by John Brooker | Aug 25, 2015 | Collaborate, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Overcome Challenges, Solution Focus, Tools
“One does not have to be a mad scientist to travel in time.” Authors of research paper: “Back to the future. Temporal Perspective in the Explanation of Events.” Need to run a brief post project review including remote teams? Post Project (or phase of a project) Reviews are a regular type of meeting that organisations run. However, there can be some issues: Often, people are keen to get on with the next project or phase of the project; time is short amongst the team Projects don’t always go to plan; there can be sensitive issues to discuss leading to friction during the review Some parts of the team are often based in different locations and must participate via teleconference or video conference A client asked me to run a workshop to review one phase in a project. I expected this to be a half-day with all participants in London, no issue. However, my brief was to complete the workshop in two hours, be sensitive to some challenging topics and ensure three people linking in via videoconference would feel part of the workshop. Luckily, I enjoy a challenge. My first thought was that two hours was too short, however, it transpired that an extra 30 minutes extra were available if all agreed on the day. This was still not a lot of time, so I decided to use Solutions Focus (SF, please see Improve Collaboration With Solution Focus for a PDF article on this), which is very efficient and invaluable when there are sensitive topics to deal with. Even though I am highly experienced with SF, with a challenging brief I decided...
by John Brooker | Aug 17, 2015 | Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Overcome Challenges
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by John Brooker | Aug 14, 2015 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Innovate, Overcome Challenges, Tools
“First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth.” John F. Kennedy, former US President How might you gain a better understanding of your goals and challenges? Kennedy made the above point in a “State of the Union” speech to the US Congress on 25 May 1961. Whilst most countries would probably dedicate a whole speech on the subject, the moon landing was one of eight strategic goals that Kennedy spoke about and was just one of the four space initiatives that included communication and weather satellites! The reason for starting with this moon landing story is to illustrate that whatever your goal, it will form part of a taller and wider hierarchy that you can represent on a map. For example, a more operational goal would be “Enable astronauts to write in weightless environments.” (This might remind you of the story that the USA spent millions of dollars inventing a pen to write in space whilst the USSR used a pencil. People often cite this story as a reason to find the simplest solution, however, please see my closing story for a different insight.) SO If your goal is very strategic and you wish to understand the hierarchy of goals beneath it, you can use a Level Map. This enables you to: • Diagram that hierarchy and see the relationships before you choose one to work on. • Chunk the goal into lower level goals, thus increasing the potential goals to achieve and reducing the...
by John Brooker | Jul 31, 2015 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Innovate, Overcome Challenges, Tools
“There is no truth. Only perception.” Edith Sitwell (English Author) Looking at a challenge in a fresh way can transform how you tackle it… Once, I gave an after dinner talk for around 80 college lecturers and examiners attending a seminar on innovation in assessment. The premise of my talk, more an interactive lecture, was that if we could inspire people to enjoy the whole process of exams, it would reap benefits for the college and be an innovation in assessment. This idea underpinned a study day that my friend, Elvin Box, and I ran for many years, for MBA students studying Creativity, Innovation and Change. We challenged the students to enjoy and look forward to the exam rather than dread it. I had happily accepted the challenge of giving the talk, but a couple of weeks after accepting I became a little nervous, wondering what I would find to talk about that would interest and be of use to the audience. I didn’t realise how nervous I was until one night, I had a dream. In it I was delivering the talk and in front of everybody, could not think of a thing to say. In the dream, (this is absolutely true) Piers Brosnan , ex – James Bond and erstwhile singer in “Mamma Mia,” appeared and sagely told me all I needed to know. He may even have sung it, I don’t recall because when I awoke, I had forgotten all he told me! However, some of you will recognise the type of dream as the “examination dream”, one I used to have regularly before appearing in plays, constantly forgetting...
by John Brooker | Jul 30, 2015 | Collaborate, Facilitate meetings, Free Articles, Innovate, Overcome Challenges, Solution Focus
“Where a minute before a handful of tech guys could agree on almost nothing, it took us only five minutes to identify the future perfect on which we all agreed.” Niklas Tiger. Managing Director of Hi5, Sweden. Want to solve challenges more effectively? How many meetings have you been in where you have tried to tackle a challenge in a team and it just kept going round in circles? The following is a true story related by Niklas Tiger, Managing Director of Hi5, an IT organisation in Sweden that provides outsourced IT services to customers over the Internet. Hi5 is not a client of ours but Niklas has given us permission to create an article as an example of how the Solution Focus approach to tackling challenges and change can work. (Please click on the link to read an article on Solutions Focus). I have adapted the wording for clarity slightly; otherwise this is his story, which, as it is from an organisation, I thought would be valuable for you. If you would rather read this article in an illustrated short ebook, please click here ebook A tale of two meetings. “Implementing Solutions Focus (SF) as a way of managing change in our organisation and also in collaboration with customers, really has transformed our company. A very low tech down to earth example of this happened as recently as this...
by John Brooker | Jul 30, 2015 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Overcome Challenges, Solution Focus
“A candle loses nothing when it lights another candle.” Thomas Jefferson. 3rd President of the USA. How appreciating what others do can change your life and build a creative climate Hi. Wouldn’t it be great if this year were a WOW year for you? This article could help you achieve that. For only the third time I am going to use another author to write my blog because I thought this article contained a simple and memorable way to improve the creative climate in your life and organisation.. Julia Kalenberg, a Solution Focus practitioner from Switzerland, writes it, though I have made a few small edits. Here is what she says: Looking at what already works and what is already there instead of looking for what’s missing can change your life and the life of others. If you look at resources instead of problems, you help others grow and create a totally different atmosphere in teams. When I was at the SOLWorld Conference in Oxford in September 2012, I experienced the wonderful effect of a real and authentic “Wow”. When people appreciate what other people do it creates a positive atmosphere that is ideal for development and growth. Coming back from Oxford I thought about what WOW could stand for and decided it can stand for WHO OR WHAT. The WOW Formula Who or what really impressed me today? Who or what am I really grateful for today? Who or what would need a nice word today? Who or what will I really be thankful for tonight and why? Different Levels of WOW The WOW formula works on different levels...
