Tools and Techniques — Third Thought

Productivity Tools

22nd of January ~

Don’t you want to be more efficient? I do. I want to make the time I spend at my desk as efficient as possible because I want to save time for doing all my other enjoyable activities.

Last week I attended a webinar by Connie Malamed who is a learning expert. She’s the author of a nifty little app called Instructional Design Guru and shares provocative information about adult learning,

One of my favorite posts is the Best Productivity Tools for 2012. I’ve started using the online TaDa list which is accessible anywhere, you can share it and send yourself a copy. I know I can actually WRITE a list on a piece of paper and have a hard copy instantly. But I am finding it useful for categories of lists that I don’t want to lost.

Thanks Connie!

Technique Tuesday: Immersion

13th of September ~

Meg Wheatley writes beautifully on chaos and systems theory. Her books are full of images and humanity. She was fond of telling her students who were lost in the chaos of a thesis or dissertation, “Just immerse yourself in the data. Eventually the patterns will emerge.”

Steps

Read everything you can about your given topic or challenge.
Talk to anyone who knows anything about your topic or challenge.
Talk to people who might care about or have an opinion about your topic.
As you do steps 1-3 make notes and draw pictures.
Finally, put everything away and sit with it. Let your intuition do the work.

It may take a few days or a few years. But the patterns will emerge.

Technique Tuesday: Appreciative Experiential

6th of September ~

David Cooperrider, one of the pioneers of Appreciative Inquiry tells the story of working with a highly dysfunctional hotel leadership team. Housekeeping was at odds with Room Service and Reservations was completely out of alignment with HQ. After several sessions of conflict management and team building not much progress had been made.

At that point Dr. Cooperrider suggested something different. He arranged for the leadership team to gather at the best hotel in the region. But he did not schedule any more conflict management. No team building. Above all, he told them, they were not to work on their issues.

Grumbling, they checked in. They ate in the restaurant. They visited the spa.

photo by Diamondduste

Little by little they began to see opportunities for improving their own operations. Housekeeping sneaked in problem-solving conversations with Room Service. Gradually, enthusiasm built over the ideas that began to percolate in the team.

By now, you can guess the happy end to the story. After their experience of appreciating what was possible they began to outgrow their conflicts and work together as a team.

As Cooperrider notes, this is in alignment with Jung’s theory that sometimes we don’t have to SOLVE a problem. We can outgrow and transcend it by moving to a new stage of development.

So, what part of your personal or professional life could use some transcendence to a new reality?

Technique Tuesday: Take Stock

16th of August ~

Sometimes you need a specific technique to help you solve a problem. Other times you need to step back and take inventory of your ‘problem-solving milieu‘. Do you have the support and surroundings for optimal innovating?

Here is an model I developed to help you identify the areas where you are strong and where you need to get more innovation support.

You can download your own version here: InnovationBalanceInventory

Try it. Your creative efforts deserve all the support they can get.

Technique Tuesday: Deal Me In

2nd of August ~

This activity is a converging exercise–that is, it helps you evaluate and close-in on the most appealing ideas. I like it because you are playing with something real.

When you are working with a small number of ideas I recommend the use index cards to help you prioritize the options.

Steps:

1) Write each option on a separate index card. Note how many options you have.

2) Select the option that you like the least. Write the last number on it. Select the option you like the most. Write #1 on it.

3) Select the next idea that you like the least. Write the higher number on it. Select the next best idea and it becomes #2. Repeat until you have all the ideas numbered.

Sort the cards in numerical order.

Intuitive Option:

When you have narrowed your ideas to 2 or 3 take the cards and array them in front of you. You may want to pass your hand over each one in turn. Which has the greatest energy associated with it?

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