Upon further reflection, I get the nagging feeling that it is a gross simplification to say that facilitating this organisational change process simply boils down to giving the organisation what it thinks it needs in the way that it wants it. Clearly it is also not simply a matter of me giving the organisation what I think it needs in the way that I want! This is the dilemma. It is neither of these things. Indeed, the place where I need to position myself is the interstice between these two horrible abstractions. I need to float about in a kind of limbo between worlds: my world and the organisation's world. I need to be able to tap into the organisation's great sub-conscious - and also my own. I need to be able to tap into the infinite sea of possible futures. I need to feel the call of our times and understand what this 'call of our times' is calling me to do and what it is calling the organisation to do. I need to influence things without really having any control. Indeed, I may be the only thing that I really have any direct influence over!
This makes me wonder. Am I here to make a three year plan or am I facilitating organisational change? How can I tell? Who do I ask? What might be the signs? Am I just doing a kind of dance routine to fool myself into thinking that I am actually having any influence whatsoever while things just continue on their merry way, flowing past me indifferently? Is this just about me wanting to be powerful? Influential? Notice me! Notice me! Listen to my ideas! I have all the answers! That sounds ludicrous and shameful - and shouldn't be coming from me if I am to be true to my values.
But I'm still puzzling over that dilemma. That little gap that sits between my world and the organisation's world; or better still, between my worldview and the organisation's worldview. Indeed, I would contend that it is that very gap that is my playing field. I must play in the interstice; I must live in limbo. I must learn to feel comfortable there. I must put myself above all kinds of attachments but at the same time be calm and persistent.
I recently read a nice article (thanks to a friend of mine for passing it along) by Adam Kahane. Some snippets that I really have to quote are given below:
"The first thing you have to do is commit yourself to changing the world ...
"The second thing to do ... is to listen to what wants to change in the world...
"The sensing and listening that you have to do have three dimensions:
- You have to be able to see the world, to observe precisely [...] through your own and other people's eyes; to see new possibilities and new scenarios through the eyes of customers, of other players, of competitors, of heritics.
- Second and more difficult, you have to be able to see yourself in the mirror [...]; to see your own role and influence, your own part in the dance; to be reflective; to see your seeing
- And third and most difficult, you have to be able to glimpse the place where looking at the world and looking at yourself are the same [...] to see the underlying oneness."
Nowhere does Kahane make it clear just what this involves, but I think it is a pretty apt representation of what I am trying to do. So I consider myself as having a little authority to comment on what it involves: it's not easy. It's so not easy that it's not funny! Half the time, I feel insignificant. Half the time I enter a power-trip where I feel that I ought to be controlling everything. Neither of these are healthy.
As I swing from one extreme to the next, I cross a small patch of clarity. It might happen during a casual conversation, or while groups are presenting whatever came out of their discussion back to the group. It might even come in the morning after I do some stretches or in the late afternoon as I walk back home as the sun sets behind the temple on the hill beside my house. These are the moments when I feel neither insignificant nor on a power-trip. At these times, I know that there is a bigger process going on and that I have helped to give it shape, energy and perhaps even a little direction. At these moments I feel humble but joyful, at ease... I feel as though what I am doing is helping whatever is supposed to emerge to actually emerge. That is to say, that the dilemmas and paradoxes that lie at the heart of all the work actually find a voice and get set on the table for collective inquiry and dialogue... And out of this, new realities can be born.
I am still struggling to understand where, when and how to push and where, when and how to create the space for things to emerge of their own accord. What are the strategic moments, the tipping points where it makes sense for me to add a little of my own energy to the process and where should I stand back and let things take their course? This question is all the more challenging in a context where I know that I do not know everything! So it is not a simple question of pushing wherever things are not how I would like them to be... because that could very well backfire (as it has in small ways in the past) - for example by creating extra resistance (because every action has an equal and opposite reaction) or missing spontaneous opportunities that may present themselves (for example, by not being patient enough to recognise the new/different avenues that open up when a slightly different direction is chosen). At the same time, how do I make sure (if indeed I should) that we end up on the right course, or that the knowledge I bring finds a proper space in the outcomes of the process?
It seems a little as though I have different hats that I have to wear for different occasions. There is my 'facilitator' hat - which I wear when working with groups. My 'friend' hat, which I wear when I chat casually about 'what's going on'. My 'PME/outcome mapping/learning' hat, which I wear when I feel that people are not going about their process of visioning, strategy-making or whatever in a systematic manner. My 'comunity knowledge gardner' hat, which I wear as I zip about from place to place relating stories from one person, group or programme to others in order to give them a better picture of the totality... And so the list continues. Figuring out when to wear which hat is a bit of a challenge. I tend to do it spontaneously... But what effect is it having? And am I taking on too many roles?
I suppose this is exactly what I am learning through this experience.
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