Top 5 Books
A friend asked me if I could keep only 5 of my books* (gasp!) what would they be.
*Existing books, already on my bookshelf
*Work/business-related books
So here goes: (in no particular order)
Hang on – this is hard! I’ve had to decide on some criteria – so ‘currently useful’ and ‘well thumbed’ (which I guess means, ‘useful in the past’ too)
Keith Johnstone’s ‘Impro’ – it’s a classic and I used it to inform my facilitation practice well before I knew anything about improv
Sam Kaner’s (et al) ‘Facilitator’s Guide to Participatory Decision Making’ – lots of really practical processes, and good theoretical underpinning of the process of group decision making
Thiagi’s ‘Design Your own Games & Activities’ – for when I’m stuck and want some inspiration for an intentional activity to reinforce a learning point (especially in training)
Robert McKee’s ‘Story’ – just everything you need to know about story, narrative, mythic structure etc – a great source of all things, well, story
Paul Jackson & Mark McKergow’s ‘The Solutions Focus’ – because I’m a novice at this approach and am enjoying applying it. The book is a great ‘how to’ and reminder.
How about you – what are your Top 5?
PS: My friend then went on to ask which books had been most influential. That’s another story for another time.
Hi Viv,
my current top 5
The Art of focused conversations: lots of thoughful and insightful ways to approach exploratory dialogue using the ORID/ discussion technique, where at times people are unaware they are in a facilitation mode.
Winning through participation: Laura J Spencer…because the ICA/ Technology of Participation frameworks are where I began a more intentional facilitation journey.
SAm Kaner’s Pacipatory Decision Making for the same reasons you gave
Workshop Management: method to magic Strachan and Pitters, heaps of planning templates and structure to the thought processes that sit behind workshops planning and design, suits me very well.
Vivien Twyfords’ Beyond Public Meetings as a primer and reminder for all the stuff to get right and all the right reasons to bother to get it all together, when doing public participation,
love your blog site, cheerio Tammie