When I was up in Whitehorse last week I got to spend time with folks from the Public Service Commission discussing a project that would see us looking at discriminations in the workplace from a complexity angle. Using Cynefin and SenseMaker(tm), we hope to understand the ways in which the landscape of discrimination shifts and changes over time so that the PSC can make wiser decisions about the kinds of initiatives it sculpts. One of the problems with diversity initiatives in the public service (in any large public organization really) is the feeling that they need to be broad based …
In the complex space, Paul Hobcraft shares some very good guiding principles, but the whole post shimmers with good advice about transformation, and is applicable to movement building, network organizing and enterprise. Today corporate transformations must be designed and executed quickly and routinely—not as once-a-decade events. Management teams are looking for best practices that increase speed and reduce the risk of pursuing business model innovation and change. That’s where minimum viable transformation comes into play. Before diving in, management teams should consider these five principles: 1. Learn how to learn. The central goal of minimum viable transformation is to learn …
I remember when I worked in the federal government, one of my roles was acting as part of an internal facilitation team. This team was put together by a director in who had an interest in organizational development. This was back in the late 1990s and we didn’t really have in house OD units which was a blessing. Instead we had this team of people that were interested in systems thinking, development and facilitation and we were made available by our bosses to do work within the organization. I cut a lot of my hosting teeth in that context. I remember …
Thinking that the facilitator has the answers is one of the biggest problems with the way people are entrained to relate to facilitators. Because you are guiding a process, many people will feel that you are also an authority on what to do. They will often stop and ask questions about how things are going to work. Imagine: you have just done an elegant and energetic Open Space opening and you are ready to hand the process over to the group. You have slowly and clearly explained the instructions. You have showed everyone how the process works. You have restated …
in most of our leadership training work and our strategic work with Harvest Moon, we devote at least a half day to working with limiting beleifs using a process developed by Byron Katie called simply The Work. At its simplest, the work is a process of inquiring into limiting beliefs that are unhelpful in our work and lives. Such beliefs often include judgements, ideologies and other beliefs that prevent us from really seeing the reality we are dealing with. Some of these beliefs are so strong that we take them for granted – such as “Richard shouldn’t have punched Eric” …