Emergent Knowledge – David Grove’s ‘clean’ facilitation and communications methodology, six degrees to freedom, plus and introduction guide for learning
Outcomes in Small Group Process
My recent post: Can we Survive? is a draft for an item in a psychodrama publication. In that post I link Wisdom Councils and – Creative Insight Councils to the Sociometric methods of J.L. Moreno. The main idea is that there is a lager community and the small group resonates with the larger group in isomoprhic harmony, and can thus give back compelling insights and wisdom.
In this post I want to add a related idea.
From Dynamic Facilitation and the Wisdom Council theory I have got it clear that a small group can achieve something in addition to personal therapy for its members, and assist an organisation or community in developing its life, and in its decision making.
Jim Rough calls it “option creating”, I am not yet sure exactly what he means by this but it is not just a list of possibilities or wild ideas from a brainstorming session. The breakthrough in a group happens when there is an insight into a real option – something the whole group would like to see happen.
Such breakthroughs are possible over the longer time frame of a group, of diverse members, meeting for several days and sharing at a deep level. Traditional meetings can’t achieve this depth.
For a group to be of use to a larger community there needs to be a thorough warm-up before the event as to the purpose and context. While in psychodrama we are aware of the importance of the frame, I have not experienced a group in that tradition that has the focus of leading to outcomes for the whole community. In our organisations we tend to make decision in meetings, and while there is plenty of interaction and depth work, it is not specifically an clearly focussed on future actions. There may be specialist sub-committees, or work groups, but they tend to be by the people with special positions an ongoing positions within the organisation.
Imagine randomly selected diverse small group – from an organisation or community – doing depth work groups with the task of one or two of the following topics:
What is our strategic plan?
What is our vision?
Principles for the Constitution.
Who should be a member?
The group would present its findings to all members of the community or larger organisation and its governing in one a4 document, and 20 minute audio file at a special hui for the occasion.
Self-Portrait – Peggy Holman
Peggy Holman Founder of Open Space
via Self-Portrait – Peggy Holman.
What is an underlying question that gives form to your work or interest in this field?
“How do we seed, grow, and evolve enlightened communities and inspired organizations?”
THE ETHICS OF DUAL RELATIONSHIPS by Karl Tomm
I found this interesting about 20 years ago when I first read it. Might be worth a review.
THE ETHICS OF DUAL RELATIONSHIPS
by Karl Tomm
First paragraph follows/
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Love Maths – John Gottman on relationships
Edge: THE MATHEMATICS OF LOVE: A Talk with John Gottman:
We were able to derive a set of nonlinear difference equations for marital interaction as well as physiology and perception. These equations provided parameters, that allowed us to predict, with over 90 percent accuracy, what was going to happen to a relationship over a three-year period. The main advantage of the math modeling was that using these parameters, we are not only be able to predict, but now understand what people are doing when they affected one another. And through the equations we were now really able to build theory. That theory allows us to understand how to intervene and how to change things. And how to know what it is we’re affecting, and why the interventions are effective. This is the mathematics of love.
THE MATHEMATICS OF LOVE [4.14.04] A Talk with John Gottman
Gotman Videos follow:
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Sex Education in Online Media
Looks interesting. I found it hard to hear the audio. Got it from this tweet.
Dr. Keely Kolmes (@drkkolmes)
5/0
2/10 6:10 PM
Sex Education in Online Media: http://vb.ly/20uy Excited to see video of @violetblue‘s talk. She also links to her slides.
Carkhuff – Core Conditions of counselling
I was steeped in this model of counselling for many years, first I was taught in the early ’80s by my supervisor, John Morrison, and then more formally in Social Work training. Still think it a useful approach. I like just seeing the list of these core conditions again.
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Isomorphism insight + Audio
In this two minute snippet I think I managed to get enough of the idea down, so I can elaborate.
Isomorphism – an insight -wl -mp3
I had a moment of seeing clearly how different phenomena can all be related under one heading:
Isomorphism in human relations.
I am writing this after making the audio, expanding on it:
General semantics – Outline
GENERAL SEMANTICS: An Outline Survey
by Kenneth G. Johnson 3rd Edition Revised
A very interesting Outline! This is by the same guy who I quoted earlier.
11.4 “ ‘You’d be interested to know,’ he (the psychiatrist) said, ‘how many people come to me with troubles that are largely a matter of nomenclature. They suffer the tortures of the damned at the idea that a particular label may fit them or may not fit them. ‘Am I a man? Am I a coward? Am I a failure? Am I an invert? Sometimes, simply, am I a lunatic?’ If you could only get it through your head that it’s you, only you, who’s pinning the label on or taking it off, you’d have your problem half licked.’ ”
– Louis Auchincloss [14]
Relations of the means of community
Facebook just bought FriendFeed. The ensuing discussions have been fascinating, they raise the question:
Who owns your words?
There has been a fear that our personal writing, intimately connected to us, will be lost, deleted, stolen. It has happened before! E-minds, is one example, and there must be many more. The cry is Backup! OK. I have just set up this blog to make a weekly digest of my Tweets and the @replys. Good idea. Thanks to Twitter Tools. However it is not enough.
Who owns your relationships?
FriendFeed is a community, there is an invasion, a takeover. We can escape with some of our goods, but we have lost our land, and the community. (I am reporting what I hear, and sense though I have only been a member for a few days.)
“A platform is not a community, it is the people.” He tangata, he tangata, he tangata.
Yes and no. People are splitting off from FriendFeed, to identica, to Facebook to streamy.com, some are staying. There is a turmoil and a community is in stress. And the people were alienated from the decision. By joining a proprietary community we know this can happen, but no one involved the community members. The real value of FriendFeed is the people, but they were simply sold as part of the property. The relations of of the means of community are not reflected in the relations of the community.
If this jargon is not familiar, read the Communist Manifesto on the relations of production (or look here) and the relations on the means of production. Production is social, ownership is private in capitalism.
We are seeing the virtual microcosm playing out the capitalism of the macrocosm.
And of course, the FB / FF takeover has raised these questions and the responses. Dave Winer is particularly warmed up to the issue, leading two important threads.
One is Your Blog Loves You. We can trust a blog because we own it, and not only that, it can’t be sold, so I can trust your blog as well. (well mostly), I can certainly trust the blogosphere as a whole to persist.
Is this a retreat into individualism & denial of community? Not really. The communal space is then the larger blogosphere, with its clustering, and overlapping communities. Bazaars not a cathederal.
The other Dave Winer initiative is: we’ll build one we own!
Permalink
Align the interests of: 1. Users and 2. Investors.
How to do that?
Well, they need to be the same people.
Align the interests of: 1. Users and 2. Investors. How to do that? Well they need to be the same people.
I like the idea, but have misgivings! I’d like to follow up research on online community and the relations of ownership. I will have a look again at Virtual Communities on my bookshelf. Or maybe the current discussion, if you move among the bazaars will do the trick. (See Doc Searls response for example.)
Tom Atlee has just written an excellent item on Town Hall Meetings, notice how important the framework is and how it determines the outcome. Even the simple idea of breaking up into Topic Tables would have a huge impact.
It might pay to start with Engles and his book on Utopias, here is the chapter on Utopian Socialism. I say this because I read it in 1974, after investing 5 years of my life creating and participating in a physical community that was owned by its members. I wish id read it before I embarked on the project!
In conclusion…
Where I am at? The container for dialogue, for community, matters. No one structure or method is best. What suits the purpose.