The Surprising Power of Liberating Structures: Simple Rules to Unleash A Culture of Innovation (32 page)

• Go deeper with a second or third round to refine or deepen understanding of unwanted results.
  
• Link these results (creative destruction) to a broad review of activities via
  Ecocycle Planning
  .
  
• Share action steps: then go deeper and string together with
  Troika Consulting, Wise Crowds
  , or
  Open Space
  .
  

• For reducing harm to patients experiencing safety lapses (e.g., wrong-side surgery, patient falls, medication errors, iatrogenic infections) with cross-functional groups: “How can we make sure we always operate on the wrong side?”
  
• For helping institutional leaders notice how it is they inadvertently exclude diverse voices: “How can we devise policies and practices that only work for a select few?”
  
• For IT professionals: “How can we make sure we build an IT system that no one will want to use?”
  
• For leadership groups: “How can we make sure we keep doing the same things with the same people while asking for different results?”
  

Below: presentation materials for introducing
TRIZ

“You cannot cross the sea merely by standing and staring at the water.” R. Tagore

•
  
In connection with their personal challenge or their group’s challenge, ask, “What is your 15 percenty? Where do you have discretion and freedom to act? What can you do without more resources or authority?”

• Unlimited number of groups.
  
• Chairs for people to sit in groups of 2-4; no tables required.
  

• Everyone is included
  
• Everyone has an equal opportunity to contribute
  

• First alone
  
• Then in pairs or small groups
  

• First alone, each person generates his or her own list of 15% Solutions. 5 min.
  
• Individuals share their ideas with a small group (2 to 4 members). 3 min. per person and one person at a time
  
• Group
  members provide a consultation to one another (asking clarifying questions and offering advice). 5 to 7 min. per person and one person at a time
  

• Move away from blockage, negativism, and powerlessness
  
• Have people discover their individual and collective power
  
• Reveal bottom-up solutions
  
• Share actionable ideas and help one another
  
• Build trust
  
• Remember unused capacity and resources (15 percent is always there for the taking)
  
• Reduce waste
  
• Close the knowing-doing gap
  

• Check each item to assure that it is within the discretion of the individual
  
• Be ready for BIG things to emerge via the butterfly effect
  
• Reinventing the wheel is OK
  
• Each 15% Solution adds to understanding of what is possible
  
• Clear, common purpose and boundaries will generate coherence among many 15% Solutions
  
• Make it a routine to ask for 15% Solutions in meetings (15% Solutions are otherwise commonly unnoticed and overlooked)
  
• While introducing the idea, tell a story about a small change made by an individual that sparked a big result
  
• Learn more from professor Gareth Morgan, who has popularized the concept at
  www.imaginiz.com/index.html
  under the tab Provocative Ideas
  

• Natural fit with
  Troika Consulting, Wise Crowds, Open Space, Helping Heuristics
  , and
  Integrated~Autonomy
  
• Returning to a group, you can ask, “What have you done with your 15 percent lately?”
  

• For any problem-solving or planning activity in which you want individuals to take initiative
  
• For inclusion in the conveners report in
  Open Space
  sessions
  
• For any challenge that requires many people to change for success to emerge
  
• For generating small “chunks” of success that can be combined into a simple prototype that is easy and cheap to test (low-fidelity prototype)
  

Below: presentation materials for introducing
15% Solutions

“To listen is very hard, because it asks of us so much interior stability that we no longer need to prove ourselves by speeches, arguments, statements or declarations. True listeners no longer have an inner need to make their presence known. They are free to receive, welcome, to accept.” Henri Nouwen

•
  
Invite the group to explore the questions “What is your challenge?” and “What kind of help do you need?”

•
  
Any number of small groups of 3 chairs, knee-to-knee seating preferred. No table!

• In each round, one participant is the “client,” the others “consultants”
  
• Everyone has an equal opportunity to receive and give coaching
  

• Groups of 3
  
• People with diverse backgrounds and perspectives are most helpful
  

• Invite participants to reflect on the consulting question (the challenge and the help needed) they plan to ask when they are the clients. 1 min.
  
• Groups have first client share his or her question. 1-2 min.
  
• Consultants ask the client clarifying questions. 1-2 min.
  
• Client
  turns around with his or her back facing the consultants
  
• Together, the consultants generate ideas, suggestions, coaching advice. 4-5 min.
  
• Client turns around and shares what was most valuable about the experience. 1-2 min.
  
• Groups switch to next person and repeat steps.
  

• Refine skills in asking for help
  
• Learn to formulate problems and challenges clearly
  
• Refine listening and consulting skills
  
• Develop ability to work across disciplines and functional silos
  
• Build trust within a group through mutual support
  
• Build capacity to self-organize
  
• Create conditions for unimagined solutions to emerge
  

• Invite participants to form groups with mixed roles/functions
  
• Suggest that participants critique themselves when they fall into traps (e.g., like jumping to conclusions)
  
• Have the participants try to notice the pattern of support offered. The ideal is to respectfully provoke by telling the client “what you see that you think they do not see”
  
• Tell participants to take risks while maintaining empathy
  
• If the first round yields coaching that is not good enough, do a second round
  
• Beware that two rounds of 10 minutes per client is more effective than one round of 20 minutes per client.
  
• Keep the spaces safe: if you share anything, do it judiciously
  
• Questions that spark self-understanding or self-correction may be more powerful than advice about what to do
  
• Tell clients to try and stay focused on self-reflection by asking, “What is happening here? How am I experiencing what is happening?”
  
• Make
  Troika Consulting
  routine in meetings and conferences
  

• Meld with
  15% Solutions
  : each client shares a 15% Solution, asking for coaching
  
• Inviting the client to turn around and sit facing away from his or her consultants once the question has been shared and clarified deepens curiosity, listening, empathy, and risk taking for all. The alternative of not turning around is an option.
  
• Restrict the coaching to generating only questions to clarify the challenge: no advice giving (aka Q-Storming)
  
• String together with
  Helping Heuristics; Heard, Seen, Respected; Nine Whys
  

• For the beginning or end of staff meetings
  
• After a presentation, for giving participants time to formulate and sift next steps
  
• For students to help one another and to promote peer-to-peer learning
  
• In the midst of conferences and large-group meetings
  
• As a self-initiated practice within a group
  

Below: presentation materials for introducing
Troika Consulting