[Dialogue] Guernica & Conversation Roots & Shoots

Thu May 3 10:09:31 PDT 2012

Thanks, John

This is an interesting conversation. I feel having a having a variety of
methods available for use and not being bound to any one way of doing things
important. I find listening carefully and being in a place of openness is
more important than any particular method. There are a lot of different
conversation methods to select from.  I've seen groups bond and thrive using
ORID, and without any seeming "method" at all. When people listen carefully
to one another; everyone is given a chance to speak without interruption;
and everyone is included, amazing things happen. I still find using the ORID
sequence (visible or not) deepens conversations. 

I've recently done some planning with an individual whose life was in chaos.
I used Appreciative Inquiry for pre-planning; ORID with the Action Plan;
Spirit conversations a couple of times; and deep listening, saying almost
nothing. The conversations were always free flowing. This woman said the
experience was the most helpful thing she'd ever done and felt it made
moving forward possible for her.

In my experience the "mind change" dynamic happens anywhere, any time with
any "method" or no methods at all. And I've see it happen often using ORID,
which I still refer to in my imagination as the Art Form Method, our lives
being living, breathing art forms.

An historical note:  In 1998 Glenna Gerard and Linda Ellinor wrote Dialogue:
Rediscover the Transforming Power of Conversation  and started the Dialogue
Group. I went to their session at an Organization Development Network
conference in San Francisco in the late 90's and it was terrific. I
appreciated what they were doing and felt it was a great addition to the
world of "conversation methods". I think they came to a ToP course in SF
that Pat Tuecke and I did. Pat may recall. In the San Francisco Bay Area
organization development people were doing a lot cross pollination. I also
think they did a session at an IAF conference. 

Beret Griffith

From: dialogue-bounces at lists.wedgeblade.net
[mailto:dialogue-bounces at lists.wedgeblade.net] On Behalf Of
jlepps at pc.jaring.my
Sent: Thursday, May 03, 2012 10:22 AM
To: Colleague Dialogue
Subject: Re: [Dialogue] Guernica & Conversation Roots & Shoots

Colleagues:

Since this stream has involved a bit of ORID-bashing (or de-sanctifying if
you prefer) I'd like to say a little on its behalf. 

O-R-I-D is simply the sequence in which the mind works. We perceive
something, we react to it, we make sense of it, and we act appropriately.
When a facilitator sequences conversation questions in that order, the
dialogue flows naturally. The "depth" to which it goes depends on the
subject and the group and, to some extent, the facilitator. 

We recently presented this "method" to a group of judges in Singapore and
invited them to try it with a scripted conversation at their 5 tables. The
topic was "mentors." The bottom dropped out; All five table conversations
went deep, and awe filled the room. On reflection, the people gathered said
the reason it worked was the sequence of the questions: they flowed
naturally. Often that type conversation yields pious or abstract
characteristics of mentors; this one was specific and based on experience of
group members. As an outside observer during this conversation, I thought it
became a spirit conversation under the category of meditation. 

ORID, though belonging to the ToP suite of methods, is not "ours" alone. I
attended a workshop at an IAF meeting in Germany in which the workshop
leader (from the UK) presented a conversation method entitled 4-F (facts,
feelings, findings, future). The leader had never heard of ORID. 

When you see what passes for group conversations in most situations, having
a sensible sequence that considers how the mind works is a major step
forward. How "deep" we let it go depends on how well thought-through our
questions are at the "I" and "D" levels - and what is our aim in conducting
the conversation in the first place. 

I look forward to your responses.

John Epps

At 05:06 AM 5/3/2012, you wrote:

Steve,

I revere the "art form" methodology as much as and appreciate its
contribution over the years to our "knowing."  However, in more recent years
I've arrived at a slightly evolved understanding of knowing, having not so
much to do with clarity, awareness, consciousness and all of that as we used
to define those words.  For me knowing now has more to do with "metanoia,"
what the late Willis Harman called "mind change," which I take to mean
seeing the world differently to the extent that one revises ones stories of
reality and as a result, lives life differently.  The NT translation of
"metanoia" is "born again," and it can occur again and again in the course
of a lifetime.

To allow this to happen, I'm finding conversational approaches like Bohmian
(physicist David Bohm) dialogue to be more effective.  It is much less
structured than ORID, and therefore more open-ended and less prescriptive
about desired outcomes.  It is more of an art than an art form.  The
conclusions arrived at by the individual participants are less important
than the communal bonds established in the process, built not on the basis
of having arrived at a common mind (read "consensus") regarding the subject
at hand, but on the foundation of discovered and acknowledged
interdependence and shared destiny, i.e., community.  ORID, which still has
a valuable role to play in our work, depends more on the discipline of the
facilitator.  "Dialogue" seems to me to depend more on the discipline of the
participants, with a skilled facilitator way over on the side.

I think generally we ICA types need to loosen up a bit, occasionally put
away our work sheets with prescribed outcomes, and acknowledge that good
things can happen, and are happening, without our having to engineer
them--in the midst of which we can be participants with meaningful
contributions to make in our role as partners.  

Randy

"Listen to what is emerging from yourself to the course of being in the
world; not to be supported by it, but to bring it to reality as it desires."
-Martin Buber (adapted)
From: steve har <stevehar11201 at gmail.com>
To: dialogue at wedgeblade.net 
Sent: Tuesday, May 1, 2012 1:08 PM
Subject: [Dialogue] Guernica & Conversation Roots & Shoots

Regarding Wayne's assertion: "The basic phenomonology of the conversation
method has not changed. It has always been oriented toward the ontological.
If it isn't, it is some other method - put it that way."

With respect, I'm afraid I disagree with Wayne's assertion that the basic
conversation method has changed. What has changed is the the emphasis of the
conversation. 

In the Art Form method the conversation is "for" being. It is
ontological-existential and ethical. In the ORID format [as articulated in
ToP] the focus is knowing and sharing something inside the context of a
facilitator-client agreement with a particular group of participants. the
conversation is "for" knowing i.e epistemological.

Brian Stanfield's wonderful book of Focused Conversations really highlights
this shift to the client-consultant workplace -which was a new field of
engagement in which to practice conversation making. 

Reading Brian's workplace conversation models is like reading the music
scores for Bach's Well-tempered Clavier. Publishing those models really did
change the conversation focus in my view. Of course there is other music to
score and play besides Bach's and there are other conversations to model
besides conversations for knowing [epistemology].

 JWM's NRM monastic  distinctions are really powerful:  Knowing | Being |
Doing are actually phenomenological distinctions for sorting out the
internal and social experiences that open up in conversations and dialogues.

A conversation "for Being" [ontology]  is an entirely different score and it
creates an entirely different kind of conversational "music" that has a much
wider and deeper expression - like the original Guernica Art From
conversation did or like the Tombstone conversation did. In these
conversations, you get to declare something, you get to take a stand and say
what you value. The questions can reveal personal character, what was lost,
what was gained, who you are being in this moment as a human being. The
conversation can be profoundly existential i.e. ontological. It can also
contain varieties of ontological language like mythological and religious
expression.

There are 2 wonderful "Tombstone Conversations" for being done recently by
Charlie Rose in commemorating the death of 
http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/12297 and Christa Tippitt
Contemplating Mortality 
http://being.publicradio.org/programs/2012/contemplating-mortality/ 

A conversation for Doing -using JWM's NRM phenomenology is Largely
unexplored in my opinion. John Epps wrote some brilliant and new Other World
in This World conversations in 1996 which I found in the 6th floor Archives
last summer. last summer we tried some over skype. Bruce Hanson gave a
wonderful talk using the other world charts and Hoksai's pictures to
describe an Appreciative Inquiry assignment at Hitachi Company on the
outskirts of Tokyo. He talked about himself as being a navigator on an
otherworld trek.

In my view the Jenkins's book on the 9 disciplines is a clearheaded
translation of the old monastic categories. What remains is to see clearly
the Knowing Being and Doing phenomenology in practice and in roles like the
role of a facilitator and the new roles of pedagogue, story maker, coach,
navigator

So in sum, the point wasn't to jump on Wayne's good thoughts. The point is
to make some new distinctions about conversations that freshen the wind and
hear new music...

Steve 

-- 
Steve Harrington

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