Out Of The Clouds Jenny Sauer-Klein on experience design, connection and scaling intimacy
In this episode, Anne Muhlethaler, host of Out of the Clouds, interviews consultant and experience design specialist Jenny Sauer-Klein.
Jenny is passionate about how we get together as groups and how we learn, and she regularly consults for organisations like Google, Airbnb, Dropbox and the Haas School of Business. She is a wonderful facilitator who has spent her life creating lasting experiences for a myriad of different audiences and is a frequent presenter at international conferences and has been featured in The New York Times, Forbes, Fast Company, and Inc., as well as Tim Ferriss’ book “Tools of Titans”.
In this conversation, the native New Yorker shares with Anne her personal journey, how she went from Broadway actress to yoga teacher, which led her to therapeutic acrobatics and then on to launching AcroYoga with co-founder Jason Nemer.
Jenny talks about how she stepped away from this previous career despite having scaled AcroYoga to an international brand, community and organisation with millions of practitioners, and how she came later to understand that the values that AcroYoga was based on -- trust, connection and playfulness -- were still her core values that would guide her towards her next steps.
Jenny also explains her thoughts on how we gather and learn. The two go over some of the pillars of the experience design training program Jenny created (named Scaling Intimacy, which Anne took last year) and how you can help people make a crowd of 100 people feel like a gathering of 10. The three-day workshop caters to those wanting to develop interactive and engaging live events where collaborative learning and connection are privileged over content.
Finally, the new mom talks about her experience of pregnancy during COVID, and distils the essence of the TED talk she gave (while 8 months pregnant) in January 2021 on the 3 Keys to Virtual Connection.
If you are into leading engaging events or want to create meaningful experiences and inspire your communities with a sense of purpose and connection, this is the episode for you. Happy listening!
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Selected Links from Episode
You can find Jenny at https://www.jennysauerklein.com/
And Scaling Intimacy School of Experience Design - https://scalingintimacy.com/
Play on Purpose - https://playonpurpose.com/
You can watch Jenny's TED talk, the 3 keys of virtual connection https://www.ted.com/talks/jenny_sauer_klein_3_keys_to_virtual_connection
Ken Nateshvar Scott https://contactyoga.com/
Jason Nemer and Acro Yoga
Learning zones framework - https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/learning-zone-model.htm
Pryia Parker - The Art of Gathering book
The study by Arthur Aarons about interpersonal closeness https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003
Business Insider article on Breema, Tim Ferriss and no hurry, no pause https://www.businessinsider.com/how-tim-ferriss-keeps-from-burning-out-2017-1?r=US&IR=T
Breema - https://www.breema.com/
The Red Tent - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4989.The_Red_Tent
Stinson Beach - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stinson_Beach,_California
The song Ani Kuni by Polo & Pan
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If you enjoyed this episode, click subscribe for more, and consider writing a review of the show on Apple Podcasts, we really appreciate your support and feedback. And thank you so much for listening!
For all notes and transcripts, please visit Out Of The Clouds on Simplecast - https://out-of-the-clouds.simplecast.com/
Sign up for Anne's email newsletter for more from Out of the Clouds at https://outoftheclouds.com.
Follow Anne and Out of the Clouds: IG: @_outoftheclouds or @annvi Or on Threads @annvi On Youtube @OutoftheClouds
For more, you can read and subscribe to Anne's Substack, the Mettā View, her weekly dose of insights on coaching, brand development, the future of work, and storytelling, with a hint of mindfulness.