7. ESSENTIAL CONVERSATION
Meaningful exchange in an atmosphere of trust
HAVING CONVERSATIONS OF CONSEQUENCE
Essential Conversation is, in many ways, the meat of authentic engagement. In order to get there, we follow the Aspects of the Convening Wheel that come before so that we may gracefully enter Essential Conversation with planning and respect. The presence of trust and safety plays an important role in the quality of the conversation and the ability to maintain authenticity.
When we’re authentic and engaged, we’re more able and willing to work together to imagine, and be responsible for, the best possible future. When creativity and wisdom become activated, whatever outcomes the group is working toward can be enhanced or accelerated.
Once the container has been successfully created and we’ve begun with hearing the voices of the assembled, there is an opening for a graceful transition to the very practical Aspect of Essential Conversation.
Various potent dialogic and conversational methods (World Café, Bohmian Dialogue, Appreciative Inquiry, and Circle Process, to name a few) can be good tools for establishing Essential Conversation. Two methods we use are the following: asking for reflections “popcorn style” (that is, each person in the gathering speaks whenever he or she is moved to speak, in what sometimes seems like a verbal “popping”) and small-group breakouts. In both settings, conversation is initiated with an invitation to speak or a directed question to speak to. We remind participants of the protocols of engagement, utilizing the Principles of Conversation, such as deep listening, slowing down the conversation, and allowing the space for difference (see “Arrows for Your Quiver”). The crucial step now is to call upon the participants to share their wholehearted wisdom with each other.
A critical challenge at this juncture is self-consciousness. It may show up as internal mind chatter exhibiting itself as nervous domination over the conversation, or as not speaking at all. Ultimately, this behavior prevents us from being vulnerable and genuine in our exchanges. As Conveners, we are vigilant for the signs of self-consciousness in ourselves and the participants. Establishing and reestablishing trust is the key to overcoming this challenge so that the gifts of authentic engagement and our wholehearted wisdom can emerge.
Once in Essential Conversation, the Convener is called on to use whatever skills we have acquired personally and professionally (leadership, facilitation, coaching, and training) to detect and work with the reluctance and/or anxiety that comes with self-consciousness. The goal is to keep all participants involved.
We’re now three-quarters of the way around the Convening Wheel, having moved from the more preparatory Aspects of the engagement to the most socially engaged point of the meeting. The foundation for trust and respect has been laid, opening the possibility of experiencing our interdependence and the best common future we can imagine together. Because we have taken the time to prepare the seedbed of our engagement, an environment has been created where there is excellent potential for everyone to be energetically connected as part of a whole living system.
CHALLENGE
Self-consciousness
The principal challenge in this Aspect of our gathering is self-consciousness (awkwardness or embarrassment in the presence of others; being ill at ease). It might look like eyes averted or heads down, or show up as either not speaking or speaking without listening. However it is exhibited, in us or others, facing up to the nature of self-consciousness is critical in order to maintain authentic engagement that provides the meaningful exchange that is Essential Conversation.
Slowing things down and getting back to familiar territory, as in Hearing All the Voices, is one way to address self-consciousness in a group. Another is to honestly admit our own self-consciousness and model our own courageous willingness to move beyond it. Whatever way we choose to address this challenge, we do our best to ease fears and model respectful authenticity.
EXTROVERT/INTROVERT DILEMMA
Pam convened a regular meeting of leaders in a large health-care organization. She reported that her convening muscles were most exercised during the Essential Conversation part of the meeting.
Once she had brought the group through Hearing All the Voices and opened the group to discussion of the topic at hand, there was a tendency for the two or three extroverts in the group to do all the talking. The three or four introverts, perhaps self-conscious or uncomfortable with interrupting, seemed content to sit and listen.
When she noticed this happening, she would pause the group. “Let’s stop for a minute. We can continue to discuss this issue, but right now I’d like to go around and hear an opinion from everyone. Then we can open it up again.”
Sometimes one of the extroverts would again begin to dominate the meeting, but Pam had learned to be very clear about the terms of engagement, while honoring each participant. “We want to hear your thoughts, but right now the process is to hear from everyone. Don’t worry, you will have a chance to say what you need to say.”
Pam held the people in a container of safety and trust, and allowed the full expression of wisdom to emerge from the group.1
PRINCIPLE
Meaningful exchange creates a connected and interdependent whole.
When our conversation lacks meaning, as when we exchange clichés or just “download” our thoughts onto others without listening or understanding, we remain disconnected from those around us even in the midst of what we might consider a fun and lively conversation. Introducing thoughtfulness and meaning into what we say and how we hear others brings us to realize our connection.
When we sense our interdependency, we see that our future is tied together. Authentic engagement is then more likely to continue. Participating in meaningful exchange is a powerful way to make this interdependency salient to all.
ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS
Has the ground been adequately laid for essential conversation to occur?
What am I now aware of or open to (that perhaps I was not before)?
What wisdom is already present?
These are the questions we ask ourselves as we move from Hearing All the Voices to Essential Conversation. The first question requires us to assess whether the ground is adequately laid for the Essential Conversation to begin (for example, people are not talking, or there are latecomers who missed the first part); then we may choose to go back to Hearing All the Voices for another round, or restate context, agreements, or intentions.
We also ask ourselves what we are now aware of that we were not before. It might be something that a participant said during Hearing All the Voices, or it might be a shift in the energy of the group itself that we detect. The time may also be right for us to notice how our own perceptions and positions create receptivity to the group.
We want to approach Essential Conversation in a way that flows naturally for the participants, and the answers to these questions will allow us to determine what is best, trusting that everything we need to know is already present in the room.
MAKING IT REAL
There are many ways to bring our group into Essential Conversation. If we’ve done our preparation thoroughly, the purpose for our gathering is clear to everyone. The group has begun to connect more seriously through Hearing All the Voices and is now mentally, emotionally, and energetically ready to engage at a more essential level. One way to enter Essential Conversation is to open the floor for reflections or comments. Conversation can be initiated with an invitation to speak freely or a directed question to speak to. The Convener must decide how best to frame this interaction. Still another way to enter into Essential Conversation is to ask particular people to comment or ask to hear from each participant in turn.
“LET THE WILD RUMPUS BEGIN”
A powerful way to get to Essential Conversation, especially with larger gatherings, is to split the group into smaller groups of three to five people. Using the Principles of Conversation (see “Arrows for Your Quiver”) as a group-process guide, these small groups can effectively, with the aid of good themes or questions, bring the participants to recognize each other as fellow travelers. These small, “knee to knee” groups also encourage deep listening and sharing. At the Thought Leader Gatherings and in other settings, we call these Wisdom Circles. The process is created to evoke the wisdom of the participants.
Coming back from a round or two of these small-group sessions, the Convener may ask for reflections or reports back from each individual, certain individuals, or anyone who is ready to speak.
Although this Aspect of the Convening Wheel is the place where participants gain independent energy to continue, the Convener’s job is not over. This is where our skills as leaders, facilitators, coaches, or trainers come in to help us manage this sometimes-messy phase of our engagement. Our objective is to remain alert for self-consciousness and to get to the place where people are willing and ready to work together authentically.
CREATING MEANING AT WORK
As a group of cautious but willing learners, we stumbled through a new way of being together at work. The process provided an increasing recognition that convening and having a language and a process to generate solutions to our issues brought empowerment and built trust. We did not set out to “create” anything in particular, but one of the most powerful impacts was learning that having a place where you can have meaningful conversations creates power.
Most compelling was where we arrived after six months. We had, through this process, become a “community.” The principles and practices set us up to demonstrate care, create true understanding, and share thoughts and ideas in a productive manner. We made commitments to bring forward what we valued and what we saw as needed in our organization. We shared what we were learning with our peers and our clients, we told stories of our success, and we recommitted to our next series of applications and actions.
In terms of building capability, the skills, tools, and application of the Art of Convening principles and practices are still being used. The business benefits are both tangible and intangible as the HR organization continues to meet with greater efficiency and effectiveness. I find it interesting that in business, we typically shy away from getting to the heart of the matter, yet what we learned through this experience was that being with the heart of the matter is where true performance contributions manifest and become significant business impacts.
—By Anne Griswold2
When we notice that the participants are tending toward self-consciousness, signaled by individual or collective agitation, reluctance to engage, or disharmony, we may choose to bring the group back together by convening another Transition Exercise (see chapter 4), Stringing the Beads again, or restating the terms of engagement. The Convener, as leader, evaluates all the elements of the gathering—the unique characteristics of the participants, the design and venue—and makes a clear-headed assessment of our own personal capacities, skills, and expertise. As with driving a car, the more we practice convening, the more natural and instinctive these decisions become.
The continuation of trust through integrity is the key for the success of this Aspect. What is wanted from people here is their wholehearted engagement and wisdom. This can happen very easily and naturally; however, the journey can also be emotional and messy. Remember, the Convener does not fix situations or people to make either better. The Convener’s role is to steward the space for participants to offer their gifts.
Trust is born in an environment that allows for personal safety and truth telling. When we know what the agreed-upon game is and trust that what we are hearing from people is true, the possibility for authentic or Essential Conversation is present. When the dialogue is trusted to be authentic, or at least the cards are on the table, the mood in the gathering transforms from one of perhaps confusion, mistrust, or even hostility to collegiality. It is then possible for the participants to have a sense that they belong to the same community.
Achieving trust is no small thing. We live in a world where the rationale for our distrust is constantly reinforced. It’s so ingrained in our psyches that we don’t normally question the validity of our distrust.
There is a cost to this distrust and caution in our everyday relationships, and therefore our engagements. If we expend energy trying to second-guess the virtue and validity of everything we hear and experience from others, we have less energy to be truly engaged and creative. That’s why the preparatory work, in the sequencing of the Wheel, is so important. A potent antidote to fear and distrust is having an experience that proves otherwise. What we have created is a space for give and take. Authentic engagement thrives in this kind of environment.
Imagine now that we’ve successfully created a safe and trusting container in which to have our meeting. The assembled have all introduced themselves, and spoken to their goals and aspirations for the gathering. The last person has spoken, and now the room is silent. Imagine what the people in the group may be thinking and feeling. This is the moment when a transformative shift is most potent.
In more cases than not, an Arc of Recognition takes place (see the next section). It may have already occurred during the time of Hearing All the Voices, and it allows for Essential Conversation to take place.
ARC OF RECOGNITION
When we are invited to speak our name and what is true for us, and we hear others do the same, an energetic shift predictably occurs that is at once quite ordinary and simultaneously astoundingly transformative for the group. We wrote in the preceding chapter about the power of being heard. However, the combination of speaking and listening deeply in a safe container produces a remarkable shift within a group that may be imperceptible to almost everyone but the Convener. Simply put, we experience being heard and “seen” as who we truly are while simultaneously seeing and hearing others for who they are. This produces the effect of recognizing one another in an essential way. In the movie Avatar, the central social theme revolved around the indigenous Na’vi “seeing” one another. This sweet spot in any gathering is a moment that the Convener watches for with great anticipation. It’s the appearance of this Arc of Recognition that can enable us to successfully enter Essential Conversation.
More specifically, something is happening in the group dynamics. Like much in life, it’s the simple things that often have the greatest impact. When we are asked to speak from a place of meaning and allowed the space to do so, we become vulnerable and open to each other as witnesses to who we really are. This is true even if we are just saying our name, where we live, and a word or two about our present condition. Hearing others speak this way may have the effect of creating a shared experience—an arc across the room (or space)—that allows us to truly recognize our common humanity. With practice and deepening of our own awareness and skills, we facilitate this authentic engagement more and more. It may happen in the first Stringing of the Beads, or when we open to Essential Conversation, or perhaps further along in the engagement, if there is a second Stringing or beyond. We then have the potential to experience interdependence and a common future. A very natural trust emanates from this awareness, allowing authentic engagement, leading to the potential for our collective wisdom.
STILL THE VOICE INSIDE
As I have brought Art of Convening principles to my program planning and evaluation work, it has been exciting to see movement from stale meetings to participatory processes where the energy level and sense of possibility is palpable. I once had the difficult job of helping an organization examine their mission and values, which ultimately ended a youth mentoring component of their program that was not working well. Using principles from the AoC, such as knowing myself as a Convener and approaching each session by preparing a safe container for each participant, I helped the group decide for themselves how their organization should evolve.
I developed a step-by-step process over a period of several weeks that allowed the mentoring program to end gracefully. The process culminated in a circle where each Native American youth shared about their time with their mentor. These youth, who for the most part had not been very communicative to their mentors about their feelings, did an amazing job of eloquently expressing their reflections in this circle, including unsolicited but very insightful comments about their own participation. This experience included the difficult practice for me to “still the voice inside” that wants to move to a solution too quickly and left me with a sense of awe about the power of respectful convening.
—By Lauren Patterson3
The art, for the Convener, is in the recognition of the subtle shift of energy and in knowing what to do or not do in the moment. Our inner work, drawn from the initial aspects of the Wheel, comes in handy here. Since we can’t count on anyone else to have done the preparation or to be on the lookout for these vital signs, this is the moment when our skills of patience and discernment pay off. As the Conveners, we are continually sensing the mood of the group. We assess the energy and the ability of the assembled to be connected—both personally and to their common future. This is usually the time to slow down the conversation and find common ground. At this stage, the participants may engage with one another, for the first time, in a meaningful way and begin to function as a unified “living system.”
The phenomenon of the Arc of Recognition has been experienced many times in Thought Leader Gatherings (TLGs). Embedded in the design of each of the half-day sessions is the seed of Essential Conversation, which rarely fails to come to full blossom. Take note of the progression of the Aspects as you read about the TLG format.
THOUGHT LEADER GATHERINGS
Heartland has convened Thought Leader Gatherings every month since their founding in 1998. These events alternate between the San Francisco Bay Area of California and the Twin Cities area of Minnesota.
HOW THE GATHERINGS WORK
Each phase of the four-hour Thought Leader Gathering (TLG) is designed to bring the group to an experience of the Arc of Recognition, which then stimulates and reveals the collective wisdom of the group in an effective and efficient, yet unhurried, time frame. We draw on ancient as well as modern group process models, borrowing from the great cultural and organizational traditions.
The TLGs are held in beautiful venues that offer access to natural lighting and wholesome food. The format is designed to guide the 50–100 participants successfully through an interactive learning experience, from the conversation starter’s opening remarks to the closing harvesting session. The hub of each gathering is the Community Circle, where the conversations begin and end.
THE ELEMENTS OF DESIGN
The day begins with breakfast at round tables of six to eight. In an adjacent space is a large Community Circle with a chair for each participant, which will, throughout the session, be reconfigured into small-group Wisdom Circles (see “Arrows for Your Quiver”). The day proceeds as follows:
• Everyone is welcomed by a greeter at registration.
• The session starts with a welcome, followed by Setting Context for the gathering, including a brief genesis story of how the TLG began, and the agenda/overview of the day.
• We communicate the agreements, including an agreement to utilize the Principles of Conversation.
• A brief transition exercise follows, then an invitation to join the Community Circle.
• Once in the circle, we String the Beads for Hearing All the Voices.
• We introduce the conversation starter (presenter), and he or she speaks.
• Break.
• Two rounds of small-group Wisdom Circles follow the break, shuffling participants and addressing different questions.
• We return to the Community Circle to Harvest the Wisdom.
This core design has been convened in this essential form each month for 12 consecutive years in Minnesota and California, with consistent results that many experience as transformational.
The journey around the Convening Wheel is made prior to, in the planning of, and during each TLG. The process is initiated by clarifying our purpose and intention into a compelling integral invitation. The venue has been prepared to maximize safety, beauty, and interaction. The flow of activity from the welcome; through Setting Context, agreements, and protocols; to Hearing All the Voices is seamless.
The goal, once again, is to create the container in which each can experience the Arc of Recognition. It may come early in the session, during Stringing the Beads, or later, during the small-group Wisdom Circles, or back in the large circle as we Harvest the Wisdom.
Bringing a room full of people together, from longtime members to first-timers, month after month, to achieve a high level of Essential Conversation that matters demands an ability to create and execute a design of convening principles and practices that are consistently effective.
We have seen over and over again that when the conditions are set for meaningful engagement, the potential for the individual to viscerally experience a connection to and interdependence with others increases many-fold.
WHERE WE ARE ON THE CONVENING WHEEL
1. At the Heart of the Matter—We have explored who we are and how we will be in relationship with others.
2. Clarifying Intent—We have identified an intention consistent with At the Heart of the Matter that has substance and is acted upon.
3. The Invitation—We have extended a sincere invitation with genuine hospitality, generosity, and conviction.
4. Setting Context—We have clearly communicated the form, function, and purpose of our gathering.
5. Creating the Container—We have prepared a physical space with beauty and life, and we have agreed on terms of engagement or protocols that bring safety for our time together.
6. Hearing All the Voices—We have spoken and heard every other person speak in our gathering, creating an authentic whole.
7. Essential Conversation—We have entered into a meaningful exchange in an atmosphere of trust.
Essential Conversation is an exciting phase of our engagement that has power and consequence. As this conversation develops, a key outcome will be the subject of the next chapter—Creation.
Things to Remember
Challenge: Self-consciousness. Are we willing to be seen and listen deeply enough to see others?
Principle: Meaningful exchange creates a connected and interdependent whole.
Essential Questions:
• Has the ground been adequately laid for essential conversation to occur?
• What am I now aware of or open to (that perhaps I was not before)?
• What wisdom is already present?
Aspect-Strengthening Exercises
Checklist for the Gathering at Hand
• Do a mood check of the group. Have you heard all the voices?
• This is usually a good time to slow down the conversation to find the common ground.
• Are there energy leaks in the group? Check for signs of self-conscious behavior.
• Are you able to sense the presence of the Arc of Recognition?
• Assess the energy and ability of the group to be connected— personally and to their common future.
• Are you ready to move on to Creation?
EXERCISE 1: CONVERSATION REDIRECT AND REFLECTION
The next time you find yourself in a conversation with another person and you wish to shift the exchange from superficial to one of more depth, try the following:
1. Simply ask your partner if it’s OK to hit the pause button for a moment or two of silence to reflect on why you decided to meet. This reflective “time-in” encourages the possibility of meaningful and transformative conversation.
2. Now briefly share with your partner what came up for you; then ask your partner to do the same.
Reflection is a core leadership competency. Designing opportunities for taking a time-in to reflect has the effect of slowing down the interaction to the speed of life, therefore allowing for a deeper consideration of the purpose of your interaction with that person. With reflection comes listening, which births understanding. Wisdom is the outcome.
EXERCISE 2: PRACTICING MEANINGFUL EXCHANGE
1. Find a private and comfortable place to sit close to and directly across from one other person.
2. Decide who will speak first to a predetermined question of mutual interest. Speak of things in your everyday life that have real meaning for you; resist exchanging cliché for cliché.
3. Now look directly into each other’s eyes, and take turns speaking and listening without interruption or distraction.
4. The speaker speaks for a few minutes while the listener simply listens, offering no verbal or physical feedback. When the first speaker is finished, simply thank one another and switch roles.
5. You may alternate speaking and listening for as long as you wish.
6. Remember, it is important to avoid advice giving or feedback. You may wish to go offline if things come up that you feel you need to further work through together.
Journaling Questions
• Recall a time when you engaged in a meaningful conversation in an atmosphere of trust. How was this different from other conversations?
• When in your life have you experienced the Arc of Recognition in relationship to your engagements—of being seen by others in your essence while simultaneously knowing that others are having the same experience?