BAodn Style: Holiday Social

On December 12, a few students, OD practioners, BAodn Board members and friends gathered together to celebrate the holidays and the new year. The event was held at Ana Mandara restaurant in Ghirardelli square. An exquisitely decorated venue with Asian themes, couches, and international flavor. I arrived right at 5:30 p.m. as it began to rain. And was visually pleased to enter this wonderous place.

We came together to celebrate our passion for OD, and the conversation certainly had that flavor. I met some new people that I had not attended before. Most who attended were independent consultants. As I looked around everyone seemed to be converging into small groups and deep in conversation with others. My group was made up of two independent consultants, and one psychologist. The conversation turned lively as we began discussing the communication efforts of various fortune 500 companies, the role of OD in Corporate America and Seth Godin, marketing genious. We also talked about various books and interesting readings and of course a little about human nature and behavior. The best part of all turned out to be recruting my little group to write blogs in January-so look forward to some great writers with lots of experience in January. I invite others who attended to feel free to comment and share their conversations.

The appetizers were delicious as always and included chicken skewers with peanut sauce, bite sized turnovers, tempura shrimp, vegetable egg rolls and much much more. We stayed pretty late until about 10 p.m. One thing I have come to know about OD consultants and specially at BAodn that we do LOVE to socialize.

I am looking forward to the January 4th event with Linda Ackerman Anderson-how to REALLY succeed in large systems transformation. This is something I always wonder about. How successful and sustainable our the changes we implement? Hope to see you there and at other networking events!

Behind the Curtain: BAodn Board's Fall Retreat

The BAodn Board meets once per quarter to connect, support each other with projects, formalize strategic plans and brainstorm ways to support our member community. About a month ago Rani H. Gill and I volunteered to lead the retreat. We spent four weeks planning the agenda, planning the team building activities, the food and the content. Yes, if its a BAodn event, there has to be food!

We began by checking about the funniest costumes we ever or wore or saw. And continued the checking by connecting about an inspirational aspect of our life as well as a challenge that we were currently facing (non BAodn related). This helped us all learn more about each other, connect and bond as human beings.

We then moved on to review the Mission and Goals we worked on at the last retreat. We each had come up with a mission that described what we wanted to accomplish this year. Chanterria, BAodn President, took all our input and presented a proposed Mission. We gave feedback on the Mission. While this still needs to be tweaked a bit we present a rough draft for your information:

Mission:

BAODN is a community organization that supports a practicing local community of Organization Development professionals, consultants, and students. We provide opportunity for dialogue, networking, and exploration of the practice of OD through the use of social media, events, and continuing education.

2010 Goals:

1.    HSMC Transition

2.    Increase member benefit

3.    Create internship program

            4.    Understand and implement technology solutions to support initiatives

After the review of the Mission and goals, each of the board members presented their initiatives or projects. This served to orient everyone on all BAodn activities. This was also an opportunity for board members to request help from the Board on their initiatives and find ways to move forward. Items in the discussion were tabled as action items for smaller groups and or the monthly board meetings.

Initiatives

The technology & infrastructure initiative is to support board members and volunteers in sustaining the organization with appropriate tools and collaborative processes, to maintain and improve systems for members to access BAodn services, and to support the professional practice of BAodn members and the OD community by connecting people virtually with other people, knowledge, and resources.- Pam Davis

Volunteer recruitment is an ongoing activity to encourage involvement by members and potential members in BAodn programs and initiatives. BAodn is a volunteer run organization and relies on volunteer engagement for vibrancy and sustainability. - Katherine Kott

The internship initiative is designed to support the new and emerging BAodn mission and culture which focuses on being a community of practitioners as well as a community of net-workers. The initiative will unite professional and student volunteer practitioners to assist with our community organizations' ever changing developmental needs.   -Riley Sullivan

The purpose of the Action Learning Group (ALG) is “to provide an opportunity for managers/consultants to reflect on how they are going about their jobs and work challenges; as a result, to act in new and different ways and to assimilate new learning.” In effect, the three (3) existing BAODN Action Learning Groups function as supportive resources for Organization Development professionals seeking a safe space to explore, reflect and learn about application-based alternatives for their practice(s) from each other. - Diana Saunders

The Baodn Communications Director is responsible for managing broadcast based communications on behalf of the Board of Directors, Membership and advertiser's.  On-going initiatives include the monthly publication of Memberclicks, development and execution of the organizations communications strategy and the strategic development of the organizations messaging and positioning statements.  The communications director consults on the usage of technology and social media throughout BAodn.  Tactically, the communications director posts member events to MemberLinks and supports/contributes current topics posted on social media sites including, LinkedIn, BAodn blog and will provide support to Twitter and Facebook as those platforms are launched. - Jeff Harnois

BAodn Events are targeted to maximize member benefit and rebuild BAodn brand name and member satisfaction and loyalty by providing quarterly social networking and thoughtleader gatherings to increase interaction, dialogue, and collaboration among members and between members and BAodn. 

In the next 6 months, we hope to organize one event every month. Each time in SF downtown area on the last Wednesday of the month so that our members can arrange their schedule beforehand and travel more conveniently to attend the events. - Melody Chen

As Treasurer, my role is to be a watchdog over all aspects of financial management, working closely with other members of the BAODN Board to safeguard our organization's finances and to ensure that we remain a sustainable organization.  I act as an information and reference point for the Chair and other board members to:
1.) clarify financial implications of proposals
2.) outline our current financial status
3.) maintain and retrieve all relevant financial documentation

Best in the West (BITW)

We began with a history of Best in the West and some of the challenges in putting such a huge conference together with a small team of volunteers. We then moved on to brainstorming on how to make this event an easy, fun and worthwhile for all. We wanted to come up with ideas for the committee and something to make BITW a success and supportive of our members this year. We had a great time learning how to brainstorm ideas without censoring each other and allowing what ever was there to emerge. Certain themes emerged in our brainstorming which included:

1) Having a global and/or international component
2) Expanding the audience beyond what we typically call "OD" into other OD related fields
3) Connecting with other OD organizations and schools with OD programs
4) Use technology like Webminars, Videos, Twitter, etc to make BITW interactive
5) A focus on connection by including team building and networking activities (one includes having pictures and bios of everyone attending the conference)
6) Areas for OD learning
7) Topics that could be applied to work

Conclusion

We concluded the retreat by following in the footsteps of our presenters earlier this year Eddie Seashore and Michael Bloom, who closed the session with three words.  And here they are for your reading pleasure:

• Inspired, excited, optimistic
• Satisfied, saturated
• Excited, relieved, satisfied
• Energize, relieved
• Connected, satisfied, anticipation
• Please, fatigued, encouraged
• Refreshed, connected, hopeful
• Connected, curious, satisfied
• Grateful, optimistic, curious

Reading Now: Demystifying the Development of An Organizational Vision

A vision is more than just a mission statement, says Mark Lipton. In this brief article, a clear preamble to his 2003 book Guiding Growth, Lipton makes a strong argument that companies and organizations that manage using a positive vision can have powerful results.

A vision can help employees understand what an organization stands for and what is expected of them. But having a vision is not enough, Lipton found. The key is effectively communicating that vision through the organization. With this tool, a vision can help “keep decision making in context”. In a fast paced consumer world, having that long-term view presents a road map to wanted outcomes. As Lipton puts it, a clearly understood vision creates a compass.

But what exactly is a vision statement? Lipton’s formula is simply stated: Vision = Mission + Strategy + Culture. This is the organization’s purpose, how that purpose will be achieved and the values presented in the everyday attitudes of the organization. Lipton’s article walks through what a great vision can do for a company (with inspiring examples) and why and how a vision can fail.

I’ve turned to Mr. Lipton’s articles and books about vision constantly since I was introduced to his theory in graduate school. I have found that keeping the vision present in tough conversations leads to a dramatic shift - a positive shift - in decision making. To simplify it drastically, having a vision is like the common saying about keeping an eye keenly on a goal - the obstacles tend to evaporate and the path to achieving those goals become clear.

To be honest, I’m a devout optimist and I love thinking about a bright, happy, better future, which is why the vision theory is so appealing to me. How about those self proclaimed pessimists out there? Do you think a vision statement is right for every organization?

You can download the article here:

http://xa.yimg.com/kq/groups/23463272/2139850325/name/Demystifying+the+Development+of+an+Organizational+Vision.pdf

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Erin Kenny stumbled on the field of Organizational Development in graduate school when she came across an article about Appreciative Inquiry. She holds a master's degree in Nonprofit Management and a post-master's certificate in Organizational Development from Milano The New School of Management in New York City. She currently is a freelance organizational consultant working on projects in the Bay Area, most recently with the Mill Valley Philharmonic to create an audience development plan. Erin is a native of Utah but now consider the Bay Area her home. She is an amateur bassoonist and enjoys long-distance running.

Membership Has its Priviliges: USF and BAodn Team Up

The University of San Francisco's Business and Professional Studies department and BAodn teamed up to build a bridge between "real world" OD and OD students.  The concept is not new and has had great success in the past.

The event featured BAodn's own Melissa Daimler, Director of Organizational Development for Adobe Systems, Inc. Melissa has over 20 years of experience in OD, with an emphasis towards performance management, employee engagement, team and organizational effectiveness, employee & management development.

The venue was perfect.  Intimate enough to allow a tremendous amount of knowledge and experience transfer and exchange.  The university catered the event with teriffic Hors d'oeuvres, beer and wine.

The post event feedback was great.  Everyone enjoyed themselves and felt good about the session.  Melissa was of course, fabulous!
 

In the future, we hope to bring together communities of practice in the greater Bay Area, along with current and former OD and MBA students with an interest in OD. We will continue to bring great speakers  starting early next year.  BAodn is fortunate for our members to participate in this "invitation only", member benefit. If you wish to join Baodn please go to www.baodn.org. 

Viewpoint: Resistance to Change

I was recently asked, “What is the single biggest reason people resist change?” Of course, my opinion is not intended to be the definitive final answer. In fact, the best I can hope for are your challenges to my assumptions and opinion liberties. I do hope you have other perceptions, and your responses are both welcomed and encouraged.

For me, understanding the resistance to change is certainly much easier than removing the root cause and components to meaningful, sustainable and continuous change. I believe at the simplest level, fear is the single largest impediment to any form of real change. Our culture has largely been built on the reward/punishment system where mistakes are not tolerated, and in corporate America especially, the consequences can be dramatic, life and career altering.

Organizations ask for change, but punish (loosely translated) failure. It is the classic “carrot and stick” metaphor. People fear the stick over the benefit of the carrot. When individuals perceive they have more to loose than gain in a changing environment, they will resist when possible. Choosing instead, to cling to their perceptual safe zone. The fear of the unknown has been woven into the very fabric of our culture and professional DNA. Simply put, when fear is present, innovation is not. Change is a steep, uphill climb.

So if fear is the problem, what does that mean to managers of change? I would postulate that fear is at the starting gate of change. And, until that gate is unlocked and satisficed to align with the removal of fear and installation of safety, transformational change does not have a realistic chance at achieving long term success.

What is needed is a complete overhaul of corporate culture (albeit, an unrealistic idea). A culture that celebrates mistakes and turns them into learning opportunities becomes opportunistic and gains immensely and continuously. This concept is easier to integrate in a start-up environment, since “fearless” can be baked into the founding culture. Older, larger organizations will have a difficult time switching gears to varying degrees, and some organizations will never be able to make this level of fundamental change. So what is the solution to fear resolution?

A culture and environment accepting failure as a part of the success process is going to produce much stronger results. Maybe we call it “positive failure” to assist in its adoptability and improve its stickiness. The element of failure as a critical element to success, reminds me of a company called IDEO and its Director, David Kelly. One of his quotes resonates with me to my very core, “Fail often, in order to succeed earlier”. In other words, the faster you fail, the faster you can succeed. IDEO is one example of a fearless culture where failure is encouraged, expected and rewarded.

For anyone managing change, whether practicing from the soft sciences or simply a manager tasked with change, I would encourage you to take a look at IDEO for a perspective a good distance from our norms. You can view a terrific video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M66ZU2PCIcM

Opinion ends here. I look forward to your feedback, additional discussion and perspectives on the topic.
________________________________________________


 Jeff is currently the Principal Consultant at iBridged Consulting, a sales and sell-through performance management consulting firm. He has of two decades of executive sales leadership experience leading people and companies to reach goals previously thought to be unattainable. Working with and for brand name companies like Apple, HP, Xerox, Microsoft and many others, Jeff understands the complexity and strategic nature of the tools, systems and processes necessary to improve sell-through in any organization.


Jeff serves on the Board of Directors at Bay Area Organization Development Network, leading the organizations' communication strategy and implementation. Jeff holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Management and is currently completing a Masters of Science in Organization Development at the University of San Francisco.

Letter from: BAodn Director of Technology

BAodn’s mission is about supporting a community of organization development practitioners. As Director of Technology & Infrastructure for BAodn, I am focusing on how we can best use technology to forward that mission in two ways. One is making sure our board members and volunteers have access to tools & resources they need to communicate and get work done on behalf of the organization. Second is improving services we provide to members and to the OD community via technologies like our website, our membership directory, e-mail newsletters, the BAodn blog, and social media.

When Paul Konasewich, last year’s president, posted the description for the board position of technology director it said, “In many ways, running BAodn is like running a small company”. This is so true! As an all-volunteer organization, operating primarily in the virtual world, we face particular challenges with coordinating schedules, sharing knowledge, and getting the right information to the right people without inundating folks with e-mails. These are not just technical decisions about what tools to use, but cultural and style decisions that depend on who we are and how we like to get and transmit information. Add to that the fact that we want to maximize efficiency on a small budget. Luckily there is a wealth of choices for online collaboration out there, many of them free such as Google docs and groups.

We are not alone in grappling with these issues. I shared some e-mails recently with Liz Smith, programs coordinator of the Chesapeake Bay Organizational Development Network (CBODN). She was soliciting information from other OD networks about what business systems and collaboration software we all use (She will be sharing her results with us!). Again, one side of the equation is researching what the technologies can do. The second side is what works for us, considering who we are and what we need. What I hope to accomplish is to use technology wisely where it can help, but not change old tech for new just for the sake of modernizing. For some things a regular e-mail to a decision-making group is still the best way to coordinate!

Choices we make about our outward-facing technologies are not straight-forward either. It’s easy enough to say, for example, we should have a Twitter account, or that we should add certain bells and whistles to the website. Sounds great! But what does that mean for implementation? Our current board president Chanterria McGilbra suggested a framework which we used for discussing the launch of the BAodn blog. She asked Alyea Sandovar (blog editor) to present an outline of what needs to happen to get it going, and what we need to do to keep it going. In other words, we want relevance, but we also want sustainability. My approach therefore is to look at efforts around technology in a comprehensive way. I presented five components of my strategy at our board retreat in July and I’ll share them here:

Support the BAodn mission and overall strategic initiatives. This is key, because we want to be developing resources that are relevant to our members and/or to sustaining the life of organization.

Leverage existing tools and resources. No need to reinvent the wheel if we can improve or tweak something we already know and make that better. This is also about being realistic about what our limits are, in budget and in volunteer time.

Balance technology choices with our organizational culture and preferences. This relates to what I said above about internal collaboration, to the degree that outward-facing tools are maintained by the same board and volunteers. Some people thrive around technology, while others may be uninterested or frustrated. We don’t want to introduce technologies that only a specialist can or would want to manage.

Use data. This comes from my training in both web development and OD. Rather than guessing at user needs, let’s look at statistics for some direction. Are there pages on the website that no one goes to? We can see that (with Google analytics) and make adjustments accordingly. Does membership go up when we send out newsletters to our public mailing list? We can use information like that to make decisions about our communication technologies.

Adopt best practices for technology and social media. Again, we are not alone in developing services for a membership-driven, professional association. What can we learn from other groups about creating and supporting online communities? Furthermore, what can we learn from for-profit companies and web experts about things like web usability and social media development?

This is an exciting time to be involved with BAodn as we put our attention on what our members need and on how we can best support OD practitioners. If you would like to help with our technology or social media initiatives please feel free to contact me at technology@baodn.org or e-mail volunteer coordinator Katherine Kott at volunteering@baodn.org. We are currently looking for a webmaster and you can read about it on the BAodn website.

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Pam Davis is a futurist interested in helping organizations align goals, strategy, people, and technology for maximum success. Her diverse background spans education, community organizing, office administration, website programming & analytics, knowledge management, and social media technology. Pam is completing an MA in Organizational Psychology at Alliant International University’s Marshall Goldsmith School of Management.

A Must Read: Surviving the Baby Boomer Exodus

On Oct. 27, 2010 BAODN presents a workshop with Ken Ball and Vic Passion based on the new book Surviving the Baby Boomer Exodus: Capturing Knowledge for Gen X and Y Employees. This workshop will examine the specific areas of mentoring, a highly effective strategy for sharing knowledge. Click for registration details.

Ken and Vic will offer takeaways and tips for how OD practitioners can more effectively use mentoring, whether for knowledge capture or other strategies for making sure employees are talking and sharing what it is they do and know.

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The Book

Surviving the Baby Boomer Exodus: Capturing Knowledge for Gen X and Y Employees by Ken Ball and Gina Gotsill examines the "knowledge vacuum" that is occurring in the business world as Baby Boomers retire or leave the workplace, and take with them, their soft skills an practical wisdom.

Summary

At first glance, this book appears to be about the sea-change that we've heard so much about in the context of social security -- retiring Baby Boomers. The book then quickly takes a deep dive into the specifics of those generational differences, examines different types of knowledge, and looks at the impact on specific industries. A large part of the book outlines on what you need in order to design a program that will effectively help transfer and retain knowledge.

This book is based on both primary research -- talking to people in companies who are dealing with this very issue -- and well-grounded secondary research. There's a special focus on industries such as aerospace, manufacturing, oil, gas and utilities. Some snippets that resonated with me:

• One-third the youngest boomers do not want to be known as Baby Boomers-- in fact, most identify as Gen X.
• Baby Boomers like telling stories, but GenX often wants to approach Boomers in a less "adoring" manner than they would prefer.
• GenX consider themselves "free-agents", often mentor each other, and just want to be left alone to get the job done.
• Younger generations expect exceptions -- they lack patience for a "must do this way" approach to learning.
• Data with interpretation becomes information, and with context and experience becomes knowledge
• Information exchange does not equate to knowledge transfer.

In order to understand the most appropriate methodology for transferring knowledge, you must first understand your audience, and the difference between the types of knowledge. Is it explicit, implicit or tacit, and how do you know the difference? The core challenge of the Boomer Exodus is transferring tacit and implicit knowledge from boomers to younger generations.

Mentoring is one of the key strategies to knowledge transfer. In order to do this effectively, consider the audience, your metrics, and the nature of the job (e.g., sales coach vs. leadership mentoring). Supporting tools may include supply toolkits, worksheets, forums for networking, orientation and training the creating a mentoring program. It can be 1:1 mentoring, or perhaps even the creation of mentoring circles. Additional means of knowledge transfer include using social media, communities of practice, narrative storytelling, and even after-action-reviews.

Why read this book?

If you're looking to establish a knowledge transfer program within your organization this book will help you create a process around a knowledge project. It goes through the specifics of designing, developing and implementing and nurturing a program with mentoring at the cornerstone.

If you're looking to understand differences in generational learning preferences and the characteristics of these generations, this book provides well-researched basics in the subject. It has a textbook feel to its approach.

The authors come from an instructional design perspective and so use the ADDIE process to guide you through the creation of a program. The authors may not be "traditional" OD practitioners, but the process of creating a knowledge transfer program is OD in practice.

In general, practitioners who are faced with the challenge of an aging workforce, retirements that loom large, will find this book to be a useful, practical guide to structuring and implementing a solution.

If you're interested in learning more, come hear Ken Ball speak with his colleague Vic Passion at an upcoming BAODN event on Oct. 27, 2010.

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Rani H. Gill is a learning designer looking at ways to help people learn and organizations change. She speaks, manages, and designs in three languages: technology, education and business. You can find her at her blog (wanderatwill.com), twitter, or Linked-In. She currently an external consultant and the Speaker Series volunteer with BAodn.

A New Focus for The Field of Organization Development

The educational process of the field of organization development has focused on developing consultants (external and internal). These consultants work with organizational leaders toward improving the health and well being of their organizations. Even our OD membership organizations (OD Network, the Organization Development Institute, regional OD networks, NTL, etc.) have been focused on serving practitioners who work with organizational leaders. Academic programs have proliferated in the same vein.

That may be overstated but not by much: In essence, we have created an OD skill-stream that is only adjunctive to where it is most needed—our organizational leaders.

Imagine if our field really focused on developing conscious organizational leaders just as we focus on our own conscious use of self! Imagine if we focused on developing conscious organizations! Imagine if we began to emphasize the need to inculcate OD skills and sensibilities into the entire management cadre of our client organizations!

What would a conscious leader skilled in the perspective and skills of organization development be like? First and foremost the conscious leader understands that the effectiveness of his/her technical and operational systems is dependent of the effectiveness of the human systems that develop, operate, and maintain those systems. Second, the conscious leader would have feedback loops in place regarding the effectiveness and health of the human systems that are commensurate with those for technical and operational systems. Those feedback loops would monitor, for example, communication dynamics, leadership issues, the management of differences and related power dynamics as well as decision-making efficacy. In this manner, corrective action could occur before they begin to impact the technical and operational systems for which they are responsible.

Typical organizations have feedback loops regarding their sales and manufacturing in-puts and outputs that are attended to weekly if not daily. Critical machinery and computers are routinely maintained to assure their continual productivity. Conscious leaders would do the same for the effectiveness and health of their human systems as well. As the human systems go, so go the technical and operational systems. Together they drive overall productivity and fiscal success!

Pictures in this blog are from the event with Edie Seashore on September 23, 2010. Stay tuned to this blog for more about conscious leaders and the ways they impact the power dynamics which can be so harmful or advantageous to organizational dynamics. Your reactions and thoughtful responses would be welcome. Respond to this blog or contact Michael directly at michael@chumans.com. Check-out the “Resources” tab of his web site www.chumans.com as well!

Spotlight on: Edie Seashore & Michael Bloom

Ms. Edith Whitfield Seashore and Dr. Michael Broom are presenting a BAODN workshop on Sept. 23rd called “Becoming a Change Agent”. The following post merges separate interviews with Edie and Michael about their upcoming workshop, the two key disciplines they are focusing on, and the state of OD today.

Edie and Michael are a multicultural team who have worked together for many years. Both are psychologists and seasoned change management professionals who have worked both internally and externally and are well known and published in the field.

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In your upcoming workshop, you’re focusing on the disciplines of conscious-use-of-self and infinite power? Why did you choose these two?

Michael: We want to give the audience a strong dose of two of our eight disciplines critical to any OD practitioner. Both Edie Seashore and I have taught at Hopkins, Georgetown, McGill, plus more. Graduates are struggling to apply what they learned. Academia is based on knowledge, but how to apply that knowledge? We focus on the ‘conscious use of self’ -- that's where change in any system starts. If I cannot manage myself effectively it's going to be difficult to support you in you managing yourself effectively, so that you can manage the changes in your organization.

Edie: The whole premise on which our program is based is the conscious use of self, so that's obvious why we would choose that one. We think that everything that any of us do would be enhanced by our being more aware and conscious of how we choose to lead ourselves. So that’s a baseline.

Michael: We go through life mostly on automatic, and most of the time automatic works just fine. We get up out of bed a certain way, brush my teeth a certain way, cook my dinner a certain way---I don't have to think about it. But if we really want to manage change and not have things be the same as they have been then we really need to be aware of when we have slipped into automatic and get ourselves off of automatic so that we can behave, think, feel and have beliefs that support all that.

Edie: A discipline is [something] that you are deliberately trying to put into practice and that takes a lot of conscious use of self to do so. A lot of [the disciplines] are counter-cultural -- they aren't the way we usually operate. For instance, on the use of self, our tendency is very often to be on automatic or to blame others for what's going on instead of taking it upon ourselves to think about what choices can we make, and being accountable in every respect, even when things aren't going well. What can we do that will make a difference and try to be accountable to that rather than just going on automatic and blaming or feeling upset. That takes discipline to do that.

What is infinite power?

Edie: So automatically we go to a win/lose because that is what we have been socialized to do in this society from the time we're born, even with our own siblings, right? The infinite perspective is that we both be satisfied with the solution. I don't like the phrase win/win but I like the notion that we're both feel equally okay about how it all comes out--that take a discipline to keep playing the game long enough for that to happen, without succumbing to a win/lose. That's a big discipline.

An example: I was watching a group try to decide how to change a weekend workshop. The reason they had to change the date--there was about 25 of them involved--is because one of the faculty had misunderstood a date and couldn't do it that day. They kept trying to find out when everybody could come to another weekend, and they kept going further and further out and they were not [able to find a date] and finally one guy said "Look, this is just ridiculous. I can't change a weekend that most of you could come because it's my wedding date. However, I don't mind missing that weekend. So go ahead and do it.” And just before they decided to go ahead -- they were so relieved -- one woman said, “Let's try for one second and go further in instead of going further out.” She proposed another weekend closer and everybody could do it. And they all said "Wow." She said, “I just wasn't going to settle for him not being able to be there. So I tried one more shot at it." So the question is--can we keep the game playing for one more shot at it so everybody's ok with what the solution is? Given the pace of things in our society these days, people stop short of that. Because it does take time.

The person who suggested this was a woman. She felt very powerful when she came up with this crazy weekend that everybody could do. And all she had done was just not give up on the game. But she was very powerful, everybody was very grateful, and so it worked out.

Michael: We live in a world where most of us are on automatic and see that power is scarce. If I'm going to get my way you can't get yours. It's dog eat dog and we're either going to compete with each other or somebody is going to conform because they don't want to look like they're not playing ball. Nobody wants to be called "you're a loser" nobody wants to hear that you're not a team player. Rather than risk that kind of win/lose situation we turn ourselves into victims and go along to get along. That really trashes our own sense of self, and second it really doesn't help us get to the next discipline which is ‘learning from differences.’

When we're playing win/lose power dynamics, what we use to determine who's going to win and who's going to lose are differences. That's really important to get. Well I'm a male and you're a female and both the culture you're raised in, men win over women...and if there was a white person present both of us would lose at least in this society because of that difference. There's just many mundane differences where we've already been programmed around who's going to lose and who's going to win; such as first and second, which wins? Top/bottom which wins? Fast/slow which wins? We're already been programmed to think about that without even knowing well, fast what? More what? Now when we're using differences to determine who wins and who loses, differences become dangerous, so that I'm either going to fight about my thought that's different than yours or I'm just going to just cave and pretend that I agree.

Unless we can switch out power paradigms over to one that is much more open...which we call ‘infinite power’ where the point of the game is to keep the game going. Because if we're going to play win/lose we don’t really know who's going to win and who's going to lose until the end of the game. The point of the infinite game is "Can we keep this game going?" That means we got to take care of all the players because if any players gets hurt or gets dissatisfied, the game is in danger of ending. Something really fascinating happens there...differences are no longer dangerous. Their inherent value can then come out and the inherent value of differences is that they are the only learning that we have.

You could put in me in a room with 25 clones of Michael Broom and I already know everything that they know. But I can learn from you. I can learn from anybody because you're different than me, if I've got my learning cap on. Now Peter Senge talks about the learning organizations but Peter doesn't talk about that we can't become a learning organization unless we can switch this power dynamic away from win/lose to something much more open.

Edie: Very often the win/lose ends up taking more time because those who didn't win are trying to to figure out a way for them to get what they had in mind. They're fighting for that, so it isn't exactly always a time-saver. The question would be--is this an issue that is important enough for us to stay with? And keep working on it, so that we can actually all feel good about it?

I think incidentally women, the notion of a power is something that could be an intriguing conversation. As woman who grew up during the women's movement I was very involved in all of that. I think women are enormously powerful and the socialization was that we shouldn't be seen or heard and I think there was a reason for that....because we turn out to be quite powerful.

Women would be more inclined to be excited about [infinite power] as we like relationships, we like to collaborate, and this has a lot of that quality to it and it also turns out to be very powerful.

What would experienced practitioners learn from your workshop?

Edie: Well most of them haven't given much thought to the kinds of things we talk about interestingly enough. We put the workshop together for experienced people. We were very astonished that ‘conscious use of self’ was not part of their repertoire. They didn't realize how enormously impactful they as human beings were being in the system and how they could help other to recognize that.

Even the people who put the wonderful models together are not necessarily caught up in how people in the system can use themselves consciously to make a better impact. The relationship between their intention and their impact is not very clear in many cases. People go into meetings and say, “There was no reason for me to be there and it was a waste of my time.” Well why would they say that if they were using themselves effectively? I think they just didn’t bring this to their consciousness. I think that we have been more impactful on the experienced people than we have been on new people. The experienced people know what they haven't been doing.

What is the state of OD today? Is it still relevant? How is it still relevant?

Michael: It's a very important question for several reasons and is one of the reasons why I got myself onto the Board of the OD network. We don't have a standard definition of what OD is. If you look in the literature then you see all the definitions, they're all kind of vague. They kind of point us in a certain direction but the really don't say what is it we do. So we've come up with a more concrete definition which goes like this:

"We collaborate with organizational leaders and their groups towards systemic change and root cause problem solving on behalf of greater productivity and increased employee satisfaction through strengthening the human processes through which they get their work done."

I think that OD is more relevant than it has been because the bulk of our issues in human systems deal with differences, and if we go back to learning from differences and the infinite power aspect and being able to use ourselves consciously, then we become much more productive, much more satisfied. Life becomes much more meaningful and many of the issues that we find not only in the workplace but at home, and in the world will just go away because essentially OD is really about fundamental life skills about how to make human systems work.

Edie: If it can go into many different parts of the organization--I don't think it has to reside in the consultant or in a position--I think the principles of OD being incorporated into the system would be fantastic. I think that every leader should be an OD practitioner, that's how relevant it is. I think it's extraordinarily relevant. But not as a discipline necessarily, but as a concept that everybody could share.

I don't think we [the OD consultants] should be the sole consumers of OD. We should be in a position to pass the principles and disciplines and concepts of OD into the system so that other people can make sense out of them and use them.

Michael: The educational process for OD practitioners is misplaced. The OD skills really belong with leaders, not necessarily with the other layer called OD practitioners. The leaders actually need these skills on a day-to-day basis. OD should be embedded in the rubic of leadership development.

Want more? Come meet Michael and Edie in person on Thursday September 23rd. For registration and details please go to www.baodn.org

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Rani H. Gill is a learning designer looking at ways to help people learn and organizations change. She speaks, manages, and designs in three languages: technology, education and business. You can find her at her blog (wanderatwill.com), twitter, or Linked-In. She currently consults with organizations interested in using learning methodologies to change their organizations. Rani is also a Speaker Series volunteer with BAodn.