The Surprising Power of Liberating Structures: Simple Rules to Unleash A Culture of Innovation (46 page)

• Don’t do your first
  Ecocycle Planning
  session with your group’s entire portfolio of market strategies. Start with a simpler program, something tangible with shared experience.
  
• Remind participants that all phases of the Ecocycle must be parts of a healthy organization
  
• Be
  very clear on the domain or type of activities being considered—check activities to be sure they are on a similar scale and domain
  
• Include views from inside and outside the organization or function (diverse participants and clients can help)
  
• Preparations and explicit criteria for each quadrant may help or interfere
  
• Don’t hesitate to do a second round
  
• Identifying the Rigidity and Poverty Traps, plus connecting specific activities with these labels, launches the search for solutions
  
• Learn more from professor Brenda Zimmerman at
  http://changeability.ca
  and see the excerpt from her book
  Edgeware
  under the tab Publications
  

• Ask participants to make a list of all their important
  relationships
  with internal and external customers/suppliers (in addition to their activities) and to place them on the Ecocycle. Ask them to evaluate the relationships with the same questions used for the activities and to include them in the last four steps of the Ecocycle planning process. Highly recommended!
  
• String together with
  Panarchy, 1-2-4-All, WINFY
  , and
  Open Space
  
• TRIZ
  can help to deepen the Creative Destruction quadrant
  
• Use with virtual groups by inviting participants to place their Ecocycle assessments with a dot on the whiteboard, then chat in pairs and with the whole group about the pattern that emerges. Before you enter into full-group placements, use silence and paired chat (
  1-2-All
  ) to build understanding. You will need to agree on a short common list of activities or relationships to help simplify mapping. Number or letter each item and invite placements one by one. Sift and sort answers with a whiteboard and a person playing a “synthesizer” role. Don’t worry about perfection in the first rounds. Virtual sessions can deepen or complement face-to-face exchanges.
  
• What, So What, Now What?
  and
  25/10 Crowd Sourcing
  can help spur action about activities or relationships when the group seems to be stuck.
  

• For service portfolio review with an information technology department
  
• For nursing executives and academics transforming their approach to education (evaluating the history as well as proposed change initiatives)
  
• For planning changes in an individual’s personal life, sifting through activities and shaping next steps
  
• For accelerating performance of an executive team in the midst of integrating a newly acquired company (sifting through a mixture of two product lines and research opportunities)
  

Below: a portfolio of market strategies arrayed around the
Ecocycle
by members of a management team. Each number represents a strategy in play or under consideration
.

“If a living system is suffering from ill health, the remedy is to connect it with more of itself.” Francisco Varella

Below: presentation material we use to introduce Panarchy

•
  
Invite participants to identify what is contributing to the existence of a challenge at levels above and below them. Ask them also to specify different strategies and opportunities for change within each level and across multiple levels.

• A room with an unobstructed flat wall and open space for participants to stand comfortably in front of the wall
  
• A blank Panarchy chart handout
  
• A large wall-poster or flip-chart version of the Panarchy chart
  
• Post-it notes for each participant
  
• Flip-chart pages for the Panarchy graphic
  

• Everyone involved in spreading a transformation or innovation effort is included
  
• Everyone has an equal opportunity to contribute
  

•
  
Individuals, pairs, groups of 4, whole group:
1-2-4-All

• Introduce the idea of the
  Panarchy
  (and the
  Ecocycle
  if needed). Show an example, such as the MRSA infection Panarchy in Collateral Material below, and hand out a blank Panarchy chart to each participant. 5 min.
  
• Invite participants to work individually to generate the set of system levels that influence the spread of their ideas/innovation in three steps.
  
• First step alone to make a list of factors by asking, “What are the smallest-to-the-largest factors influencing your/our chances for success?” Include micro (particles, individual people, teams), meso (organizations, networks), and macro (culture, politics, myths) factors that contribute to the existence of the challenge being addressed. 5 min.
  
• Second step in pairs to “translate” the factors into levels and create labels for each level (4–7 levels are sufficient). 10 min.
  
• Third step in groups of four to compare their levels and finalize their chart with Post-its. 10 min.
  
• If there are multiple groups of four, create a single chart, by inviting each group to place any levels not previously included on the larger chart. 10 min.
  
• Invite participants to work in groups of four to reflect on the following questions: “On which levels have attention and resources been invested to date? Which levels have been neglected? What do I/we
  know about the status and dynamics in play at the different levels?” 10 min.
  
• In the whole group, share reflections from a few groups. 5 min.
  
• Ask groups of two or four to explore one level in depth with the
  Ecocycle
  . Each group should pick one of the 4-7 levels. Distribute people with experience at the different levels to those groups. Ask, “At this level, what is going on right now and what actions are being taken for the challenge that our innovation addresses? Is the response to the challenge in an entrepreneurial, bureaucratic/management, heretical, or renewal phase?” Create a rough draft of Ecocycle assessments for this level. 15 min.
  
• Collect the Ecocycle assessments from the groups. Each group presents the Ecocycle assessment of their level briefly. 10 min.
  
• In small groups, brainstorm a list of obstacles and opportunities in regard to efforts to spread ideas/innovations. Ask, “Looking up and down the levels, what opportunities and obstacles do you see for changes
  across
  the levels? What
  windows
  for new ideas are opening above? What resources are flowing downward from creative destruction unfolding above? What small-scale developments from below are disrupting the level above?” Encourage the groups to go wild and have fun. 15 min.
  
• Prioritize the opportunities and obstacles that emerge. 10 min.
  
• For each opportunity and obstacle on your list, create one first-action step using
  1-2-4
  by asking, “What action can you take immediately to influence levels above and below you?” And, “Who do you know that has influence in more than one level simultaneously?” 10 min.
  
• Share action steps with the whole group by placing Post-it notes on each level of the large Panarchy chart. 15 min.
  
• Invite the group to take a close look at the chart. Use
  What, So What, Now What?
  to make sense of and prioritize all of the possible next steps. 15 min.
  
• Revisit and update the Panarchy chart periodically as the group continues work to spread its innovation.
  

• Identify a mix of strategies at multiple levels to move transformation efforts forward
  
• Create
  an opportunity for people from many different levels to work together
  
• Prepare for serendipity as opportunity windows open or close
  
• Identify people that span levels and can help the group move forward
  
• Help a whole group see the whole picture (forest AND the trees AND the bioregion)
  
• Create resilience and absorb disruptions by reorganizing together
  

• Use
  1-2-4-All
  for all or most of the steps even if it feels like a chore: the objective is to identify ALL opportunities and obstacles at ALL levels!
  
• Include people or perspectives from each level (the more participants, the better)
  
• Look to research when you are unfamiliar with dynamics at smaller and bigger scales
  
• Do not neglect history and its role in defining what is possible at each level.
  
• To learn more, see professor Frances Westley’s contributions to the SIG Knowledge Hub on scaling (
  http://sigknowledgehub.com/2012/05/01/introductio-to-scaling/
  ), his work in Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Human and Natural Systems (Gunderson and Holling, eds.), and other writing.
  

• String together with
  Ecocycle, 1-2-4 Whole, What I Need from You, Social Network Webbing, Celebrity Interview
  
• W
  ³
  (What, So What, Now What?)
  can help spur focused action steps
  
• Use
  Panarchy
  for individuals by asking, “What is contributing to the existence of your challenge at levels above and levels below you? What elements are perpetuating the challenge you are facing? What are the different speeds for effecting changes at each of the levels?”
  

• Native American school administrators advanced education opportunities for their students with innovations ranging from individual student advising to dispelling social myths
  
• Safety advocates in one hospital planned the spread of their innovations locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally
  
• Foundation grantees planned dissemination of their disaster-preparedness innovations from prototype to national adoption
  
• An individual artist sketched out how her work can influence change at different scales