Finding ways to de-construct and re-construct the new. Another example of the exciting work being done.
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- 2013-05-16 Wow! Leadership lessons from dancing guy.
Liberating Structures, Including and unleashing everyone
(Question: what is the difference between “liberation” and “empowerment”? I always use the latter.)
http://www.liberatingstructures.com/
(At 5:25 in the video)
“. . . Natural ecosystem power is totally distributed all over the place. .. They function very well because of that. … So what is it that you can do that could create the same conditions in a human organization …?
“Do the opposite they exclude. . . . conventional structures were not designed to include everybody… was not possible (technology). . . . Traditional old structures have been there for a very long time … designed to control, to direct . . ‘one to many’ kind of communication and instructions. What we are talking about . . . ‘many to many’ to communicate, for everybody to be connected in the same way as in natural systems where everything is connected in one way or the other.”
TEXT OF THE HOME PAGE:
When you feel included and engaged, do you do a better job? Do you think teams in which people work well together produce much better results? Have you noticed the best ideas often come from unexpected sources? Do you want to work at the top of your intelligence in a group of people and give the same opportunity to others?
If YES, we have found this is the kind of organization and community that people want to be part of. AND, Liberating Structures help make it happen.
So why is it that so many organizations of all stripes are filled with disengaged workers, dysfunctional groups and wasted ideas?
While there will always be some justification for blaming leaders (or professors and administrators in education), the more compelling and useful explanation is not that people involved are bad, stupid or incompetent, but rather that the practices they have all learned are neither adapted to today’s realities nor designed to achieve the ideals listed above.
Unwittingly, the conventional structures used to organize how people routinely work together stifle inclusion and engagement.
(Video)
Conventional structures are either too inhibiting (presentations, status reports and managed discussions) or too loose and disorganized (open discussions and brainstorms) to creatively engage people in shaping their own future. They frequently generate feelings of frustration and/or exclusion and fail to provide space for good ideas to emerge and germinate. This means that huge amounts of time and money are spent working the wrong way. More time and money are then spent trying to fix the unintended consequences.
This website offers an alternative way to approach and design how people work together. It provides a menu of thirty-three Liberating Structures to replace or complement conventional practices.
Liberating Structures used routinely make it possible to build the kind of organization that everybody wants. They are designed to include and unleash everyone in shaping the future.
This alternative approach is both practical and feasible because Liberating Structures are quite simple and easy to learn. They can be used by everyone at every level, from the executive suite to the grassroots. No lengthy training courses or special talents are required. Mastery is simply a matter of practice. LS routinely unleash a vast reserve of contributions and latent innovations waiting to be discovered.
Every person interested in leading change—in schools, hospitals, foundations, agencies, and businesses—can use Liberating Structures.
Liberating Structures are easy-to-learn microstructures that enhance relational coordination. They quickly foster lively participation in groups of any size, making it possible to truly include and unleash everyone. Liberating Structures are a disruptive innovation that can replace more controlling or constraining approaches.
Liberating Structures spark inventiveness by minimally structuring the way we interact while liberating content or subject matter. Very simple constraints unleash creative adaptability, generating better than expected resutls. Individual brilliance and collective wisdom are unbridled. Such a dramatic shift cannot be THAT simple, engaging, and powerful but it is.
By design, Liberating Structures distribute control so that participants can shape direction themselves as the action unfolds.