Participatory Methods

Our core capability is the design and facilitation of participatory planning and change processes:	We are accredited and experienced in these highly engaging, participative methodologies:
Conferences Summits Team meetings Trainings One-on-one coaching sessions for successful implementation.	Appreciative Inquiry… Open Space Technology… Future Search Conferencing…
To request a proposal for any of the above services or be trained in these methods, please contact us.
Our key to success is flexibility with service configurations that scale to fit your needs. We draw upon leading technologies to achieve the following results: Cause people to care about and take responsibility for their contributions Make sense in the bigger scheme of things Improve productivity in a structured framework Encourage contribution Increase work satisfaction Create bigger connections	We encourage you to include all relevant stakeholders for input into decision-making. Our services ensure you make the right connections and put them to work. We know trust grows when people share their stories. We know stories unfold from the respectful act of inquiring. We know the respectful act of inquiring leads to understanding. We know understanding builds relationships, trust and prosperity

We stress the art of crafting questions.

How we ask that very first question is fateful – it determines what comes next.

• We live in a world our questions create.
• The questions determine the results.
• The more positive the question, the more it will create the possible.
• Questions create movement towards positive change.
• The questions we ask are choice points.

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Appreciative Inquiry

Appreciative inquiry is an affirming way to embrace organizational change. It initiates long term positive change.

• From the very first question we ask, positive change begins.
• Why not ask what’s right, rather than what’s wrong?
• We ask what works, rather than what are the problems to be fixed.

What is a high point experience in your organization – a time when you were most alive and engaged?

• Appreciative Inquiry is a change method with the perspective that every organization has something that works right – things that give it life when it is most alive, effective, successful and connected in healthy ways to its stakeholders and communities.
• Appreciative Inquiry begins by identifying what is positive and connects the positive qualities in ways that heighten energy and vision for change.

Applications

• Strategic Planning
• Change Management
• Leadership Development and Team Effectiveness
• Valuing Diversity
• Mission, Vision, Values Creation
• Innovation and Prototyping
• Collaboration Break-throughs
• Product Development

What will happen?

Appreciate Inquiry can vary in length – from a 1.5 hour introductory interview to a full 3 days summit, depending on the objectives. The framework is the 4-D Cycle and the process is flexible and adaptable.

Impact of Appreciative Inquiry

• Reduced cycle time for positive change - change ready
• Rapid whole system mobilization capacity for strategic planning
• Digital story telling
• Measurable performance in unit performance and employee morale.
• To learn more about Appreciative Inquiry, please contact us.

“Extraordinary Organizations Are:

Vision-guided, principle-driven businesses and organizations that focus on the “7 Ps of organizational excellence”—Purpose, Principles, Performance, Profit, People, Planet, and bold Possibilities. They serve the needs of employees, the community, external stakeholders, and the world as a creative, entrepreneurial, and constructive force for individual, organizational, and global change. By applying the concepts of Appreciative Inquiry, these leading-edge organizations soar to new heights of success while simultaneously seeing their role in society through a new lens.”

David Cooperrider , co-creator of Appreciative Inquiry

Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University

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Search Conferencing

When you awaken people to the difference between a probable future and a desirable future, you make them aware that a probable future means mostly doing nothing so things stay the same; whereas a desirable future provides desire for a co-operative search for what it is you want to create so you collectively make it happen.

Search Conferencing is a potent way of awakening people to new possibilities for the future. Search Conferencing is a participative planning event that enables a large group to collectively create a plan that the members themselves will implement. They search for the most desirable future of a system to bring about positive change.

Four Design Principles

• Getting the “whole system” in the room (or a representational cross section)
• Exploring the same global context as a backdrop for local action.
• Focusing on the future and common ground rather than conflicts and problems.
• Inviting self-management and personal responsibility for action during and after the conference.

Four Assumptions about People

• People are purposeful with the capacity to select and produce desirable outcomes
• People accept responsibility for a task that is meaningful to them
• People are ideal seeking under the appropriate conditions
• Given the above, people grow and contribute to the well-being of their system and this is transferable to others

What will happen?

The central point is a workshop – preferably off-site that involves meticulous pre conference planning, followed by ongoing learning and implementation. This participative, highly interactive methodology is also known as Future Search.

Impact of Search Conferencing

“The desirable future for the world as it as been envisioned by people from hundreds of Search Conferences expresses a set of common ideals. The world people wish to bring into being is a world in which they can work together

- be joyful in their daily lives

- make wise decisions

Their desirable future always includes components that state:

- we all belong to the same human race

- we live together in peace

- we respect our differences

- we co-operate to better our world

we care for the thing that most binds us, our physical home, the planet earth

The envisioned future may sound like a utopian dream, but it is an expression of the highest human ideals. It is the kind of world that we collectively desire and would create if our institutions were aligned with our hopes and dreams. Search Conferencing is a potent way of awakening people to new possibilities for the future. Pockets of this dream can be found in progressive companies that have truly empowered their employees, where work has become meaningful and business in thriving.”

From Merrelyn Emery and Ronald E. Purser, “The Search Conference” 1996, Jossey Bass

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Open Space Technology

When diversity, complexity and urgency meet passion and responsibility, workable solutions abound.

Open Space Technology is a simple and highly effective meeting method that enables groups of people, to deal with issues constructively and speedily.

There are Five Preconditions for Open Space:

• Real issues of concern
• Diversity of players
• Complexity of elements
• Presence of passion
• Decision time was yesterday.

In Open Space meetings, participants create and manage their own agenda of parallel working sessions around a central theme of strategic importance.

There are Four Principles of Open Space

• Whoever comes is the right people.
• Whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
• Whenever it starts is the right time.
• When it’s over, it’s over.

There is One Law of Open Space

• The Law of Two Feet – if you find yourself in a situation where you are neither learning nor contributing, use your two feet.

Open Space is without formal prescribed agendas and can appear to lack structure. Yet, an Open Space meeting is highly structured through the capacity of self organization. Those who care and are prepared to take responsibility step up and drive the change agenda with an energy and commitment that no imposed management–driven design could prescribe.

What will happen?

We never know exactly what will happen when we open the space for people to do their most important work, but we can guarantee these results when any group gets into Open Space:

• All of the issues that are most important to the participants will be raised.
• All of the issues raised will be addressed by those participants most qualified and capable of getting something done on each of them.
• In a time as short as one or two days, all of the most important ideas, discussion, data, recommendations, conclusions, questions for further study, and plans for immediate action will be documented in one comprehensive report — finished, printed and in the hands of participants when they leave.

The meeting duration depends on the number of people and the number of issues they put on the agenda. With groups of 5 to 2000 — working in regular weekly staff meetings, one-day workshops, three-day conferences, the results are powerful and effective

Impact of Open Space

It all begins with an invitation

• Palpable passion
• Voluntary responsibility and accountability for issues of concern
• Connection at all levels across all divides
• Opening of the mind and heart
• Energy for positive change and action
• To learn more about Open Space Technology, please contact us.

“In the 20 year period since 1985 when I created Open Space, it has been used in excess of 60,000 times in 108 countries with groups ranging in size from 5 – 2000. Typical applications have included such things as strategic and tactical planning for Rockport Shoes Inc – in which some 400 employees established goals and directions for their company in addition to developing a totally new product and redesigning their inventory system. All of this was accomplished in 2 days, and except for the opening and closing of the event there was absolutely no intervention by the facilitator (me) at any time. The people did it all by themselves.

In another case, some 2008 German Psychiatrists gathered for a single day’s event intended to synthesize their collective learning at the conclusion of their biannual conference and further build the common body of knowledge. In all they created 236 working groups in about half an hour, self-managed the entire process and produced a book of proceedings as a record of their effort.

In the United States, a much smaller group (23) of architects, technicians, and executives completely re-designed the AT&T Olympic Pavilion for the 1996 Olympics. They essentially started with a blank sheet of paper, and at the conclusion of 2 days had a totally new design down to the level of working architectural drawings for the $200,000,000(US) project. Once again the group did it all without outside intervention.”

Harrison Owen, Creator of Open Space Technology

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Participatory Tools

Language is a tool. Feelings are tools. Thinking patterns are tools. Processes and systems are tools. They are all tools that enable us to evolve, grow, develop and prosper. In this section, we outline briefly our use of groupware and web-based tools that create positive change, enhance and enable participation and meaningful collaboration.

We offer a range of tools to increase participation, heighten engagement, and improve productivity and collaboration. In our workshops and conferences, we supply participants with wireless keyboards, or, if they are remote, they participate via laptops or via linked conference hubs with their own keyboard setup. You can have a closed system for registered participants to see what all other participants are typing as the data is streamed onto a large projected screen, in themes, as opposed to a continuous, unrelated, growing list.

Our use of and experience with a range of next generation groupware, hasn’t yet delivered us a one stop shop. There are pluses and minuses among them all. However, as a first step, if you can achieve the following, then you are on the way to creating and/or sustaining a participatory culture, using technology wisely.

• Everyone gets really involved and is heard.
• Disorganized groups self-organized organically.
• Knowledge is shared and new knowledge is co-created.
• There is pause to make sense of all the knowledge generated.
• People become committed and more readily support what they create.

Success Factors

Success is achieved by establishing a protocol that ensures the focus remains on the human-to-human connection. Unless facilitated appropriately, there is tendency for people to have the relationship with their computer!

Success also involved facilitating a sense-making step to review and make sense of the rapidly accumulating knowledge progressively. While the input during early phases is often raw and somewhat unfocused, we find the quality of input increases dramatically when you include a sense-making step for participants to review the knowledge gathered so far. The facilitator asks for themes or poses questions to guide the thought process or aid in decision-making to create positive change. Examples of questions the facilitator can pose at this point:

• What does this mean for the issue?
• What does this say about our culture, our leadership our values etc?.
• What are the emerging themes?
• What patterns do you see?
• What are our collective strengths?
• Where do we need to focus our attention?
• What are the next steps, timeframes, resource needs etc?

Co-creating next steps will depend on the objectives of the meeting, the tools used and the will, skill and mindset of the participants. How a group proceeds is a facilitated choice. At minimum, a report with all the questions and the conversations is distributed to the participants and other relevant parties.

We build in action planning, personal commitments, self-reflection, and sometimes all of those factors into all our workshops.

To learn more about participatory tools and online facilitation, please contact us.

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