Hi Terry
Great story. You ought to think of writing it up for the case study
section of the HBR. My thoughts/comments follow:
1. With the benefit of your honest and thoughtful articulation of your
experience, the fundamental "problem" seems to me to be the fact that an
"outsider" was brought in to replace the "founding" manager of the group.
The generic problems associated with this phenomenon were exacerbated in
this particular situation by the facts that:
--the group was of long standing (4 years) and probably very close
knit, due to its separate facility and its demographic homogeneity, not to
mention all the hard work they had done together "implement(ing) the
principles and practices of a LO."
--the "founding manager" falsely raised the expectations of both
"Bill" and his co-workers by making it known that he was the
"heir-apparent." When this did not happen, I am sure that a lot of the
trust which had been developed over the previous 4 years was vitiated.
--the agency director compounded this problem by (apparently)
appointing someone else without getting input/buy-in from the team (in
stark contrast, I might add, to the stated "participatory nature of this
agency.")
2. I think your "20/20 hindsight" conclusion that you should have talked
one-on-one with each member of the group prior to the meeting is valid. I
was taught to do so when I started doing small group facilitation 20 years
ago, and I have yet to to find reason to question that teaching. In my
experience, pre-meeting one-on-ones allow you to:
--better understand the issues facing the group
--connect individually with each member of the group (develop trust)
--learn of each member's attitudes towards the issues
--get a preview of possible group dynamics
In your case, again with 20/20 hindsight, I would have also had a
pre-meeting one-on-one with new manager, the "founding" manager and the
agency director.
3. I probably would not have agreed (again in hindsight) to hold the
meeting without the new manager. Even if the meeting had been more of a
"success," her lack of participation would have made building on that
success difficult. Rather, it would have likely strenghtened the us "vs.
her" attitude of the "team." Here, I assume that the stated agenda for
the focus group was something like "How do we take this group forward?"
rather than "Why aren't we talking to each other?" I believe that using
neutral/positive agendas as a framework for resolving even the most sticky
issues is very good technique. It also allows everybody (particularly the
main protagonists) to participate. I've previously used the "how do we go
forward?" agenda in several occasions where the externally obvious (and
ultimately agreed upon internally) answer was, "We can't, we shouldn't,
and we won't" (i.e. voluntary sale or dissolution). The short summary of
this long-winded paragraph is--if you're going to hold an important
meeting, make sure that everybody directly contributing to that importance
(and nobody else!) is involved.
4. In the meeting itself, one technique that I almost always use, and one
which is particularly effective in meetings where one can anticipate
hostility and/or lack of participation is to start the proceedings with a
simple exercise.
--hand out a blank sheet of paper and a pencil to each participant
--give them 15-20 minutes to write down, legibly, their answers to
the following question--"What are the 3-4 most important issues which this
group will have to deal with over the next year?"
--Collect the answers.
--Fold up the papers.
--Shuffle them about.
--Re-deal them, randomly, to the participants
--Have the participants read out the answers they have been given
This gets everybody talking. It allows them to present their opinions
anonymously. It usually also starts the process of building a consensus.
It's not foolproof. I've more than once had an issue read out in this
exercise to the effect of "Why are we paying this college boy enough money
to buy two Buicks to tell us what we probably already know?" (.... but in
refelction, at least one of those meetings turned out to be very
successful!).
5. Finally, as you describe it, this group is not now (if it ever was) a
Learning Organisation. It is an accumulation of bile. Who let this
situation go on for 9-10 months? Somebody's abdicating their leadership
responsibilities. The new manager? Her boss? At some point, in some
assignments, it is regrettably necessary to make a final report to senior
managment that says, in effect, to paraphrase Pogo, "We have found the
enemy, and it is you!" Not necessarily the best recipe for follow-on
business, but good for the conscience and the soul.
Hope this is of help.
Cheers
Richard
Richard Goodale
Managing Partner
The Dornoch Partnership
"Discovery, Creativity, Leadership"
--Richard Goodale <fc45@dial.pipex.com>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>