The Surprising Power of Liberating Structures: Simple Rules to Unleash A Culture of Innovation (30 page)

• For sparking deeper connections on the first day of class, college professors have asked their students, “Why did you choose to attend this class? What do you want to learn from and offer to members of this class?”
  
• For jump-starting a cross-functional, interdisciplinary learning session, Tim Jaasko-Fisher used
  Impromptu Networking
  with judges, lawyers, clerks, and social workers. See “
  Fixing a Broken Child Welfare System
  ” in
  Part Three: Stories from the Field
  .
  
• For connecting far-flung innovators and disparate prototypes among members of the Innovation Learning Network. See “
  Inventing Future Health-Care Practice
  ” in
  Part Three: Stories from the Field
  .
  

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.” Antoine de Saint-Exupery

•
  
Ask, “What do you do when working on ______ (the subject matter or challenge at hand)? Please make a short list of activities.” Then ask, “Why is that important to you?” Keep asking, “Why? Why? Why?” up to nine times or until participants can go no deeper because they have reached the fundamental purpose for this work.

• Unlimited number of groups
  
• Chairs for people to sit comfortably face-to-face; no tables or equipment needed.
  

•
  
Everyone has an equal opportunity to participate and contribute

•
  
First pairs, then groups of four, then the whole group (
2-4-All
)

• Each person in a pair is interviewed by his or her partner for 5 minutes. Starting with “What do you do when working on ____?” the interviewer gently seeks a deeper answer by repeating the query: “Why is that important to you?” Switch roles after 5 minutes. 10 min.
  
• Each pair shares the experience and insights with another pair in a foursome. 5 min.
  
• Invite
  the whole group to reflect by asking, “How do our purposes influence the next steps we take?” 5 min.
  

• Discover what is truly important for the group members
  
• Lay the groundwork for the design that will be employed
  
• Ignite organizational momentum through the stories that emerge
  
• Provide a basis for progress evaluation
  
• Generate criteria for deciding who will be included
  

• Create a safe and welcoming space; avoid judgments
  
• Keep going! Dig deep with compassion. Vary the ways of asking “why?” For example, ask, “If last night, while you slept, your dream came true, what would be different?”
  
• Make sure the question asked is, “Why is it important to YOU?” (meaning not THE amorphous organization or system but you personally)
  
• Share the variety of responses and reflect on differences among group members. What common purpose emerges?
  
• If someone gets stuck ask, “Does a story come to mind?”
  
• Maintain confidentiality when very personal stories are shared
  
• Make
  clarifying purpose with
  Nine Whys
  a routine practice in your group
  

• Ask the small groups whether “a fundamental justification for committing time and money to the work” emerged in the conversation. A clear personal purpose plus a community justification can quickly fuel the spread of an initiative. Work toward a single sentence that powerfully justifies the group’s work to others: “We exist to…!”
  
• In a business context, ask, “Why would people spend their money with you? Why would leaders want you to operate your business in their country?”
  
• Add 10
  how
  questions after you have clarity around why (it becomes MUCH easier).
  
• A good purpose is never closed. Make it dynamically incomplete by inviting everyone to make contributions and mutually shape understanding of the deepest need for your work.
  
• Record answers on Post-it notes, number them, and stick on a flip chart. You can arrange the answers in a triangle: broad answers on the top and detailed answers on the bottom. Compare and debrief.
  
• Ask, “Why is that important to your community?” “Why? Why? Why?…”
  
• Use the chat function during a webinar to start formulating a purpose statement: participants reflect on the Nine Whys questions, sharing their ideas in the chat box.
  
• Link to
  Purpose-To-Practice; Generative Relationships; Wise Crowds; What, So What, Now What?
  and many other Liberating Structures.
  

• For crafting a compelling shared purpose to launch a collaborative research organization. The Quality Commons, a health-service research network composed of representatives from seven health systems across the United States, used
  Nine Whys
  as one step in the
  Purpose-To-Practice
  Liberating Structure.
  
• For the beginning of any coaching session, including
  Troika Consulting
  or
  Wise Crowds
  .
  
• For
  clarifying the purpose behind the launch of a new product.
  
• For anchoring each element of a
  Design Storyboard
  by asking, “Why is this activity or element important to you? What does it add to the flow of exchanges among participants?”
  
• For you as an individual to clarify your personal purpose
  

Below: presentation materials we use to introduce
Nine Whys

“How wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we have some hope of making progress.” Niels Bohr

•
  
Ask, “What opposing-yet-complementary strategies do we need to pursue simultaneously in order to be successful?”

• Groups of 4 to 6 chairs with or without small round tables
  
• Paper for recording
  

• Everyone involved in the work or topic is included
  
• Everyone has an equal opportunity to contribute
  

• Individually
  
• Small groups (6 people or smaller)
  
• Whole group
  

• Introduce the concept of
  Wicked Questions
  and paradox. Illustrate with a couple of examples of
  Wicked Questions
  . Give the following template, “How is it that we are … and we are … simultaneously?” as the sentence to complete by inserting the two opposite strategies that are at play. 5 min.
  
• First
  alone then in small groups, each participant generates pairs of opposites or paradoxes at play in his or her work using the
  Wicked Question
  format. 5 min.
  
• Each group selects its most impactful and wicked Wicked Question. All selected Wicked Questions are shared with the whole group. 5 min.
  
• Whole group picks out the most powerful ones and further refines the Wicked Questions. 10 min.
  

• Describe the messy reality of the situation while engaging collective imagination
  
• Develop innovative strategies to move forward
  
• Avoid wild or “bipolar” swings in policy and action
  
• Evaluate decisions: Are we advancing one side or the other or attending
  
• Ignite creative tension, promoting more freedom and accountability as the discovery process unfolds
  

Wicked Questions engage everyone
to both?
in sharper strategic thinking by revealing entangled challenges and possibilities that are not intuitively obvious
.

• Make sure that participants express both sides of the paradox in an appreciative form: “How is it that we are ____ and we are ____ simultaneously?” and not in opposition of each other
  
• Use a variety of examples to make the paradoxical attributes accessible
  
• Work in quick cycles, failing forward as you make the questions perfectly wicked
  
• Avoid nasty questions that appoint blame or are unbalanced on one side. Here is an example of a nasty question: “How can we focus on our customers when we are forced to spend more and more time on the headquarters’ bureaucracy?”
  
• Avoid data questions that can be answered with more analysis
  
• Invite participants to include others in making their questions more wicked
  
• Draw on field experience; ask, “When have you noticed these two things to be true at the same time?”
  
• There are no quick fixes to Wicked Questions and you may need to return to the challenge periodically with additional rounds of Wicked Questions
  
• Often
  a handful of people are very skilled at generating Wicked Questions: let them shine and inspire the rest of the group!
  

• Use
  Wicked Questions
  to evaluate and launch
  Improv Prototyping, Ecocycle
  , and
  25/10 Crowd Sourcing
  
• When you have a strong Wicked Question, don’t stop there! Follow with
  15% Solutions
  and
  1-2-4-All
  to generate and sift ideas. Making progress on any one Wicked Question can shift what is possible.
  
• Learn more from Brenda Zimmerman in
  Edgeware
  and
  www.changeability.ca/Change-Ability.html
  

• For parenting advice: “How is it that you are raising your children to be very loyal/attached to the family and very independent individuals simultaneously?”
  
• For helping leaders discover how to include everyone in stopping infections: “As infection-control leaders, how is that you have stepped up and stepped back to help a unit take more ownership of prevention practices?”
  
• For managing large global operations: “How is that we are always and never the same… an organization with a singular global identity and we are uniquely adapted to each local setting? How is it that we are integrated and autonomous?”
  
• For a functional department, such as HR, finance, legal, etc., to bring to light the Wicked Questions that capture the essence of the function in the context of the department’s organization
  
• For surfacing personal Wicked Questions, for instance, with respect to one’s relationship to one other person or in connection to a personal challenge. For instance, “How is it that I am simultaneously dedicated to my work and being fully present for my family?”