The Real Estate of Fear – “Criticism”

To: Professor Ellis
From: Jodieann Stephenson, Samantha Pezzolanti, Pamela Drake, & Mariah Rajah
Re: Project 3 Collab. Memo “The Real Estate of Fear”
Date: 03/14/2016

Dear Professor Ellis,

After much deliberation and brainstorming we have come to the conclusion that this third project should be based on the overall arching theme of fear and how it plays a part in determining aspects of our professional lives. Since this project will be be both collaborative and non-fictional based we have all chosen issues which we have faced in our personal lives that we believe many professionals also face.

Jodieann Stephenson has chosen to take on the fear of public speaking and how it has affected her in such a way that she has gone out of her way to create a “persona” in able to cope with her speaking fear. She has even chosen a career of writing which will allow her to say what she physically cannot. Her Podcast will be an insightful and eye opening podcast about public speaking, anxiety, and coping mechanisms.

Samantha Pezzolanti has chosen to take the root of understanding the fear of change and how it keeps it sometimes keeps us grounded in one place because we fear the unknown of what comes with change. She explores this through her own life experiences and will illustrate ways in which to face this fear in many ways like she has. This podcast will allow for professionals to have another perspective on change and the way it can be seen as opportunity and not a rabbit hole.

Mariah Rajah has taken on the task of understanding and illustration the fear of leadership. In her own life she has been afraid to assume the role of a leader due to the fears of failing in the eyes of other and dropping the ball in that role. Her podcast will give examples of what she believes to be a good leader and will share her story of how she has even moved past her fear by assuming the role of a leader time after time. This podcast will be an overall look into leadership and the fears individuals can approach the role in such a way that they understand its responsibilities enough not to fear it.

Lastly, Pamela Drake will paint a picture of how individuals fear criticism, the way in which it affects an individual, as well as ways in which learning to make it constructive instead of destructive. Her exploration into the fear of criticism allows for her to relate to Ms. Stephenson’s podcast due to the fact that many of those who fear speaking fear being criticized for their voice. This podcast will reveal the ways in which a professional can understand the differences in critic and how the separate fear from it.

The podcast we hope to create will focus on these fears we speculate many professionals fear. We hope to produce an episode in which our audience can learn, engage, and realize that all fears are essentially inevitable but they do play a larger role in our lives that we may recognize. All in all we hope that this podcast will meet all requirements for the project effectively and our stories will be able to connect with not just an Openlab audience but a larger one.

The Real Estate of Fear – “Criticism”

This project is about the fear of criticism.

I will discuss what criticism is and how to overcome it by dealing with it in a positive way and turning it into something good.I will be focusing on criticism from a professional aspect.

As this is a collaborative effort, all the episodes will focus on the professional aspect of fear and attempt to have a cohesiveness to the episodes.

Beginning with a definition of criticism, I will discuss the barriers that many people encounter when dealing with criticism. I will refer to a research study that investigated criticism and what the research found. Then I will discuss the two types of criticism—constructive criticism and destructive criticism, what makes them different and what are the motivations for their approach.

I will discuss my personal struggle with coping with criticism and how it made me feel as a young person. I will discuss my challenges in Internalizing the feelings and how I overcame to be more professional and productive.

There will be two interview in the podcast where I will ask two people about their experiences of being criticized and how it made them feel. Then I will provide tangible solutions resulting from analyzing and evaluating the criticizer and the criticism.

I will conclude by reiterating that we have control over how we allow criticism to affect us and we should not be fearful.

9 Minute Version

7 Minute Version

The Real estate of fear- “Change”

Pitch

After much deliberation and brainstorming we have come to the conclusion that this third project should be based on the overall arching theme of fear and how it plays a part in determining aspects of our professional lives. Since this project will be be both collaborative and non-fictional based we have all chosen issues which we have faced in our personal lives that we believe many professionals also face.

Description
Change is something people sometimes have a problem coping with. Knocking things off the track or having them abruptly rerouted isn’t an easy hill to climb. However when you forget the courage and ability to climb obstacles no longer seem life changing. Change comes in many forms, personal being emotional or interpersonal or even physical. Professional change is another form of change that isn’t given much credit and that’s what I’ll be discussing today, how do you cope or understand that the goal you’d set yourself years ago is suddenly no longer an option.

For today’s class, you read Miller’s “Using Digital Storytelling for Promotion and Advertising” chapter. You’ve likely experienced or seen examples of the things that she discusses in this chapter. Use the beginning of class to write a summary of the reading and post it as a comment to this blog entry. We will discuss it briefly before continuing with Project 3 and Project 4.

For today’s class, we are catching up on reading pushed back in the interest of moving Project 3 forward. Looking specifically at Chapter 11, Beginning a Project and Chapter 12, Using Digital Storytelling to Teach and Train, let’s spend a slightly longer time than usual–15 minutes–writing summaries of these two chapters. Write your summary in a single memo and copy-and-paste it into a comment on this blog post at the end of the 15 minutes. Then, we will discuss the two chapters, the upcoming midterm exam, and Project 3. The remaining time will be used for working on Project 3.

Before our next class, you should complete a strong draft of your podcast episode’s script. We will begin working on this during class today after we discuss arrangement and script style.

Post a copy of your individual episode details memo into a comment to this blog entry. Remember: We will only work on Project 3 during class on Wednesday and we will cover the next two chapters in Miller during Monday’s class.

Beginning in our last class, you held a discussion to plan your collaborative podcast series. The memo describing your plans should have been written collaboratively. Each class member should copy-and-paste the memo into a comment to this post to demonstrate that everyone had access to the document and contributed to it.

During the first ten minutes of class, memorialize your reading of the Transmedia Storytelling chapter from Miller, and copy-and-paste your summary into a comment to this blog post. We will discuss the chapter and take a look at some of the examples that she mentions immediately afterwards before turning our attention back to Project 3.

This is a short fictional video inspired by TED Talk and I have recreated the organization FRED Talk. FRED Talk is a platform for discourse worth having. Started in 2016 as a class project where you can have a dialogue about various topics including business, technology, and professionalism. FRED is built on the foreground of sharing ideas across the seven seas. In this FRED Talk, presenter Naomi Dixon, renowned emotional intelligence subject matter expert shares her top 7 tips on emotional intelligence to becoming a good contributing citizen of society allows us to create a better tomorrow.

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Reflection

As I look back at the uniqueness of Project 2, I can’t help but think that in a matter of days I became a composer in the YouTube community. I was not only a participant but a composer, which I never imagined that I would ever be. One of the major challenges for this project was creating a unique fictional story around the subject of communication. When I wrote the script for the “FRED Talk” I wanted to be something useful, so I chose the topic of emotional intelligence because I thought it is something that everyone can work on. I wanted it to be timeless and useful. At my current internship, I became introduced to whiteboard video as a way to break down complex ideas into simple ones and I took a chance at creating my own video. Also, the reason why I choose to recreate a FRED Talk inspired by TED Talk is because I have dreams of one day working for the company. So this is a piece I could use as part of my portfolio for when I apply to TED. I want to show that I have a clear understanding of the goals and audience. Finally, after settling on a idea, scripts and storyboard I was ready to record the video. Looking back, I wished I had spent a little more time on perfecting the recording and editing of the videos. There were moments in my finished product that you could hear the video in other parts that it should not have been apart of the video.

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Analytics

Since the video has been up, it has received over 40 views. I posted the video via my personal Facebook and Twitter page in hopes to increase user engagement. Last week, I tweeted the video to TED Talk, and they read the tweet—fingers crossed they liked the video.

After everyone contributes to and is happy with the collaborative planning memo detailed in the step one of the assignment sheet, each student should copy-and-paste the memo into a comment on this blog post. Next week, we will pick up with each team member’s individual podcast episode.