R is for remember*

*Thanks to Patti Digh for inspiring this post.

Today is my mother’s birthday. She would have been 95. She died 23 years ago and I still miss her. She was my hero – and best friend – as well as my mum.

In her mid 30s, just as the Second World War was ending, and people could begin to see a future again, her world fell apart. Her husband died of TB and left her to raise their five children. He had remained in Australia during the war because he was a bricklayer and was required to build airports and other important infrastructure needed by the war effort. Because he was not a returned serviceman my mother was not eligible for any war pension or support. I cannot imagine what a struggle it must have been.

She eventually met my father, who was a returned serviceman and struggled throughout his life with post-traumatic stress. I came along when she was 44 – a classic ‘menopause’ baby – her sixth child.

We were very close. My four brothers and sister were all much older. My sister even had her own child when I was born – an instant auntie!

We shared a love of reading – especially science fiction. We shared a love of cooking – of trying new and ‘adventerous’ recipes (in 1960s Australia even an avocado was exotic!). She tolerated my love of footy – this was a passion I shared more with my sister who took me to matches every Saturday when I was a teenager. We used to talk a lot, my mum and I – about our hopes and dreams. Hers unrealised, mainly due to circumstance; mine yet to be realised. We shared a love of social history; of family history. We would write away for documents and eagerly await their arrival when we could add another piece to the family history jigsaw.

She was an advocate for human rights and feminism way before they became popular. She helped settle refugees arriving in Australia after the war. She was a mentor to many, a confidante, a shoulder to cry on. When I announced at the age of 16 that I wanted to be an agricutural journalist and that I would therefore need to go to agricultural college, she didn’t bat an eyelid. Not until the headmaster at my school told me that ‘girls didn’t do agriculture and certainly didn’t go to agricultural college – I could become a nurse or a teacher’. My mum marched into his office and told him I could do ‘whatever I bloody well wanted, and his role, and the role of the school was to support that, not block it’. There was also the small problem that agricutural colleges at that time didn’t accept girls – there needed to be an amendment to the relevant legislation. By the time I was accepted into Longerenong Agricultural College as part of the first intake of residential girls, many letters had been written by my mum to politicians about the rights of girls in general, and her daughter in particular, to study agriculture. This seemingly small step was the start of my journey to realise my dreams. A journey I continue today.

My mum would love to be alive today. She would have embraced the internet – and maybe would have realised her dream to be a writer. Maybe she would have had a blog too. She’d be proud of the work I do and glad that I have opportunities to work in places like Armenia and Uganda and Indonesia. We would sit for hours and talk about my experiences. I miss that. I miss her.

So Happy 95th Birthday mum – Iris Enid Arnott (formerly Walker, nee Lane)

Surf’s Up

This is where I’ll spending the next couple of weeks.

This beach is called Southside and it’s a stone’s throw from where I live. It’s right next to the famous surf beach Bells Beach. Bells is not really a swimming beach – it’s surf central. Southside is also a Marine National Park so there’s plenty to see and do on the beach, in the water and under the water. The marine life in the Southern Ocean is unique – diverse, beautiful and mostly undiscovered. Like this leafy sea dragon. I kinda like it that way.

I’m giving myself time to rediscover my passion, to maybe unearth new directions, and just to be.

So Happy New Year and thanks for your support during 2007. Who knows where 2008 will lead?

Just because…

It’s the silly season, right? So check this out. Make sure you watch to the end.

An Open Space Christmas

I’m applying Open Space principles to Christmas this year – I think they’re ideal, especially the maxim to ‘do one less thing’!

Learning facilitation – what’s significant? part 2

I’d just opened space. About 60 or so people were sitting in, not really a circle, more an amoeba. They’d done well, considering. Pillars and curves in an oblong room was not really conducive to creating a nice neat circle. No matter. They’d just sat through a tedious powerpoint presentation so I guess they were pleased to be doing something physical – moving their chairs from the traditional theater style set up to this ‘circle’.

There were three sessions, topics were posted on the wall. People were milling around – some not sure what to do next, others grabbing the chance for a cuppa, others talking about…WHOOP – WHOOP – WHOOP. The siren couldn’t be ignored. It was a fire drill and the whole building – all 20+ floors were to be evacuated. About an hour later we wandered back into the building and took up where we’d left off.

Open Space is like that – it can even accommodate fire drills and I’m pretty sure those folk standing around on the footpath in the cold wind took the opportunity to chat to one-another. Whether it was about the topic or not is irrelevant – they had a shared experience and were connecting. I can imagine future meetings:

“Hi – I remember you”

“Me too.”

“Weren’t you at that workshop with the fire drill – the one where we were allowed to talk with each other.”

“Yeah, that was a bit different.”

So what did I learn as a facilitator?

Hold space – be present – be flexible – trust (especially them) – allow conversations to flow – do nothing more.

Learning facilitation – what’s significant for you?

My friend Sri contacted me about a session he was running on the ‘challenges of facilitation’. He asked me to name 5 challenges faced by a facilitator. Being the generous soul that I am, I gave him 10.

1. Letting go – it’s their session after all

2. Accepting offers (is that the same thing maybe?) – be open to whatever the group offers, knowing that you don’t have to say ‘Yes’ to every offer

3. Understanding the ‘real’ brief as compared to the ‘expressed’ brief

4. Creating a suitable environment (physical and mental) for the work the group has to do – ie setting up the room in advance so that it makes the activities/discussion etc easy

5. Being flexible – with time, activities, etc

6. Responding to the needs of the group when that’s in conflict with the goal of the client/sponsor

7. Trying to be too clever by half

8. Using methods that get the group to generate, organise and analyse the data themselves – helps create ownership and means it’s less work for you to do afterwards

9. Keeping everyone engaged especially the louder people (maintaining their enthusiasm) while providing space for the quieter ones to participate

10. Recognising that participation isn’t always active

The next evening I attended a local gathering of residents. Following that experience, I’ve amended my list.

1. Make sure you introduce yourself as the facilitator

2. Provide a way for participants to get to know each other (and writing on a sticky label that says a cheery “Hello, my name is…” is not what I mean)

3. Context the session – tell us why we’re there, what we’ll be doing, why it’s important and how long it will be

4. Talk to all of the room – not just one side or, even worse, one person

5. Don’t ask closed questions with ‘right’ answers. Takes me straight back to feeling inadequate at school again.

6. Make the group’s data visible to all

7. Write down my comments using my words, not others that you might prefer – or even worse, say something like “I think what you meant was …”

8. At a community meeting, or any meeting that has an expressed purpose of ‘getting to know each other’, provide refreshments either as people arrive (gives people something to do) or at the end when they can mingle and chat

9. We don’t need to know what was planned but isn’t going to happen because Madge forgot to book some equipment or another. Tell us what we will be doing.

10. Smile.

Which got me thinking about what people new to facilitation want to learn. Over the next few days I might try and map my journey of learning about facilitation. What’s been your most important learnings around facilitation?

Why blog?

I’ve said it before – these guys are great, and this latest video about blogging is worth a look.

Drowning in email?

Dave Snowden has a great post about how to deal with the email tsunami that many organisations are trying to cope with. He begins by outlining how email has come to be misused and abused and makes some useful suggestions to halt the abuse and maintain the usefulness.

I’d rather be snorkelling here

This is Port Noarlunga, just south of Adelaide, South Australia, Gulf of St Vincent.

It’s a beautiful spot for snorkelling and the water is so clear you can see the fish. We met a fisherman on the wharf, who was trying to catch King George Whiting. There was a school of them. The problem was, we could see them, and they could see us – especially those with fishing rods aloft.

Connecting with people + story = winner

The Rudd Labor Government was sworn in today with Kevin Rudd aka Kevin 07 as Australia’s 26th Prime Minister. Not only was the incumbent Liberal Party vanquished but its leader John Howard lost the seat he had held for 33 years. Polls had shown the Labor Party ahead all year leading up to the election – yet many people freely acknowledged the economic management of the Liberals (I’m not one of them, but this post is not really about politics).

Writing in the Sydney Morning Herald on the Monday following the election, Arthur Sinodinos, writes:

(Stephen Denning’s) thesis is that the art of successful leadership requires the ability to tell a story. The story is the vehicle for establishing a personal and emotional connection between the speaker and his audience. Rational arguement will not win people over.

It’s compulsory to vote (or, in reality, turn up to vote) in Australia and elections are always held on a Saturday. This means that campaigning funds can be used to influence voters on how to vote rather than on encouraging them to even turn up to vote.

Putting emphasis on connecting with people was an inspired part of the Labor Party’s campaign – obviously Kevin 07 had the main running, along with many of his relatively unknown colleagues. Making a connection is ALWAYS the first step in building rapport and building some sort of ongoing relationship. We know this from facilitating. And we also know that storytelling is a way of maintaining and strengthening the connection. There’s an implicit criticism of story in Sinodinos’s article – it’s either rational argument or story. I believe that both can live side by side. There’s no rule that I know of that says rational arguement can’t be a part of story or vice versa. And wouldn’t it be fascinating to see a Government using all its resources – left and right brain?

The interesting bit now will be to see how the story unfolds.