbaum
We have one-on-one check-in sessions where we can hear from people, how is it going?
00:36:09 Joanna Lindenbaum
What do they need to be able to feel uber comfortable with the technology, with the, right, whatever we’re doing, we’re there for them one-on-one.
00:36:18 Joanna Lindenbaum
I always offer inside of
00:36:23 Joanna Lindenbaum
sacred depth sessions, be in touch with me in between sessions, ask questions, let me know what you need.
00:36:32 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m here.
00:36:33 Joanna Lindenbaum
Right.
00:36:33 Joanna Lindenbaum
So those are just a few ways.
00:36:35 Joanna Lindenbaum
I think in 2026, I’m going to do a whole episode on high touch and how to make programs high touch because it’s such a big and important topic.
00:36:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
It can really
00:36:53 Joanna Lindenbaum
change a participant’s entire experience of you and your program.
00:37:02 Joanna Lindenbaum
Okay, so a few more things I want to make sure you get today.
00:37:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
We’re going to talk a lot about curriculum development and
00:37:19 Joanna Lindenbaum
creating a journey inside of your curriculum.
00:37:24 Joanna Lindenbaum
On December 10th, I’m going to be holding, offering a free workshop.
00:37:33 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s called The Transformational Power of Curriculum, Create a Program as Powerful as You.
00:37:40 Joanna Lindenbaum
And inside of that, we’re going to go deep into curriculum.
00:37:45 Joanna Lindenbaum
You’re going to learn A lot.
00:37:46 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’ll
00:37:47 Joanna Lindenbaum
give you the link if you want to sign up for it.
00:37:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
But for now, what I want to share about your curriculum is when you put your curriculum together, please think of it as a transformational arc versus a list of topics.
00:38:15 Joanna Lindenbaum
Think of it as a transformational arc versus a list of topics.
00:38:20 Joanna Lindenbaum
So a lot of programs out there are basically just a collection of topics week after week.
00:38:27 Joanna Lindenbaum
Transformation doesn’t work that way.
00:38:30 Joanna Lindenbaum
Human beings change through arc, through sequence, through pacing, through integration, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
00:38:41 Joanna Lindenbaum
And so I want you to really think
00:38:44 Joanna Lindenbaum
as you put together your curriculum and your ideas that you’re not creating a syllabus, you’re building a journey.
00:38:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
Okay.
00:38:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
So important.
00:38:54 Joanna Lindenbaum
The journey there’s, and there’s also, you know, I’ll just say for now, there’s a cognitive journey and there’s an emotional journey that you want to have running through your curriculum.
00:39:06 Joanna Lindenbaum
You will find that you will have much higher retention, much deeper learning if you create
00:39:13 Joanna Lindenbaum
that journey.
00:39:15 Joanna Lindenbaum
All right.
00:39:16 Joanna Lindenbaum
Last piece for today.
00:39:20 Joanna Lindenbaum
I know this one is a little bit of a controversial one.
00:39:23 Joanna Lindenbaum
And by the way, I’m just cherry picking.
00:39:26 Joanna Lindenbaum
We could, this podcast episode could be like 5 hours long with all of the distinctions and the principles.
00:39:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
I’m cherry picking for today.
00:39:36 Joanna Lindenbaum
But the last one for today that is really important for me to share.
00:39:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
even though I know that it is a little controversial, don’t rely on AI or ChatGPT for your curriculum.
00:39:58 Joanna Lindenbaum
Now, for some of you, that’s going to mean you don’t rely on it at all.
00:40:06 Joanna Lindenbaum
But even if you do use AI or ChatGPT a little bit,
00:40:12 Joanna Lindenbaum
Please, pretty please.
00:40:17 Joanna Lindenbaum
Don’t create your whole curriculum inside of ChatGPT or another AI bot.
00:40:24 Joanna Lindenbaum
So I have been, I will tell you, I have been helping course creators develop their thought leadership
00:40:36 Joanna Lindenbaum
and their curriculum for decades now.
00:40:39 Joanna Lindenbaum
I have helped many, many, many, many, many people.
00:40:44 Joanna Lindenbaum
I have helped them find incredible ideas inside of themselves, experience and expertise they didn’t even know they had.
00:40:57 Joanna Lindenbaum
I have helped them not only find their ideas and their thought leadership, but supported them on how to go deeper with it, with the transformational exercises.
00:41:09 Joanna Lindenbaum
And in all the years that I’ve been supporting and teaching, what’s come out on the other side has just been amazing and authentic and so powerful.
00:41:28 Joanna Lindenbaum
And over the last year-ish, I have noticed in some of my courses and trainings that some students are using the tools that I’m teaching, but they’re bringing them to ChatGPT or other bots
00:41:56 Joanna Lindenbaum
they’re not doing, in other words, they’re not doing all the work of going deep inside of themselves.
00:42:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
And they’re basically kind of just like feeding some ideas into the bot and then asking the bot to create the curriculum.
00:42:13 Joanna Lindenbaum
And what comes out on the other side is something, yeah, it’s got a lot of words.
00:42:21 Joanna Lindenbaum
There’s some interesting, cool things in there.
00:42:25 Joanna Lindenbaum
But it’s not unique.
00:42:29 Joanna Lindenbaum
It doesn’t have an emotional resonance.
00:42:34 Joanna Lindenbaum
It doesn’t go deep enough.
00:42:35 Joanna Lindenbaum
It feels like everything else out there.
00:42:39 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s just, it flattens, it ends up flattening ideas.
00:42:44 Joanna Lindenbaum
And in the last year, year and a half,
00:42:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
I have had to, do the hard work of calling out a couple of students who I could just tell as I was reading, this is not them, this is AI and we’ve gotten them back on track.
00:43:07 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I know some of it just happens because AI is so pervasive and it seems like it’s going to be easier and all the things.
00:43:16 Joanna Lindenbaum
And I’m not saying don’t use it at all, but
00:43:19 Joanna Lindenbaum
don’t, please don’t fully rely on it.
00:43:21 Joanna Lindenbaum
You will not end up with the program that you really want.
00:43:31 Joanna Lindenbaum
Okay, so I hope that what we looked at today was uber helpful.
00:43:39 Joanna Lindenbaum
I hope that it is activating some ideas for you when you go to design your online programs.
00:43:48 Joanna Lindenbaum
I hope it will help you make your programming more experiential and engaging and personalized and powerful and all the things.
00:43:59 Joanna Lindenbaum
I don’t want you to think of yourself as just delivering content.
00:44:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
I want you to think of yourself as creating incredible experiences so that you can create spaces where people feel safe.
00:44:18 Joanna Lindenbaum
alive, connected, and capable of real transformation.
00:44:26 Joanna Lindenbaum
This is how you can support your clients to create extraordinary results.
00:44:32 Joanna Lindenbaum
And if you want to go deeper with any of this, there are two upcoming opportunities.
00:44:40 Joanna Lindenbaum
First is that workshop on December 10th.
00:44:43 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s free.
00:44:45 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’s called The Transformational Power of Curriculum, Create a Program as Powerful as You.
00:44:51 Joanna Lindenbaum
It’ll be 90 minutes of just really deep material, inner inquiry, tips and tools, along with some exercises.
00:45:04 Joanna Lindenbaum
And that workshop is a preview for Curriculum Lab, which is starting later in January.
00:45:14 Joanna Lindenbaum
And that’s the full shebang.
00:45:16 Joanna Lindenbaum
That is 6 weeks of training, of get it done sessions, of submitting your curriculum to me, of me supporting you to go deeper with your content.
00:45:30 Joanna Lindenbaum
and your exercises and your facilitation skills and some of your marketing for your program.
00:45:37 Joanna Lindenbaum
We’ve opened the doors to Curriculum Lab.
00:45:39 Joanna Lindenbaum
There is a very special early, early rate on it right now for a little bit.
00:45:46 Joanna Lindenbaum
I will drop the link for Curriculum Lab into the show notes as well.
00:45:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
Have a look.
00:45:52 Joanna Lindenbaum
Let me know if you have any questions.
00:45:55 Joanna Lindenbaum
In the meantime, I hope you love today’s episode.
00:45:59 Joanna Lindenbaum
If you think it would be valuable for anyone please share it, pass it along.
00:46:07 Joanna Lindenbaum
Give us five stars if you loved it.
00:46:11 Joanna Lindenbaum
And remember, I’m taking a little break just so that I can re-energize and I will be really excited to be back with you in 2026.
