We Think

The Hub in Brussels at the Art of Hosting

Last week, I have been in Belgium to visit the Hub in Brussels and to be part of the Art of Hosting. Over 50 people gathered at the Heerlijckyt to celebrate diversity, complexity, and collective intelligence through conversations that matter.

 

I had to go to Brussels to meet Mushin from Berlin who wrote about the Art of Hosting afterwards: “Art of Hosting is not a method, even though it uses state-of-the-art (post-)modern social technologies that make a lot of sense and help turn that sense into effective action - if that is what the participants wish.”

Using the Hub vision document to present the Hub concept at the Art of Hosting in the Hub in Brussels last Tuesday, Simone and me discovered the chaordic stepping stones inside:

Simone is the initiator of the Hub in Brussels.

And this is how her week looks like:

The Davos 2008 question

Conversations for Change

Through the online Presencing classroom, I have “met” Deborah Goldblatt who is the initiator and director of the Youth Dialogue Project. I have just watched the 16min video about this inspiring project and would like to share it with you:

Presencing Global Classroom - self stakeholder dialogues

This week, I have used the second exercise from the online course in order to invite 3 stakeholders from self Germany for a dialogue around their objectives and relationship to self.

2 stakeholders followed the invitation so far and I conducted 2 phone interviews: one with a member of the co-operative and one with a friend who has given a personal guarantee for the loan that self will get from the GLS-Bank.

Personal observations/conclusions include:

• The Voice of Cynicism was trying to play games with me and it slipped through once but I managed to keep it out of the conversation for the rest of the conversation.
• I was listening during the conversation for questions to emerge.
• Once we had reached the last question of the outline “What would be the practical next steps?”, I felt that this was not the end of the conversation, I paused, and I asked another question we often use in Pioneers of Change dialogues: “After this conversation, what is your burning question now?”
• And this question actually brought up the key insight for the whole conversation.
• After the first interview, the interviewee made a comment that I hear from a few people lately: “This is a simple process with most elements not being new. A normal consultant can come up with such a process.” How do I deal with this comment? Why is this process so fascinating and engaging for me?
• During the first conversation, I connected the conversation to my current process of defining my role as “Initiator & Facilitator of Change Networks” and to develop a social pioneer Unfolding Cards game.
• In the second interview, I took the personal burning question from the first interview to continue the dialogue among self stakeholders.

The full interviews will be posted on the selfHUB blog within the next few days…

Presencing Global Classroom - Empathy Walk Reflection

Some of you might remember Sofia’s U-Process session from Imagine 2005 and 2007…

I had my first online course on the U-Process with Otto Scharmer last week. Here is my the reflection paper for the next class next week:

(1) What interests and intentions brought you to this class?
I have recently joined a start-up organization here in Germany which has worked with the U-process in their team processes and wants to use it in further organizational developments, as well. I am also a member of a small reading group in Berlin meeting every few weeks to reflect on chapters from “Theory U”. Finding the online course on the Presencing website is a very good opportunity to get insight from Otto Scharmer directly and to learn with a group of people across borders and time zones.

(2) What is the core question that you want to explore?
I left my job at Greenpeace International last year in order to start practicing
as an “Initiator & Facilitator of Change Networks”: how can I use Presencing in my new job?

(3) What did you learn from your empathy walk?
I imagined a group of young people that I did a workshop with a few weeks back: they were catholic rural youth from the south of Germany. I remember that I felt really foreign in my own country that day. I realized that during the empathy walk I was quite curious to ask them questions such as: “How does a typical day look like for you? What do you do after school/work? What is important to you?“ I think, I was consciously preventing the Voice of Judgment to interfere in this “silent conversation”. I felt the urge to actually pick up the phone and ask these questions personally.
In summary, I learned that I was curious about the foreign and quite eager to explore questions with somebody unknown in order to start a dialogue.

selfHUB in Berlin

…is getting ready for take-off in November 2007!

Some of you might remember Manja from Imagine 2007…after 14 months of searching, a building has been found in Berlin-Kreuzberg.

We are looking for social pioneers to build the network for social innovation in Germany.

You can read about selfHUB developments here.

Another Imagine conference

We are not the only ones running IMAGINE conferences:

Imagine that you’re at the heart of a school and a community where every person is honored, where there is a passion for thinking and acting like you make a difference, where your unique talents and abilities are recognized and included. That is the world we’re creating at the Imagine-Nation Conference. That is the world we are inviting you to join!

The Imagine-Nation Conference brings together two groups: visionary adults who are already at work in their communities, shaping an inclusive future for their city AND visionary high school youth who are tomorrow’s national leaders, who can co-create a powerful path for their communities and for the nation.

The conference is delivered using Appreciative Inquiry, an organizational development process that capitalizes on the best of what is and provides a wide avenue for multi-generational and cross-cultural participation – everyone is welcome; every voice is honored.

More…

Pro Action Café is coming to Berlin

At the end of 2006, I heard about the group coaching process Pro Action Café and attended the monthly Café in Brussels in December.

I have talked to one of the founders today and we are currently planning to start the Pro Action Café in Berlin in a few weeks. So stay tuned…

What is the Pro Action Café?
Based on the World Café method, roughly 20 people had conversations around the questions that mattered to them. 4 table hosts offered their questions to the group. I hosted a table putting forward my question: “How can you turn social change into a business model?”, a question that more and more people have asked me a lot in my work for the movement We Are What We Do (WAWWD) and I have to come to terms with in order to sustain myself as a social pioneer.

Round I
We started off with people stating why they have been attracted to the question. And more questions emerged:
• What is it that you have to offer?
• For society: what is the offer and what is the need?
• What is making us happy? Community and conversations?
• How do we define happiness? Where is the market? Where are the unhappy people?
• What is social change?
• Do we want to change the world?

My key learning in the first round:
Between the social change and the business model we need the intermediate step of COMMUNITY BUILDING. How can we use WAWWD to build communities?

Round II
New people were welcomed at the table and the discussion summarized.
Again more questions:
• What is the product?
• How can you persuade people to pay money for an intangible product (i.e. memories, ideas, emotions)? Coca-Cola is selling: friends, fun, being young, happiness, an experience, etc.
• Example of Landmark Forum is given: personal development workshops – sell WAWWD in workshops: “Do you want to change but don’t know how?”
• Look at all actions: where are the actions that can both be generating money + change the world

My key learning in the second round:
What do we sell at WAWWD? We need to know exactly how to put that into simple words for everyone. If I want to apply for a loan what do I tell the bank?

Round III
And the last group of participants arrived…and here are some conclusions and even more questions
• WAWWD is selling social responsibility. Is there a market for social responsibility?
• You cannot separate social responsibility from spirituality.
• Do not ask what is your product but rather what is your service.
• How can we find synergies between your world and my world?
• Do we need NGOs? Aren’t Shell or Nestlé, etc. better equipped and managed than NGOs?

My key learning in the third round:
WAWWD is a service organisation that is selling social responsibility.

The Shift…

… is happening…