Frank Voehl in LO12417 posted 5 good specific strategies for creating a
safer environment for learning. And it got me thinking about our stuff
and why I PREFER to use images:
The images have no "up front reality" and thus are not perceived as
aggressive and thus do not generate defensiveness.
People project their reality onto the image, like a Rorschach / Ink Blot,
and thus do not feel like someone is TELLING them about the reality.
They get the big picture from looking at the image. And thus they get the
need to "step back from the wagon" to look at possibilities of their own.
We focus on things that don't work as well as others, and generally remain
very soft on the people who are vested in the paradigm.
The discussions of the cartoons have no immediate reality an thyus engage
all the partipants in the small groups (or 5 or 6).
They define the problem and they define the possibilities, rather than
some BOSS or consultant -- thus they have the ownership.
These and a whole host of other things probably work to make the
discussion much more "spiritually safe" as well as "workplace safe" and
thus all the participants can be actively involved. And, like Action
Learning, the first "roll" through the environment sets the stage for
repeated reviews; they learn an underlying process for continuous
continuous improvement.
There are a lot of ways of doing the above. And it has been an
interesting dialog thus far. Does one needs to have one's feet on the
ground but one's head in the clouds to get the perspective for
improvement?
-- For the FUN of It!Scott Simmerman Performance Management Company 3 Old Oak Drive, Taylors, SC 29687 (USA) 864-292-8700 fax 292-6222 SquareWheels@compuserve.com
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>