Small Pleasures

November is the absolutely worst month of the year in Sweden. It’s dark, cold and rainy. In order to fight depression, I try to cherish small pleasures and this weekend I have really revelled in them, involving all five senses. I went to bed Friday evening without setting the alarm, falling asleep under my thick winter duvet after reading a chapter in a clever detective story. When I woke up, I got up to get the newspaper, but went back to bed to read and fall asleep again. Waking up a second time I put my feet on the sheep skin rug and curled my toes. I put on my thick terry cotton robe and made a hearty breakfast with boiled eggs, fresh vegetables, mango juice, yoghurt and tasty raspberry muesli.

I dressed in my bright red and turquoise raincoat bought at Louisiana and my high black rubber boots and walked to the nearby folk high school Wendelsberg to look at the beautiful buildings and listen to lectures, participating in their 100 year celebration. I walked away much more knowledgeable about amusement parks through the public park, watching the last leafs falling down. Then I popped in to our local library and read some magazines sitting in one of their fancy modern chairs looking out on the lazy river. On my way home I bought some fresh flowers from the local florist and one of them was a Protea reminding me of the trip I made in 2003 to South Africa with my Mother.

In the afternoon I had a cup of spicy fair trade chai tea in the handcrafted mug I recently bought in Tällberg. You can see it in the picture on the tea tray I received recently at a workshop in Hudiksvall. Then I went to an aerobics class at Friskis&Svettis enjoying immensely moving to all kinds of music in good company. Back home I took a long warm shower, using rough Brazil nut scrub and then put on lovely-smelling chocolate lotion I bought in Öhr where my grandparents used to live. During the evening I mixed doing ironing with watching a chick flick with a happy ending (of course), before hitting the sack.

Sunday was dedicated to volleyball and I tried to do some pep talk to my arms while ecodriving to Herrljunga. I sang loudly in the car, playing favourites from the 1980ies but also some new music put together for a good cause. It was good fun meeting all friends and holding a small baby again, smelling the soft, warm skin. Back home I put my sore feet in a hot foot bath with bright white salt crystals while draping my wheat warmer on my aching shoulders, getting ready to write this blog post.

Of course I know that I am immensely fortunate having the opportunity to enjoy all these small pleasures. Every single one of them can be regarded as a luxury. I am also aware of that they are all related to what Martin Seligman calls the first level of happiness, not even close to eudaemonia or true meaning. However, when my mood is low they truly help when trying to reach the higher levels, living the “The Good Life” vision of the Västra Götaland Region.

The Road to Copenhagen

My trip to Copenhagen this August, visiting Resonans and participating in The Solutions Focus training, actually led to another journey. It took me all the way to Motala, "the city at the water". There I spent a great day with the Frisksport leadership teachers where we jointly explored our knowledge of instructional design, presentation techniques and storytelling while staying in Motala Frisksportklubb’s wonderful club house. Thank you for participating in creating a creative learning environment! I especially hope you enjoyed the Kolb Learning Styles video (in Swedish).

In one of the exercises, Carl did a presentation about sustainable development and his own attitude towards this. We all enjoyed his presentation very much, since it was very personal and sincere. I think he will find that there are lots of things going on that will help him in his attempts to become better at sustainability, for example the new newspaper “Climate Smart in Motala” provided by the municipality.

However, the road to Copenhagen can also lead to other places like Brussels, Madrid, Poznan and Bonn. By invitation of the EU Commission Vice President Margot Wallström, Club of Madrid, GLOBE Europe and Respect Table joined forces to create an initiative metaphorically called the Road to Copenhagen. The aim is to make it possible for business and civil society to become involved in forming input to the post 2012 climate change negotiations. Using modern technology like a wiki, avatars and a virtual forum in combination with IRL meetings, this initiative lets us participate as citizens or companies in forming a sustainable future.

So Carl (and others), what are you waiting for!?!

Appreciating the Creative Tension

When Robert Fritz started his workshop in Stockholm in September, I was filled with anticipation. This was my second encounter with him and his wife Rosalind and much had happened since I first came in contact with his change management ideas. I was very interested in finding out whether his concepts could be used in combination with Appreciative Inquiry.

Immediately I started to look for similarities between the two approaches. Both are constructivistic in character and emphasize the careful use of language. Interviews are used early in the process and visualization is used as a tool for creating images of what is and can be. Storytelling is central, as is retelling others’ stories as a means for extracting the fundamentals. Both take departure in the notion that what you want is often part of current reality, and spend more time talking about possibilities rather than problems. The conceptual frameworks can and have been applied in various settings: for individuals, couples, groups and organizations. The clients are considered to be the experts and the consultant’s role is to support them in coming up with the solutions or decisions themselves. Change and identifying underlying structures are in focus, where both problems and opportunities can be used as points of departure. Similar to many people working with AI, such as Frank Barrett, Robert Fritz make extensive use of music and art in combination with more traditional business development methods.

I see lots of opportunities to combine many of the tools and concepts from the two schools of thought. The Fritz way to do clarification interviews is perfect when trying to extract a client’s real challenge, using it as input in an AI process. Fritz’ creative tension chart is an excellent tool during the Destiny phase, when deciding what to do in more precise terms. Also, Digital Decision-Making can be used when deciding on what steps or design elements are more important than others.

The one really big difference lies in the different approaches towards intellectual property rights. David Cooperrider has always emphasized openness and sharing, resulting in making the AI Commons a globally accessible well of knowledge. Robert Fritz has also published books and videos, and you can find lots of information at his website but he also keeps a much tighter control of his material, for example through certification processes.

This mirrors a more general debate concerning the pros and cons of open innovation and open source. The key question is how to achieve the perfect blend of openness and ownership, in order to make you, your organization and society in general prosper. Do you have the answer?

A Stolen World

As I write this blog post, my friends Leif and Ingrid are back in Tanzania. I know that they are having a good time, because again they publish their experiences online at www.metafari.blogspot.com. Yesterday morning, they saw a lion just across the lawn from their hut in the Mikumi National Park.

If you travel northwest from Tanga in Tanzania, you will come to Mombo. Go a further 30 kilometres and you will reach the Nanyogie Maasai village. This is where Leif and Ingrid went to talk to the people about life, livestock, warriors, dreams and the rapid development in the world.

From my office window, I can see the big sign on The Museum of World Culture in Göteborg encouraging people to come and look at their new exhibition: A Stolen World – The Paracas Collection. It shows 2,000 years old funeral textiles from Peru that come from looted graves. In the beginning of the 1930ies large quantities of these textiles were illegally transported to museums and private collections all over the world. Sven Karell, the Swedish Consul in Peru at that time, smuggled hundreds of these textiles to Sweden and donated them to the Ethnographic Department of Göteborg Museum.

Besides showing these beautiful pieces of art, the exhibition confronts the visitor with questions regarding what to do with this stolen treasure. How are we to handle what our ancestors did? Does what was done in good faith, make up for the fact that it was illegal? But what about having better opportunities to preserve these important items, helping us understand history and appreciate other civilizations?

The famous Danish design company Stelton recently released what they call their Maasai collection with beautiful mugs and baskets in vivid nuances of red, blue and aubergine. There is no mention of collaboration with the Maasai people. But is this really a case of stolen culture? We are constantly inspired by the things we see around us. Can a community claim their right to some colours, their trademark?

I think we really need to think long and hard about how we handle intellectual property issues and how we pay tribute to the creativity of people, no matter country or century. Don’t you?

Positive Paranoia

In late August I spent two wonderful days in Copenhagen together with the Resonans crew and their guests from The Solutions Focus: Paul and Janine. Through working with Henrik from Resonans on a project in Sweden I had already experienced the wonders of some of the exercises described in the book “58 1/2 Ways to Improvise in Training: Improvisation Games and Activities for Workshops, Courses and Team Meetings”. I was so grateful for his gracious yes when I asked if I could come to the session.

During the two days we used tools in various combinations. We did JAM sessions (Just-A-Minute) and addressed coaching conundrums. The Walkabout Marketplace was an enriching encounter where we collectively gathered and shared knowledge on important topics. I liked the whole experience so much that I found myself longing for an opportunity to practice my newly acquired skills, so when Linnea asked me to do a one-day session with the Frisksport leadership teachers, I was more than happy to accept.

One rather fun exercise was a kind of competition where the task was to identify who was who from looking at pictures of people who have contributed a lot to the strength-based, solution-focused, self-organised, positive-oriented and constructivist community. I could barely recognise David Cooperrider and Marcus Buckingham, but my Resonans team partner Mikkel turned out to be well versed in this game and quickly spotted persons like Insoo Kim Berg (Brief Theraphy), Augusto Boal (Forum Theatre), Thiagi (Frame Games), Gregory Bateson (Change Language), Keith Johnstone (Improvising), Steve de Shazer (Brief Therapy), Martin Seligman (Positive Psychology) and Margaret Wheatly (Complexity).

Of course, the list can be made much longer than that. For example, I would like to include images of Anne Radford, the founder of the AI Practitioner and who brought AI to the UK, and Jane Magruder Watkins who was one of the early adopters and who has spread AI around the world through courses, books and projects.

Ecodriving

In these times of financial crisis and looming recession, maybe ecodriving is a good metaphor for how a country should be managed. We must learn at what speed and gear our national machinery works best, understand how to accelerate and break more gently in order to save energy, choose the right fuel and keep the engine in good shape, design efficient motors and provide clear indicators that will guide us towards our best behaviour. And of course, practice anticipation.

In Tunisia, the small city of Mahres is considered a forerunner in terms of environmental consideration. The water is recycled and the power comes from solar panels. However, none of this is noticed by the tourists passing by. Instead, they probably observe the heaps of garbage lying around everywhere. Despite campaigns in schools and in media, waste management is high on few people’s agenda.

It sure is difficult to figure out how I as a tourist can contribute to sustainable development. Should I buy the wonderful soft leather bags (made in Libya)? Or the mass manufactured pottery and jewellery of unknown origin you see in every tourist shop? Or go on a speedy jeep tour into the vast desert (probably using petrol smuggled from Libya)? Or buy a hand-made woollen rug tied by women earning 2,5€ a day? There is only so much locally produced dates and olives one can eat in a day and I can’t afford the 7.500€ shimmering silk rugs.

Tunisia is one of the countries allowed to participate in the Sida-funded Advanced Training Programme “Putting Ideas to Work – Strategies for Innovation-led Sustainable Growth” organised by the Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems. With its educational systems and high attendance-rate, the population’s excellent command of French and good grasp of other languages, as well as equal opportunities laws Tunisia stands more than a fair chance of continuing being a stable country and to prosper even more. Looking back, both the Phoenician and Roman versions of Carthage might serve as inspiration (and I don’t believe they sacrificed infants). Especially if introducing incentives for making better use of all the creative power among the large number of highly educated women.

Our bus-driver, Samir, demonstrated excellent eco-driving skills when he transported us to the Sahara and back. Maybe this could be a new line of Tunisian business: ecodriving courses in the desert! And by the way, riding a camel into the desert sunset is quite an experience!

An Excellent Choice

Life’s full of decisions, some of them more important than others. But what makes a choice excellent?

I think some of the most difficult choices I face are the ones I make as member of funding advisory committees. As member of the Venture Cup West jury, I decide which business plan gets a prize that entails both money and recognition that will help turning the plan into a start-up company. The winner will hopefully inspire others to become entrepreneurs. My job on the funding advisory committee for the Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems is to select those research groups that will become VINN Excellence Centers. By long-term funding we hope to create stable environments that will attract even more funding as well as really bright people, and of course develop some really interesting and useful results that will make sure Sweden continues to be a prosperous country. The Swedish Foundation for Strategic Research has similar ambitions, where I’m the chairman of the advisory committee for the “Program Intensive Systems” programme.

There are more difficult choices entailed than “just” selecting the winners. These involve the design of the selection process. Who and how many should be on the jury? How often should they meet? What selection criteria should be used and how can these be made simple but not too blunt? How should the rules be communicated? Should resources be spent on educating the applicants in order to raise the quality of the submissions? Should a portfolio model be used in the selection process?

I think perhaps the most important aspect of this kind of work is to ensure there is a continuous learning among all the people involved in the process, so it can be improved each round. This is why it is important to create statistics that show distribution according to for example gender, age, area, organisation and geography in order to reveal any systematic inaccuracies. I also wish that the applications should be published afterwards and workshops be held with discussions on what constitutes a really good submission.

Google has made some tough decisions through its ten years existence. Now they are facing some more difficult choices in their 10100 project. In this competition anyone who has an idea concerning how to improve the world in terms of energy, environment, healthcare, education, communities and families are welcome to submit them at www.project10tothe100.com. The competition is open until October 20 and a team from Google will select a 100 promising ideas. Everybody can then vote. From the 20 most popular projects, an advisory board will select the five projects that will share the 10 million dollars has set aside to implement the ideas.

Those of you who would like to contribute to sustainable development in other ways could look into the company MYC4 who provides micro-credits to entrepreneurs in Africa. A network of local providers screen the people who would like to obtain a loan and local lenders handle the financial transactions. The bidding process is based on a Dutch auction principle, which basically means that the more investors interested in investing, the more favourable the terms the African business will get.

Another way is to donate money to organisations such as Hand-In-Hand who educates women in India, South Africa and Afghanistan on how to read, write, run a business and act as micro credit banks. Then they themselves make the tough decisions on who’s going to get a loan to expand their business.

Maybe I should benchmark against these organisations regarding how to design efficient selection processes?