Entry

I recently attended a workshop "what is the spirit of action learning?" attended by action learning facilitators like myself. It was being held about 200 miles away and travelling on the first train of the day, and with one connection and a taxi ride at the end, there was a possibility I might miss the beginning. I warned the organisers of the possibility. Although they did not mind at all, it was something I was very keen to avoid. I hate missing the beginning of 'events'.

I have found that others share the same feeling - a friend talked about travelling to attend a workshop held at a University in a city. On arrival she and others were told they would need to move their cars. By the time they had returned, the organisers had started, participants had done their introductions and were already working in small groups. She described that she never really felt fully part of the group for the rest of the day - sometimes missing that important part of a process/relationship can not be fully recovered.

Thinking about this, I remembered a course a few years ago on 'effective tools for busy people'. The trainers had designed a model for effective working and the first part was 'E' for 'Entry' - the importance of the beginning part of 'meeting'. Basically it referred to how we form relationships, about developing 'rapport', and engaging trust. Whether the contact is short and a one-off, or long term, the common theme of my reflection is that how we 'enter' is important.

Tony Gee of the Moveable Feast, also talked about this recently when describing a way of working with people in 'workshop' - working creatively with people. He talked (and showed) how he sometimes starts (enters) a workshop from behind a screen and uses 'puppets' to engage participants' attention and imagination - starting from, and working with, the unknown to allow creativity to unfold.

What happens at these 'beginnings' or 'entrances' can help or hinder the course of any type of relationship - working ones, or otherwise. A few years ago, I was asked to form a team to run a new service from scratch. A couple of years later when recruiting a team leader into the (by now) established team (this was the first 'new' person to join them) I asked applicants at interview how they approached joining a team. This was revealing in showing how aware and sensitive they were to how their actions could help or hinder developing trust and credibility. Thinking about other work situations, it is often a crucial time for a new CEO, Director, or manager in how they engage with staff of large organisations.

Sometimes, it can help to not be there at the beginning of a meeting - if you are the common element with people who have not met before, it can help them to start forming a relationship informally themselves.

We 'enter' through doors, we 'enter' relationships, we 'enter' a meeting, we make stage 'entrances', we make a diary 'entry' and musicians playing in an orchestra make an 'entry' -beginnings and entrances are important to what follows.

Living with not knowing

Yesterday evening I went to a monthly social meeting of the Exeter group of Couchsurfers. Couchsurfing is an international not-for-profit network that connects travellers with local communities they visit. A big part of it is about people 'hosting' travellers by giving them a place to stay. But that is just part of it. On a bigger scale it puts people together who would otherwise have never met; for cultural friendship, exchange and learning experiences. I have been a member for just a year and love it! It has expanded my thinking in all sorts of ways and I love the sense of common humanity it involves. But you don't have to travel vast distances to have experiences that have a big impact.

Last night, I met Steph again - a fellow CS in a different age group to me but whose approach to life-decisions I admire.

Steph travels around by hitchhiking, and travelling back to mid-devon from Exeter wasn't much of an option. Instead he put his trust in the Couchsurfing philosophy by asking if anyone at the gathering could give him somewhere to stay that night. It made me realise how little we live ourselves in that way - most of us don't leave anything to chance, but there is so much that comes from risking/trusting ourselves that we can gain from 'stepping out' without a 'definite' ahead.

This makes me think of situations where this is an underlying feature - for example the explorations found in improvisation, in therapy, in open travel. It is also one of Revans' principles of Action Learning - to 'start from a place of not knowing'. With a good facilitator who can hold the structure and create a safe and trusting space amongst participants, people can allow themselves to tackle problems by embracing a place of 'not knowing'.

It can be a scary place - to 'let go' of the side of the riverbank and trust that you will arrive somewhere safely. My own experience is that new expansion comes from trusting yourself and others - this is what mentoring and action learning encourages people to take part in.

Whether in Couchsurfing or in development opportunities in work with people, I know that this brings us (myself included) new encounters and new learning. It's something that Couchsurfing shows so often.

Learning by Doing

....which is a key principle in Action Learning work - the basis being that we learn by a process of doing, reflecting (through questioning), planning and then doing (action).. and so on.

At a recent event, I heard the following quote from John Holt in "Chicken Soup for the Soul" -

'not many years ago I began to play the cello. Most people would say that what I am doing is "learning to play" the cello. But these words carry into our minds the strange idea that there exists two very different processes: 1) learning to play the cello; and 2) playing the cello. They imply that I will do the first until I have completed it, at which point I will stop the first process and begin the second. In short, I will go on "learning to play" until I have "learned to play" and then I will begin to play. Of course, this is nonsense. There are not two processes, but one. We learn to do something by doing it. There is no other way.'

As a guitarist, I am fascinated by this and can see how nonsensical those phrases are that we use so often.

.. and so it is in workplaces - people learn to become managers by doing it (I certainly did!) and there is no separation between managing and learning to manage. Many CEOs and Senior Managers have benefited (as have their organisations) from executive coaching at a particular time in their career. The Action Learning process works because people in the group (the 'set') are open to learning - 20 years experience in a role does not shelter you from being able to benefit from and actively continuing to learn.

For me, I will now think of myself now as playing guitar by learning - I am always learning while I am playing!