Group Works: Balance Process and Content

This entry continues a series in which I'm exploring concepts encapsulated in a set of 91 cards called Group Works, developed by Tree Bressen, Dave Pollard, and Sue Woehrlin. The deck represents "A Pattern Language for Bringing Life to Meetings and Other Gatherings."

In each blog, I'll examine a single card and what that elicits in me as a professional who works in the field of cooperative group dynamics. My intention in this series is to share what each pattern means to me. I am not suggesting a different ordering or different patterns—I will simply reflect on what the Group Works folks have put together.

The cards have been organized into nine groupings, and I'll tackle them in the order presented in the manual that accompanies the deck:

1. Intention
2. Context
3. Relationship
4. Flow
5. Creativity
6. Perspective
7. Modeling
8. Inquiry & Synthesis
9. Faith

In the Flow segment there are 15 cards. The first pattern in this segment is labeled Balance Process and Content. Here is the image and thumbnail text from that card: 

Content refers to what you are talking about and the results of a session. Process is how the conversation happens. Like two wings of a bird, both are needed for balance, lift, and progress.

 

My first thought, when looking at this captivating image, is whether the bicycle represents process or content. It's a Zen koan. Ordinarily the person is atop the bike, but not in this case. Also, I note that the seat is facing down and has no butt on it. While I'll stipulate that this graphic conveys a sense of flow and wonder, it's also rather chaotic, demonstrably ungrounded, and suggests only a tenuous through-the-handlebars connection between process and content. Meetings are not, in my book, a throw-it-all-up-in-the-air-and-let's-see-what-happens matinee performance featuring an acrobatic facilitator solo.

OK, now that I have that off my chest, let's work with the text. I understand—and fully support—the idea that the Group Works patterns are meant to illuminate and promote the development and nurturance of cooperative culture. This is in direct contrast with the competitive culture of the mainstream. One of the distinguishing features of cooperative culture is that it will tend to matter just as much how you accomplish a thing as what you accomplish. 

Thus, in cooperative culture, the way you go about things has been elevated to a higher status than in the value hierarchy in which the vast majority of us were raised. The way this plays out, as is suggested in the text for this pattern, is by balancing content and process.

Having said that, it's important to understand that this is not a tug-of-war between the two (product versus process). Rather, it's a dance—where attention to each enhances the other. When this is misunderstood, product-oriented folks may complain that "good process" simply takes too long, drawing out a foregone conclusion for the sake of form. Going the other way, process-oriented people may resent pressure to focus on solutions, fearing that cutting to the chase may risk cutting out input, or that asking people to agree prematurely risks choking down proposals (rather than enjoying a sit-down meal you are wolfing down fast food, with a concomitant risk of indigestion).

 

In my work as a facilitation trainer, I prefer to style this pattern: balancing content and energy. I hold out the ideal of coming to agreement as expeditiously as you can without leaving anyone behind (or in a state of bewilderment, standing on the sidelines). Good meetings solve problems (or at least clear up ambiguities and identify a road map for next steps) in such a way that participants are energized and feel better connected. 

While this is not that difficult to achieve when there is no serious disagreement about a topic, I hold this standard even when there is. The primary challenge of cooperative culture is how to disagree about non-trivial issues and have that examination lead to both solid decisions about how to respond, and a sense that relationships among participants have been enhanced, rather than strained or degraded. While that may sound like a magic act, it can be done. (In fact, it wouldn't be much of an exaggeration to say that my 28-year career as a professional facilitator and process consultant is rooted in my ability to consistently deliver that result.)

One of the main skills I bring as an outside facilitator is the ability to work simultaneously with content and energy—making sure that we're making steady progress on the agenda, while at the same time bringing the group into closer connection and deeper understanding of one another. In the business world (where the bottom line is king) professional facilitators are often asked only to manage content, and success is measured by how quickly you can dispose of issues. In the cooperative world (which includes that of cooperative businesses), that's not good enough: you also need to be sensitive to, and able to work deftly with, undercurrents and the disjunct between a person's words and their tone and body language. In the cooperative world, you need to be able sense when a topic is completed, not just know how to manage a parliamentary call for cloture and tally a vote. 

 

In short, you are not aiming to create flow simply by the speed with which you resolve issues. Instead, you are paying express attention to the flow of energy in the context of working content. Sometimes (for example, when a participant experiences a strong upwelling of emotion in connection with a topic) it's important for the flow that you purposefully slow things down. While bypassing the feelings might be quicker, you would do so only at the risk of compromising energy, which is generally a poor bargain. Good flow means creating a sense of purposeful movement that brings everyone along.

The bad news is that the skills needed to be good at working content are almost completely unrelated to the skills needed to manage energy. The good news though, is that both can be learned. (I know because I've been teaching facilitators how to do both for 11 years.) As far as I'm concerned it is foundational to cooperative culture that we learn to balance content and energy. Luckily, I don't necessarily think that means you have learn how fly through the air with your bicycle upside down.

Facilitating When the Stakes Are Small

I was conducting a facilitation training recently when someone in the class mused, "How do you facilitate when there are significant differences about how to respond to an issue and the stakes are low?"

Hmm, I thought, that's a good question. Mostly, when conducting training weekends, the stakes are high, and we don 't get to practice working with penny-ante topics. In setting up training weekends I suggest to host groups that they pick hard issues for the class to wrestle with, both so that the class gets challenged and so that the home community gets maximal benefit from the occasion of having outside facilitation. 

However, the reality is that all issues are not created equal, and a good portion of the time facilitators will be working with topics minor enough that world peace will not hinge of their successful resolution. What then?

• • •

The facilitator's mantra is: What is the most productive thing for the group to be doing at this time? Plenary time is precious and should be used wisely. 

While the Prime Directive can be encapsulated in a single sentence, its application is somewhat sophisticated. In general, I teach facilitators to be able to simultaneously juggle the apples of Content with the oranges of Energy. Thus, a skilled facilitator needs to assess both:

A. What's needed to resolve the issue?
Typical questions here are:
o  What is an effective sequence for figuring out how to respond to the issue on the table?
o  Does everyone know where we are in the sequence and what kind of response is appropriate for the stage we're at?
o  Do we have the relevant background information in hand (existing agreements, minutes from recent prior work, research on options)?
o  Are there key people missing from the consideration, and, if so, can we usefully proceed in their absence?
o  Have we heard enough to be able to start floating proposals?
o  If there are non-trivial differences about what to do, what are the underlying group values at play?

B. What's needed energetically?
Representative queries here are:
o  Are we working in a way that's building energy and relationships among members?
o  Are there tensions among participants that are undercutting clear thinking?
o  Are people connecting at the heart level or only with their heads?
o  Is everyone tracking well, or are some engrossed while others are spacing out?
o  Is there enough fresh air in the room; is the temperature good?
o  How long has it been since people had a chance to move, or go to the bathroom?

So why would a plenary be giving time to low-stakes items? Here are some possibilities:

—It could be that you have to address a matter in plenary for legal reasons, such as state law that your corporation has a president and a secretary. Even if those are not functions that have meaning relative to how your group functions, you nonetheless have to have minutes that show you've selected people to fill those slots.

—Maybe the stakes are low because there is high competency in the group on the issue at hand and thus minimal concern about making a mistake. Suppose you're about to put up a new building and need to decide who's going to do the work. If you have an experience construction crew in mind with an established track record of delivering quality work on time and under budget, you pretty much know going in that you're going to gratefully accept their bid on the project.

—Perhaps the potatoes are small because everyone knows that the issue coming forward involves a request for which it's widely known that there is no broad support. You agreed to give it plenary air time in deference it's being a pet project of a valued member, but everyone knows that the proposal is a dead letter.

Beyond that, there are a bunch of ways that a group can inadvertently be discussing  something it shouldn't be, or are talking about the wrong thing. Let's look at some of those:

o  Are you working at the plenary level?
It's possible that the reason the stakes are low is because the plenary is doing committee work that has no business being addressed by the whole group. Oops.

o  Is there agreement that the stakes are low?
While this can be nuanced (some may be loving that the topic is on the table, while others would rather be napping or doing a sudoku in the corner) you can at least remember to ask the question. If everyone agrees the stakes are low, I'd suggest taking a hard look at whether to keep devoting plenary time to the examination. Isn't there more important stuff you could be doing?

If there's not a uniform response, it might be worth delving into what meaning adheres to the discrepancy. Maybe some members don't get it why it's worthwhile to pay attention when they're not a stakeholder on an issue (because they're ideally suited to safeguard the process and to attend to relationships). Perhaps those who want to dig in are failing to see the forest of how best to use plenaries for the trees of their pet issue.

o  Is this more about personalities than the issue?
Sometimes the churning about an issue has more to do with a clash of styles and communication preferences than it does about the topic. If this can be illuminated, the underlying issue may be a diversity struggle (how much can the group tolerate a range of styles and still function well?) rather than because the presenting issue is compelling.

o  Is this more about unresolved tension than the presenting issue?
It's possible that the real reason that this topic needs to be tackled in plenary is because of a disturbance in the Force, such that Obi Wan Kenobi and Darth Vader are having trouble hearing each other without triggering Star Wars. That is, it might be appropriate to have the plenary support working on the dynamics, even if the topic that showcased those dynamics is not plenary worthy.

The mantra for a participant in a consensus group is: What does the group need to hear from me about this topic at this time? Note that there are several check points embedded in this admonition:

—What does the group need to hear from me?
This is not what does your best friend need to hear from you, or what do I think is clever in this moment; it's what does everyone need to know about your views on the topic. If someone else has already covered the points you would have offered there may be little for you to say, excepting a brief statement such as "So-and-so spoke my mind and I have nothing to add."

—What I need to say about this topic?
This requires discipline. Meetings are not open mic, where people are encouraged to say whatever damn thing pops into their head. They are expected to stay on topic. While it's not unusual for a current conversation to trigger relevant thoughts about a related topic that is plenary worthy, that does not mean it's a good idea to go there in the moment, sidetracking the focus.

—What I need to say at this time?
 It's relatively common for someone to have an idea (perhaps even a brilliant one) about a response to a concern raised in the discussion phase of exploring an issue, but it's not appropriate to go there until all the concerns have been flushed out. While it's understandable why people have the urge to jump in with creative solutions, it's often counterproductive if the conversation yo-yos back and forth between the expansiveness of factor identification and the contraction of problem solving.

Sometimes—especially when the stakes are low—your best choice is to shut up. And a good facilitator will help point out to the group the cornucopia of opportunities to productively not speak when it's mole hills and not mountains on the menu.