How to start a global movement
Lessons from World Escape Day
Thursday 24th September was forecast to be the day the world would end.
A good day to start building a new one, no?
The first World Escape Day brought people together over 2,000 people in 22 different cities around the world. From Melbourne to Madrid, and Johannesburg to Hamburg, those who got together in their city met because they share one belief:
Life is too short to do work that doesn’t matter to you.
This basic philosophy is the reason that Escape the City exists. And it’s as relevant in the US, France, Hong Kong and Portugal as it is in Escape’s birthplace, London.
Since 2010, when Escape the City was founded, we have received countless requests to bring career change education and opportunities to countries around the globe. With the company’s fifth birthday behind us, an online membership of a quarter million, a world-class team, and our flagship product (Tribes) helping hundreds of people in London, the time has well and truly come.
So, how do you start a global movement?
If five years of community-building has taught us anything, it’s that to lead the way, we need to get the hell out of the way. We are a facilitator, mobiliser, enabler, catalyst.
“It’s best to get as many people as possible into one room. And then go somewhere else.” (Seth Godin)
World Escape Day was designed with this as our guiding principle. It determined how we designed, co-ordinated, and structured the event. Here’s how.
Who wants in? Let the crowd decide
We figured that if there is enough appetite for an Escape meetup, the crowd will tell us. So we created a simple voting platform. Enough votes, and we would arrange a meetup in that city.
The result — after 9,000 votes for 250 different cities — was not necessarily what we would have predicted. We knew we had a strong following in Berlin, Hamburg and New York — but Siegendorf, Bucharest, and even Melbourne (not visible here) were a welcome surprise.
Good thing we asked.
Know your limits: hand over control
Let’s be real — with a team of just twelve, we had little choice but to rely on local volunteers to lead each city’s event.
Fortunately, this also meant we were forced to get out of the way. Local organisers know the best venues, are connected to excellent local speakers, and bring in additional attendees through their networks. Most importantly, they are able to optimise the event for the crowd in their city: they know which language to conduct things in, how best to brief and manage the speakers, and what the optimal start time and format is for their attendees.
If the Escape team had held on to the reins too tightly, the unique local colour of each event may have been lost.
Shut up, sit down: the spotlight isn’t on the stage
After five years of helping people make big career changes, we know that great stuff happens when a group of likeminded people get together.
Throwing endless material, speeches and worksheets at people only distracts from the all-important moments of connection — when a group of people realise they share a feeling and outlook they thought they were alone in.
“It’s so energising to see and feel that you’re not alone wanting to make a change”. (London attendee)
Our goal for every event is always to facilitate these connections. For World Escape Day, the structure was light-touch, with an emphasis on making time for people to meet each other. Although each event hosted a speaker, this was emphatically not about lecturing or teaching — rather, it was about storytelling that would bring out shared experiences.
Speaking of which…
Build a platform: showcase local heroes
Each event hosted local entrepreneurs, adventurers and independent careerists, who told the story of their escape.
We could have shipped out tried and tested UK-based speakers from our own networks, or video-linked to Escape’s founders talking about career change. But that would have undermined what was to be a defining feature of every event: the feeling that ‘if they can do it, I can do it too’.
“[Our speakers] were truly exceptional! Thank you for taking the time to share with us. I am so proud to be South African!” (Johannesburg attendee)
Social pressures are one of the main blockers to brave career change. The specific nature of these pressures will, naturally, vary subtly between cities, countries and continents.
Without local storytellers, those who attended would have missed out on hearing from people whose escape stories share the same cultural, economic and social setting as their own; and on seeing how relevant and possible it is to escape from that shared set of cultural constraints.
Simplify: define one call to action
With meetups in 22 different cities and 6 different time zones, it was important to ground every event in the same theme and idea. And, critically, we needed to mobilise those who attended into taking action.
Our theme was #smallsteps.
Escape specializes in the art of the start, the jumping off point into building a career on your terms. We know that the one and only way to start is to, well, actually start: to do… Mobilising over 2,000 people to make something happen is a helluva lot easier when that first action is:
- small. Otherwise it’s at risk of being unrealistic, daunting… and never happening..
- clearly defined. Knowing the ‘what’, ‘how’ and ‘when’ goes a long way in bridging the gap between thinking about doing something and actually doing it.
- shared. The power of accountability can’t be underestimated. Make sure everyone feels they are being checked up on and cheered on.
Every event’s attendees were asked to identify their #smallstep. Here is a selection of what was shared:
After being on my to do list for a month or so, last night gave me the push to sign up to a Leadership in Running course to help me explore the fitness industry a little more. Thanks Esc! Well done everyone on your #smallsteps today.
As my #smallstep I will begin volunteering as a mentor at a Secondary school next week with a view to moving into a career supporting vulnerable groups.
My small step — I just emailed the lovely illustrator girl I met last night about her illustrating some of my poems and us getting a book together and getting it published — I assume you’ll all be buying a copy!
My small step for today — I have just taken the password protect off my Challenge Champions Programme which encourages people to take on a challenge before their next birthday (this actually feels like a big step as it’s been sat in draft for over 2 months now!).
Just in case someone would like to watch the next one of my #smallsteps and is free tomorrow night: www.theaterclub-hamburg.de
This approach left the ball firmly in the court of each individual.
When the ball is in your court and you must decide what to do with it next — that’s empowerment, and it’s where change is born.
“After last week’s event, we feel empowered and in charge of innovating”.
(Rome attendee)
Scale: create space for connection
It’s easy to pick up a loudspeaker and yell rousing speeches to the crowd. But that approach soon results in tumbleweed and echoing silence.
“Great leaders create movements by empowering the tribe to communicate. They establish the foundation for people to make connections, as opposed to commanding people to follow them.” (Seth Godin)
Connecting people is guaranteed to fuel momentum. It is the key to scale. Mutual understanding, support and encouragement between community members creates the foundation for meaningful change.
We created a Facebook group for each city’s event, and invited all the attendees to join. Aside from sharing their #smallsteps (above) to foster accountability and exchange offers of help, their posts show the spirit of connectedness that a social movement thrives on.
“Team Paris — let’s not let this die down, if anyone wants to get together for a chat or needs to bounce off ideas, let me know.”
“The genuine desire for everyone to help each other achieve their dreams via Escape — despite having only just met — was truly humbling. I left feeling positive and certain that change will come.”
The Escape team have plenty to say, and will continue to create content that defines and furthers our mission. But ultimately we hope the crowd will create such a racket of their own that our voice becomes mere background noise.
“How we would say in Italian: L’Unione fa la forza. (Cohesion makes force)!” (London attendee)
…so, what’s next?
This was our first #smallstep.
Like any good small step, it did more than lay down groundwork — it fed us valuable data to guide our next move.
We understand more about the specific attitudes, needs, hopes and barriers associated with making brave career change in different countries. Plus, we confirmed that what we’ve learned in London is universally true: connecting a group of likeminded people together sparks magic. Discussing the possibility of a life fully led can offer relief from the too-often stifling expectations of family, friends and society. It can disrupt what ‘normal’ feels like — so that new friends become allies in creating a new, exciting and self-determined ‘normal’.
Our goal is to build on the momentum of World Escape Day by creating a structure that meetup groups around the world can use to self-organise and fuel their escapes. Which means that our second #smallstep will be to test a format for this in London. (To keep us accountable, the ‘register interest’ form has already gone live.)
Wherever you are, we hope you’ll come with us. Here are three things you can do to put some wind in your sails:
- Read our manifesto for a new way of working: How Can I Build a 21st Century Career?
- Connect with escapees in your country. Join a group or meetup for likeminded people on Facebook or Meetup.com. If you can’t find one — start your own.
- Identify your first #smallstep towards living your potential. Think about what makes you come alive, and start doing it in a small way. Tell someone you’re going to do it, then bloody well do it.
Done?
Welcome to the revolution.
