Hi Simon,
I believe that you are correct. Personal interaction is vital to effective
relations. I believe that they are essential to any kind of relationship
and would not make the distinction between social and business as you do.
I am unable to have a business relationship without some kind of social
relationship.
I do not necessarily want to be best buddies with my clients and I do want
an effective relationship based on our ability to interact successfully
together.
Getting together in small groups, to share experiences and give feedback
works well. Action Learning sets come to mind [they have a very focused
approach] Getting together without a common and agreed purpose does not
work very well in my experience.
I know that there is a growing interest in people getting together to
share experiences and learn together.
I am not sure the 'learning' for its own sake is seen as sufficient
purpose yet.
I look forward to following this thread and seeing other ideas.
Ian Saunders
Transition Partnerships - Harnessing change for business advantage
tpians@cix.compulink.co.uk
--tpians@cix.co.uk (Ian Saunders)
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>