Conversations: Change the Conversation - Change the Culture

he Conversations Workshop is about initiating and engaging powerful conversations that result in positive change within organizations. It is based on the premise that conversations more than any other single factor create and sustain the culture in which we live. In the end if you don't change the conversations you will change nothing. Conversations are powerful tools available to everyone. They can invite cynicism and helplessness or they can encourage enthusiasm and optimism.

What follows is the relevant business argument that supports what is presented in the workshop and a brief description of the pragmatic tools that convert this theory into powerful and productive action.

Hard truths face organizations everyday. Primary among them is the absolute necessity of achieving positive results. Whether results are market share, return on investment, cycle time or some other measure, the demand for results is unequivocal. Every organization must create more value than it consumes. This is not a blinding insight. We all know it. The urgent question is always, "How?" In search of answers to that question we rack our brains, go to meetings, hire consultants, attend workshops, create management schools and redesign work.

We know some things about How. Three factors consistently impact the capacity of an organization to achieve results: 1) the dexterity to give original and unique responses to customers; 2) the capacity to create new knowledge and apply it successfully to products, services and processes; and 3) the competence to create a workplace where each person chooses accountability for making the entire enterprise successful. To create new knowledge, to grant each customer the exception they want and to encourage everyone to choose accountability for the whole requires each person make the business their own. This means throwing themselves into work with hands, head and heart. Such a "leap of faith" does not occur because it is demanded. It is a personal choice. Organizations either encourage or discourage this choice by the way they engage members in conversations and work.

(continue) Background (part II)