Chaos Rules!
10 August 2007This is a really cool slide show on how chaos can improve your business.
Metaphor to the rescue!
10 August 2007Imagine this. You have nearly 200 people in a room. It’s getting towards the end of a long day of travelling, meetings and workshopping – and you’ve promised to do some Social Network Analysis. You have about 30 minutes. That’s the scenario I found myself in this week. I know people (Andrew Rixon) who know…
Jumpstart Stories
10 August 2007I’ve used Jumpstart Stories twice now with great and surprising results. This activity is done standing up in a tight circle – up to 10 people per group for large groups. Each person has 90 seconds to tell a story about the topic. After the first round people find a new group and retell the…
Leadership – and the role of theatre
5 August 2007This article from Harvard Business School on Leadership is worth a look. It’s interesting that theatre is being considered in the same breath as leadership, delegation and control – those of us interested in the application of improv theatre principles in the workplace have been grappling with these concepts for a while now. The journey…
Why are we afraid of story?
1 August 2007Storytelling, I think, is a part of being human. We hear stories, tell stories and make sense of the world through stories. So why are some of us so afraid of stories? Here’s a conversation I had this week. Me: We’ll provide an opportunity for folk to tell a short story about something positive that’s…
Citizens at the Centre
31 July 2007Thanks to Chris Corrigan for this link to a white paper on citizen engagement.
OSonOS 2008 San Francisco
29 July 2007My friend Lisa Heft is hosting next year’s international Open Space on Open Space gathering in San Francisco. Here’s what she wrote: (drum roll, please….) Dear colleagues and friends On behalf of the Host Team for the 2008 World Open Space on Open Space… …the next annual international face-to-face gathering of Open Space facilitators, learners…
Aikido
25 July 2007Wow! I’m at an Asian Facilitation Conference in Malaysia and today attended a session on Kensankai Aikido Dojo. Aikido is a Japanese martial art, focusing on peace and harmony, using minimal strength and agression. We learned about presence and welcoming and centring and deflecting and movement and responding and blending techniques (enetering and turning). This…
Improvised Facilitation – the heart of facilitation
22 July 2007Making choices is at the heart of facilitation. Choices are made from the moment we agree to a facilitation task – and continue throughout the design process AND, most importantly, when facilitating with a group. Those choices include what to wear, how to act, what to say, what to do, how to respond… With so…