At the Association of Business Psychologist Conference in May 2011 John Turner from the University of Hertfordshire led a session on open dialogue ‘ a simple methodology for initiating and facilitating a free flowing dialogue.
During his session he introduced ‘A collaborative method for defining the dialogue focus’. Once we had decided on a broad topic, he asked us to get into small groups and come up with 10 questions relevant to the topic.
At Appreciating Change we believe in the power of positive psychology to transform workplaces by creating positive energy and engagement, to build on individual and organisational strengths and to help people co-create the future direction of the organisation. There are many ways to do this, as explained in my book ‘Positive Psychology at Work’, and here are a few which can be implemented quickly and easily:
1. Opening meetings with a round of recent success stories.
At the Association of Business Psychology conference recently, Jo Hennessy and Dilip Boury from Roffey Park shared their recent research into employee engagement.
A three-part model
Their research suggests three key components to employee engagement: my job, my organization, my value. Their report ‘The human voice of employee engagement: understanding what lies beneath the surveys’ gives a full and readable account of the factors that make a difference. A key finding is that pride is at the heart of employee engagement.
The Challenge
Five strangers have two hours to prepare for a three-hour consulting session with a client they have never met.
We are a British woman, a Greek woman, two Dutch men, and a Dutch woman. All of us have volunteered to try to help this organisation as part of our two-day experience at the 11th meeting of the Begeistring Network, a European network of people interested in Appreciative and strengths-based ways of working, at Volendam in Holland April 27-29 2011.
We will be working in English throughout. On our first evening we had about an hour to start planning how we might usefully use this opportunity.