Add PETALS Advent 2025 recap post

posts/blog/2026/petals-advent-2025.md

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+---
+title: "PETALS Advent"
+date: 2026-01-23
+categories:
+  - "blog"
+tags:
+  - "petals"
+  - "advent"
+  - "team-health"
+  - "video"
+---
+
+Last month I ran a **PETALS Advent**: a daily video drop with short, practical prompts to help teams build healthier habits. Think of it as a 24-day nudge for psychological safety, feedback loops, and better ways of working. Each day delivered one micro-lesson.
+
+I wanted the series to feel light and doable. Each episode was designed to be under a couple of minutes, with just one idea per day. It was also a small personal experiment: could I outline, record, edit, publish, and promote a video *every day* without burning out?
+
+### What the series covered
+
+PETALS already covers a broad range of team health topics, so I used the Advent format to explore safety and trust, feedback and candour, clarity and alignment, rhythm and rituals, plus celebration and reflection. It wasn’t about deep dives. It was about small prompts that are easy to try in the next stand-up, retro, or 1:1.
+
+### The process (what worked)
+
+A few things made the daily cadence possible. I sketched the full 24-day outline early so I wasn’t scrambling for topics. Each video kept the same arc; context, a single prompt, and one action to try. I recorded quickly, used Descript for edits, and scheduled via Buffer.
+
+Even with that rhythm, some days still felt like a sprint. But the process held up better than expected and taught me a lot about shipping fast without losing quality.
+
+### Popular posts (by view count)
+
+Below is a starting list of the best-performing Advent videos from the playlist. I’ll update the numbers once the view counts are pulled directly from YouTube analytics.
+
+| Rank | Episode (topic) | Views | Link |
+| --- | --- | --- | --- |
+| 1 | _TBD_ | _TBD_ | [Playlist](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKbU77Ew5WTFEUBne9NhknObjdP-YLI-Z&si=sVVzILdhkKKuxs5W) |
+| 2 | _TBD_ | _TBD_ | [Playlist](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKbU77Ew5WTFEUBne9NhknObjdP-YLI-Z&si=sVVzILdhkKKuxs5W) |
+| 3 | _TBD_ | _TBD_ | [Playlist](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKbU77Ew5WTFEUBne9NhknObjdP-YLI-Z&si=sVVzILdhkKKuxs5W) |
+| 4 | _TBD_ | _TBD_ | [Playlist](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKbU77Ew5WTFEUBne9NhknObjdP-YLI-Z&si=sVVzILdhkKKuxs5W) |
+| 5 | _TBD_ | _TBD_ | [Playlist](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKbU77Ew5WTFEUBne9NhknObjdP-YLI-Z&si=sVVzILdhkKKuxs5W) |
+
+### What I learned
+
+**Small prompts travel far.** The shortest episodes often sparked the most comments because they were easy to try immediately. **Consistency builds trust.** Showing up daily reminded me (and the audience) that trust grows through repetition. **Systems beat motivation.** A simple, repeatable workflow was the only reason I could keep it up.
+
+If you missed the series, the full playlist is here: **[PETALS Advent 2025](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKbU77Ew5WTFEUBne9NhknObjdP-YLI-Z&si=sVVzILdhkKKuxs5W)**. Let me know which episode resonated most, and I’ll consider expanding the top themes into longer articles later in the year.