My 2018 Year in Review
By: Marie Poulin
Tags: Small Business, 2018, Entrepreneurship, Year In Review, Creativity

It’s time to take stock of the past years highlights, lowlights, lessons learned, and plans for the new year.

In the past I’ve gotten quite granular and categorized with my yearly reviews. These days I’m trying to simplify, so I’m moving this simple format: what went well, what didn’t go well, and what I’m planning for in 2019.

What went well

MicroConf Starter

It was pretty darn exciting to speak at one of my favourite conferences earlier this year. I managed to combine my love + knowledge of permaculture with my experience and insights into growing a software product as a tiny two-person company.

The Sustainable SaaS: What permaculture can teach us about building software

Christian Genko wrote a great recap here.

I also did a guest panel at the welcome reception for Shine Bootcamp to reflect on my experience as a participant of the speaking bootcamp the year before. Shine Bootcamp (previously CentHer Stage) was an incredible weekend speaker training that helped me get the guts and experience needed to accept that speaking invitation for MicroConf.

Marie + Lisa at Shine Bootcamp 2018

Travel + Vacation

We managed to squeeze in some travel with a trip to Belgium to visit our business friend Natasha Vorompiova.

I signed up for one of Natasha’s Systems programs years ago when I needed help getting my systems in order, and she’s been a wonderful mentor and friend ever since.

We’d talked about making this happen for 3–4 years now, so this was a definite highlight for me. We got to be neighbours for a week! We made meals together, and her husband took us on a few tours of Belgium to make sure we were well acquainted with Belgian beer.

Website relaunch

This was an effort and a half, but once we finally relaunched our website, things really started to fall into place with more ease. We had an easier time speaking to our strengths, attracted top-notch clients, and felt more confident in where we were heading as a company.

A much more effective website at weareokidoki.com

It probably took about 8 months from the time we first acknowledged that we needed to make a change to the time we actually launched. It was a struggle to achieve clarity and felt like it took forever, but the struggle was worth it.

Our redesign led to a ton of great momentum and incredible clients, and we’re continuing to see the ripple effect of this major change!

Personal Finances

I’d read Shannon Lee Simmons book Worry Free Money (cannot recommend enough) at the end of 2017, so 2018 started off with a really effective personal finance plan and budget. I went full frugal in 2018, and went hard on crushing my debts. Things were tight, but I was forced to get really creative!

I sold clothing, traded items, and found all sorts of amazing things second hand (even plants!).

I reduced my clothing consumption massively, and made a major effort to shift my buying habits toward a more ethical closet (and house).

Part of this experience reopened my love of sewing and mending.

While I’m really proud of the changes I’ve made in my personal spending, I got my hands on an advance copy of Shannon’s latest book Living Debt Free, and realized that I might have been going a little too frugal, which wasn’t really sustainable long term.

While it was a great experiment… and I know just how frugal I can go and still be happy, we decided to give ourselves a big raise in 2019 :)

Relationship

Couples counselling was a real highlight this year (yes, really!).

Living and working together from home means we rely on excellent communication in order to thrive both in business and in our home life.

We spend so much time together — and know each other so well — that it can be a little too easy make assumptions about what we’re each experiencing on a day-to-day basis.

Working on our company website together was a challenge. It brought up lots of questions for us both about what kind of work we wanted to be doing, where we see the business going, and how to make sure that both of our needs are being met professionally and personally.

love this guy.

It was incredible to be able to have a safe space to work through all of our thoughts, desires, fear, and insecurities. I feel like the insights, perspective, and tools we encountered through this process have had a lasting positive impact on our relationship, and I cannot recommend therapy enough, no matter how awesome your relationship is!

Friendships

I look back fondly on some of the amazing times I’ve had with friends this year, both old and new. I feel really grateful for amazing friends, both online and off!

Learning + Education

Permaculture

In 2018 I completed a 16-month Permaculture Design Certificate. I fell in love with the whole experience; the teachers, locations, learning, insights, reading, and the general sense that nature has so much wisdom for us if we are listening.

I signed up for an intense 5-day retreat — Cultural Emergence Effective Design — that was absolutely incredible and nurturing.

I couldn’t get enough, and decided to start a Permaculture Diploma with my incredibly inspiring teacher Delvin. This multi-year process will have me designing a number of projects that explore and apply the principles of permaculture in the context of business, life, home, and community.

Joining this community has led to so many wonderful in-person connections and friendships for which I am so grateful.

CTA Conference

I attended CTAConf for the 4th year in a row. I always learn something new at this conference, and it’s a fantastic opportunity to see old friends from out of town!

New Systems

We finally got some much needed clarity on our systems, and moved over to using Notion.so. We wrote about that more here.

I started to really clean up my processes behind the scenes, and standardize my offers, which led to a signature offer of sorts: the Strategic Roadmap.

This offer has really helped me double down on the parts of projects I love, while leveraging my strengths: diving into customer research, optimizing messaging, and offering strategic insights on product/service design + delivery.

Space for extracurricular activities

I learned how to knit + crochet (thank you Skillshare!)

Picked up sewing again, and made Ben this awesome housecoat:

Ben’s new uniform

Continued to learn about gardening, and keeping houseplants alive!

Became a Girl Guide Leader. I started volunteering as a Girl Guide Leader with Pathfinders (age 12–14). Talk about a learning curve! This has been a seriously challenging but rewarding experience that is stretching me on so many levels.

A fun little gig

Ben and I did a small acting gig for the YMCA on the Sunshine Coast. We basically got paid to have fun at camp for a few days, rock climbing, kayaking, learning archery, playing charades, and toasting marshmallows around the campfire! Our friends were the videographers ;)

See all the promo videos they made that weekend:

YMCA Elphinstone Rentals and Retreats

Reading + Learning

Books:

Designing Your Life

Atomic Habits

Thinking Fast and Slow

7 Habits of Highly affective people (re-read)

6 pillars of Self Esteem

Boundaries

The Now Habit

Nudge

The Productivity Project

Urban Lot

Steal Like an Artist

The Obstacle is the way

Service Design for Business

Talk like Ted

Demystifying Public Speaking

Permaculture: A Designers Manual

Gaia’s Garden

Year Round Vegetable Gardener

Courses:

Copy School

Make it Stick Habit School

Shows

We made a big change in late 2018 to stop watching Netflix during the week (which you can read more about here), which has been such a great change for us, opening up a lot more time for hobbies, extracurricular activities, books, and learning.

This has forced us to be really choosy about what shows we do end up watching.

Here are some of my favourite shows that I watched in 2018: