 ‘We are interested in the past only insofar as it impacts on the present.’ (Geoff Pelham)
I worked with a training group recently that was learning the skills of action learning, a form of group coaching in which one person presents an issue and others help her or him to think it through to find or create a solution. As one person at a time talked about a challenge that he or she was facing at work, I noticed others often instinctively posed questions or prompts that aimed to uncover the person’s history or the backstory to the situation. The person presenting would then typically respond with something like, ‘OK, let me take you back to the beginning, where it all started.’ In doing so, the presenter used up precious action-learning time reciting a story that he or she already knew. It was as if, by sharing wider background information in this way, the peer coaches would have greater understanding and, therefore, be better equipped to pose useful questions. Yet, as Claire Pedrick (Simplifying Coaching, 2021) puts it: ‘…our role is not to see the situation thoroughly, or to diagnose. It is for the thinker to see the situation thoroughly.’ The purpose of action learning, like coaching, is to enable the person to think more deeply and broadly for themselves. Claire goes on to reframe past-facing questions by bringing them into the present, e.g. from, ‘Tell me your backstory?’ to ‘Tell yourself your back story and let’s see what we notice?’; or from ‘What have you already tried?’ to ‘If you look at what you have tried already, what do you notice?’ If a person repeatedly recounts the same story from his or her past, Claire will shift the focus to the present, the here-and-now, by posing a gentle challenge, e.g. ‘Assume I know everything. What do we need to think about today?’; or ‘What is your most important question about that today?’ I worked with a psychodynamic consultant, Kamil Kellner, in an action learning group. Once, when a person presented a topic by framing its origins in the past, Kamil noticed her emotional state as she spoke and reflected back simply with, ‘The past feels very present.’ I had a similar experience when once, as a student in a group, I became quite emotional. The psychotherapist tutor, Mark Sutherland, responded, ‘It’s not the first time you’ve been here is it, Nick?’ The past can resonate so powerfully in the present. The gift is to notice its presence and create a shift in the now.
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 An opportunity to receive questions. ‘Unless your ideas are ridiculed by experts, they are worth nothing.’ (Reg Revans) You may have heard of Action Learning – a powerful tool used in organisations and between peers to learn in the context of action, and act in the context of learning. It typically involves one person presenting an issue, and then receiving critical questions from peers that enable them to think it through for themselves and reach their own solutions. In this sense, we could think of a conventional Action Learning process as a group-team of individuals providing coaching-consultancy to an individual. I saw this idea turned on its head on a trip to Africa. An organisation was grappling with key strategic issues and invited leaders and professionals to form Action Learning sets to address them. Instead of one person presenting, however, the groups first spent time clarifying and crystallising their own issues. They then asked of themselves and each other: What are the critical questions that, if we could answer them, would provide us with strategic options? They finished by reaching agreement on solutions. It’s the first time I had seen Action Learning used as a collective venture in this way. It was a a shared, relational process of inquiry, ownership and problem-solving wherein the group itself functioned simultaneously as both client and coach-consultant. I have seen similar patterns of approach used in Asia since. What strikes me is that this isn’t just a different, novel methodology or technique. It’s the product of a deep cultural mindset, belief and stance that sees, values and places the group first. In my experience, there are corresponding benefits and risks to working in these different ways. An individual-orientation can develop personal insight, awareness and autonomy yet may lack ‘the whole is greater than the sum of the parts’ strength and cohesion in addressing change. A group-orientation, on the other hand, can bring the latter advantages to bear, yet faces its own risks including social loafing, conflict-avoidance or group-think. I’m curious, therefore: what have been your experiences of Action Learning?  This impressed me. This woman has been deaf since birth and lip-reads. Struck by how naturally she speaks and with apparent ease in conversation, I'm curious and ask if she can hear anything of her own voice. She replies, ‘No - nothing’. Even more intrigued, I ask, ‘So…how do you know what volume you are speaking at?’ ‘Trial and error’, she replies. ‘I started to speak when I was a child. If someone leaned back as if trying to move away from me, I realised I was speaking too loudly. If they leaned forward as if straining to hear me, I knew I was speaking too quietly. Simple.’ And brilliant. There are some interesting parallels to this approach in fields such as Gestalt coaching and OD action research. It’s about trying something new – an experiment, if you like – and being open to, sensitive to, the experience, the response. This type of feedback loop can enable us to learn, grow, innovate and improve. It takes courage to take a step into not-yet-knowing; attentive observation skills to notice what happens; critical reflective research skills to make sound, meaningful sense of it and, last but not least, personal and professional judgement to make good decisions and act on them. So, what does this point towards as leaders, OD, coaches and trainers? I believe it’s about recruiting, releasing and rewarding people who seize the initiative: responsible risk-takers willing to try something new, more likely to seek forgiveness than permission. It’s also about creating healthy relational and cultural conditions where positive qualities – e.g. wonder, curiosity and inquiry – thrive and are supported. It’s about experimenting and learning without fear of blame or failure. ‘There is no such thing as a failed experiment, only experiments with unexpected outcomes.’ (Fuller).  If you love 2 x 2 models, you will love this. Maybe. I led a group supervision session this afternoon for coaches throughout the UK. As a prompt for contracting, signposting and focusing, I drew a simple grid with 2 polarities: (a) Person – Situation and (b) Here & Now – There & Then. We can think of 'Here & Now' as in the room; 'There & Then' as in the situation or story. This creates 4 permeable zones of interest and inquiry for supervision and coaching and potential prompts for reframing. I’ll offer some sample questions below that can be used or adapted in each zone: Person – Here & Now. How is this situation impacting on you here and now? As you talk about this now, what stands out as most important to you? What are you aware of here and now? How are you feeling now as you talk about this? Which aspect of this would you like to focus on here and now? Person – There & Then. What role are you playing in this situation? What responsibility are you taking for what’s happening? What outcome are you hoping for in this situation? What are you noticing and not-noticing in this situation? What critical strengths is this calling for from you? Situation – Here & Now. What is the current situation? Who is influencing, involved in or impacted by the situation and how? What opportunities and challenges are emerging in this situation here and now? Which aspects of the situation are most important to pay attention to at the moment? Situation – There & Then. What’s the back story to this situation? What goals and outcomes were identified at the outset? If this project was to be successful, what would success look and feel like for different stakeholders? What professional and policy issues will need to be taken into account?  This is an energetic variation of conventional action learning that only takes 15 minutes. It’s a great way of creating focus in conversations and a great way to practice posing powerful questions. Such questions will create a shift in a person’s insight and action. All you need is a group of 3-4 people, a stopwatch, a desktop bell or other similar item, lots of post-it notes or pieces of paper and a pen for each participant. Choose a room or space where participants can hear each other and will be free from interruptions. Ask participants in advance to think of a current issue they are grappling with - something they are willing to share in the group and would like help to solve. An additional person (or one of the participants in larger groups) will act as facilitator for the activity. Here are the rules: The group must stick strictly to time. Time slots will be punctuated by the facilitator using the bell. When one person is presenting (see below), other participants must think of the best questions they can to help the presenter move forward. Here is the sequence: The group agrees who will present an issue. The facilitator explains the rules and steps (below). Each participant is given a pad of post-it notes and a pen. The presenter is allowed a few moments to decide what he or she will present. *The presenter speaks then stops as soon as the bell pings. (90 seconds) *The other people write down a question on a post-it note, no more than 12 words, and give it to the presenter. (60 seconds) *The presenter reads the questions and decides if he or she wants to respond to any of them. (30 seconds) *The presenter speaks again and stops as soon as the bell pings. (90 seconds) *The other people write down another question on a post-it note, no more than 12 words, and give it to the presenter. (60 seconds) *The presenter reads the questions and decides if he or she wants to respond to any of them. (30 seconds) *The presenter speaks again and stops as soon as the bell pings. (90 seconds) *The other people write down a piece of advice on a post-it note, no more than 12 words, and give it to the presenter. (60 seconds) *The presenter reads the post it notes, thanks the group and stops (30 seconds) That’s the end of the sequence. If time allows, participants swap roles so that a different person presents their issue and the other participants pose questions and advice as above. At the end, participants debrief by feeding back which questions had the greatest positive impact. If you have tried similar speed activities and techniques with a group that have helped create solutions or problem-solve, I'd be interested to hear more!  I felt stimulated reading a note from Babelfish today, ‘The Value of Vulnerability’. In the 1930s, the Nobel prize winner Lord Rutherford introduced a rule in his team that when they met, they could only ever share about what they were ignorant or confused about. They could only share how their projects weren’t going to plan. This prevented them focusing only on positives or feeling pressure to display and prove their knowledge and expertise to one-another. One of the Rutherford’s team members, Reg Revans, later became the founder of ‘action learning’ – the art of posing and receiving questions that resonates with Socrates: ‘wisdom begins in wonder’, ‘I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance’. In Revan’s view, knowledge and expert skills provide cleverness but it is only through questions and reflection that wisdom emerges. The thing that appeals to me is the humility and openness it implies. It’s a trait in some leaders to aspire to the hero, the know-all, the better-than-the-other, the expert who needs no help or advice. It leads to blinkered perspectives, defensive posturing, relational isolation, devaluing of others. Against that backdrop, choosing vulnerability feels deeply counterintuitive. I read another stimulating idea, this time on MindTools, called, ‘Reverse Brainstorming’. It has a similar counterintuitive feel to it. It’s a fun approach that enables movement in thinking and practice using a creative lateral thinking technique. So, for example, instead of asking ‘how do I solve or prevent this problem?’, it proposes asking ‘what could I do to cause the problem?’ Instead of asking, ‘how could I achieve the desired results’, ‘what could I do practically to undermine the results?’ It reminds me of ‘Negative Brainstorming’, an approach to surfacing problems with an idea or proposal (and thereby provide opportunity to address them) by proactively encouraging participants to think of and articulate every reason they can why it won’t work. The theme is a willingness to share openly and actively encourage questions and critique as a way of being, of leading, of learning, of moving forward. It demands courage to make oneself vulnerable and draws out the best in others by welcoming and valuing even the most critical voices. It requires a deep sense of inner security - and rests more on belief than competence. |
Nick WrightI'm a psychological coach, trainer and OD consultant. Curious to discover how can I help you? Get in touch! 
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