NOVA Scribes

Expressing Emotion and Making Human Connection
A drawing workshop with Lisa Rothstein | DrawingOutYourGenius.com

Bring more humanity, story, and feeling into your drawings.

Whether you’re a facilitator, consultant, coach, or visual thinker, this hands-on online workshop will help you move beyond stick figures and charts to create drawings that truly connect. Led by cartoonist, writer, and visual facilitator Lisa Rothstein, you’ll learn simple, expressive techniques to make your drawings come alive with emotion.

In this 60-minute session, you’ll learn to:

• Draw faces that express real emotion: joy, frustration, surprise, pride, and more
• Add simple body language and gestures that tell a story
• Capture the emotional content of what people are saying, not just the words
• Choose when and where to bring emotion into your visual notes or illustrations
• Replace lifeless stick figures with quick, expressive characters anyone can draw
• Also, we’ll practice drawing animals!

Why it matters:
Emotional expression brings humanity to your visuals. When you show people feeling something — not just doing something — your audience instantly connects. A character straining under the weight of too many tasks says more than a to-do list ever could. A joyful customer sketch communicates success faster than twenty PowerPoint slides.

Who it’s for:
Facilitators, coaches, consultants, UX designers, and anyone who uses hand-drawn visuals to communicate ideas, tell stories, or engage groups. No art degree required: just curiosity, a pen, and a willingness to make marks on paper.

Format:

• Live online session (Zoom)
• 60 minutes of drawing, laughter, and learning
• Materials: Paper and pen or tablet of your choice

Hey IFVP Members!
Our Annual General Meeting (AGM) is set for Tuesday, November 18 at 8:00am MST (UTC−7) on Zoom. The AGM is required by our bylaws and will run one hour. We’ll keep it crisp, useful, and a little celebratory too—because it’s also our Harvest Party! 🥳

When

• Tuesday, Nov 18
• 8:00–9:00am Mountain Time (UTC−7)
• 7:00 AM PT • 10:00 AM ET • 3:00 PM UTC • 4:00 PM CET

Where

• Zoom

AGM (first half)

• Welcome & context
• Financial Report (high-level overview)
• Mentorship update (pilot → next steps)
• Website highlights
• Circle Forum: what’s what

Harvest Party (second half) – Visual Jam!

• A fast, fun visual workshop to close the year together:
• Warm-up sketch prompts
• Quick “visual sprints”
• 60-second share-outs (optional, encouraging, zero-pressure)
• Bring paper + a bold pen/marker (or your tablet). Expect playful prompts and fresh ideas you can use in your practice.

## How to Join:

• Zoom: Link accessible once you register
• Prep (optional): Paper, bold marker, 3–5 sticky notes, and your favorite beverage.

We can’t wait to gather, reflect on the year, and make some marks together. See you on the 18th! 🌟

Reflective Reasoning: A Practical Framework for Better Conversations
with Doug Hensch

When discussions get tense or deeply personal, people often retreat into defensiveness or double down on their positions. Yet with the right tools, these moments can be transformed into opportunities for insight and connection. Reflective Reasoning is a practical framework designed to help participants navigate difficult conversations by drawing from research in conflict resolution, negotiation, “street epistemology,” and motivational interviewing.

This interactive workshop introduces a simple, three-step model:

Make it safe - Help others understand they won't be attacked or manipulated.
Ask for their beliefs – Invite others to share their thoughts.
Scale their confidence – Explore the level of confidence behind that belief without judgment.
Know – Understand how they arrived at their perspective by uncovering reasoning and evidence.

Through live demonstration, guided practice, and peer coaching, participants will learn how to apply the ASK model to real-world situations. The session balances brief teaching with hands-on practice, ensuring that participants walk away with both conceptual clarity and applied skill.

Learning Outcomes
By the end of the workshop, participants will be able to:

1. Apply the ASK model to de-escalate difficult conversations.
2. Use curiosity and open-ended questions to strengthen dialogue and trust.
3. Recognize how reflective reasoning promotes mutual understanding, even in the face of disagreement.
4. Practice techniques from motivational interviewing to encourage self-reflection in others.

Who Should Attend
Leaders, managers, facilitators, coaches, and anyone who wants to navigate challenging conversations with confidence, empathy, and skill.

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Doug Hensch is an executive coach, author, and speaker who helps leaders grow through humility, curiosity, and connection. He has worked with top organizations like PwC, Hilton, Freddie Mac, and the National Institutes of Health, guiding executives and teams to strengthen resilience, problem-solving, and leadership skills. Earlier in his career, he led Nextel’s eCare efforts, saving the company over $10 million annually, and later launched a self-improvement platform that reached more than 100,000 people. He’s also the author of three books, including Positively Resilient, Re-Thinking Humility, and Re-Thinking Curiosity. His fourth book is scheduled to launch in 2026 and will be a sort of daily devotional for leaders. Doug is based in Leesburg, Virginia, and is a diehard Buffalo Bills and Boston Red Sox fan. Go Bills!

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NOVA Scribes has entered into a partnership with the IFVP: the International Forum of Visual Practitioners! This workshop is part of IFVP Learning.

This workshop will be recorded and posted on YouTube for anyone who cannot attend. You can find the YouTube link in the Comments section of this NOVA Scribes Meetup event once the workshop video has been uploaded to YouTube.

We’re not charging for this workshop, but we will be asking for donations! Donations cover the costs of hosting events on Meetup, to honorariums for new graphic recorders, and scholarships.

Please be sure you are registered on Meetup! If your Zoom name doesn’t match your name on Meetup, you will not be admitted. (We’ve had Zoom bombers.)