Title: A Willingness to do Something Different

Author: Andrew Burnham

Date: January 14, 2009 3:27:26 AM or Wed, 14 January 2009 03:27:26

Summary: After a team workshop I recently delivered, the manager of the team said to me "those we're really good action steps, but I don't thing anyone will do them". I was stunned. We spent a whole day figuring out what they could do to achieve the goals they set out for themselves (not my goals, but their goals - this was pure facilitation) and they won't do them?

Body: Why did we spend a day together? I thought and thought and thought for a long time about this. I think that many teams are simply stuck in how they have done things and won't break themselves out of their conditioned patterns. These action steps we came up with were very simple like 'spend more time connecting with customers' which meant specifically for some that they would spend 3 hours per week connecting with customers and listening to their concerns. Some even defined their action in terms of the number of clients they would connect with. This team developed concrete and specific actions (or 'improvisations') that would move them (according to them) in the direction they wanted to go.



I was more stunned because this team was enthusiastic and engaged during the workshop. Light bulbs in their minds were flashing colours. But then the workshop ends, a sigh and I imagine them saying 'Well, back to work we go.' Is it that when 'reality' sets in and they go back to the office they can't change? I think they think themselves passive players in an objective system and that they don't realize that they are part of that system and that unless they do something differently, nothing will change, no matter how many workshops or trainings they do. I got paid of course but no real satisfaction from this workshop.



Any other frustrated facilitators out there?

Notes: 

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