Portland Program
Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Leaning Into Our Discomfort: Creating Inclusion Across Difference
Patti Digh and David Robinson

Coming soon! A live podcast with Patti and David....

“I've attended several workshops faciliated by Patti and David. Always inspiring, yet I come away with practial tools I can use in my work right away. I've laughed, crie, and been totally amazed at the magic they create. This is a "not to be missed" event!" -- -- Christine Martell, VP of Outreach, Cascadia Chapter and Owner, VisualsSpeak

Intended Audience

This program is geared towards all audiences.

Overview

Before we learn about other groups, this session invites us to consider ourselves and our capacity for walking toward difference, as opposed to away from it.

“The work of diversity is messy and chaotic – too often we try to ‘fix’ it with tame solutions that only perpetuate the problem,” says Patti Digh, co-facilitator of this session. “Many organizations avoid messiness even though it is the stuff that drives innovation, creativity and real learning. And we too often focus on behavioral change…but in our experience, behavior – like water – follows the structure of the land. To really achieve change around inclusion issues, we need to look more at the ‘structure of the land’ in our organizations. That, too, is sometimes messy.”

If the real work of diversity and inclusion happens at the far edges of our comfort zone, how can we learn to step toward our discomfort when our impulses tell us to run away? What is the difference between how we behave on those edges and how we think we behave? How does our need for safety keep us and our organizations from really engaging in the work of inclusion? What in the structure of the land of our organizations keeps us from achieving what we need around diversity and inclusion?

This session will address those questions and provide tools for moving ourselves and our organizations toward true inclusion. Please bring both hemispheres of your brain because you’ll need them both!

Process

This is a highly experiential, interactive session oriented more toward learning (a process that leaves us changed) than toward problem-solving (a process focused on changing our surroundings). It will not be a traditional learning environment; people will be invited to explore, lean into their discomfort, experiment, make meaning of their experiences, and have fun. We will:

• Utilize both cognitive tools and experiential and creative techniques
• Use theatre, metaphor, story, dialogue, and other narrative tools
• Explore culturally expressive personal and organizational “masks”
• Be 85% experiential–not in the sense of simulations or games, but as unmasked engagement with others
• Invite participants to extract meaning from experiences as a collaborative learning community

Tools

All the exercises in the session serve as tools for personal development and for engendering change in an organization. In addition, the explicit tools will be:

a) The Circle Project Inclusion Model
b) The 9 Circle Project Practices
c) The “Structure of the Land” Organizational Change Model

Outcomes

1. Participants will be introduced to 9 diversity practices that will help their organizations move from “exclusion” to “inclusion.”
2. Participants will explore diversity as a wicked problem and recognize how many of our diversity interventions are actually tame solutions that exacerbate the problem.
3. Participants’ basic assumptions about diversity will be challenged in a way that could change their understanding of diversity in themselves and their organizations.
4. Participants will gain a fuller understanding of the need for experiential learning in addressing diversity challenges.
5. Participants will have an active learning experience. The meaning they make from it will be personal to each individual and the organizational context in which they find themselves.
   

Alignment with National ASTD Competency Model

9 Focus Areas Areas in BOLD will be addressed in this presentation.

1. Designing Learning 2. Improving Human Performance 3. Delivering Training 4. Measuring and Evaluating 5. Facilitating Organizational Change 6. Managing the Learning Function 7. Coaching 8. Managing Organizational Knowledge 9. Career Planning and Talent Management

Speakers

The co-founders of The Circle Project, Patti Digh and David Robinson, will present this session.

Patti Digh has designed diversity initiatives and training for nonprofit and corporate clients around the world over the past 20 years. Her first book, Global Literacies: Lessons on Business Leadership and National Cultures (Simon & Schuster, 2000) was named a “Best Business Book for 2000” by Fortune Magazine. Her second book was The Global Diversity Desk Reference (Wiley, 2003). Her third book, LIFE IS A VERB: 37 Days to Wake Up, Be Mindful, and Live Intentionally, is based on her award-winning blog, 37days, and will be published in September 2008 by Globe Pequot Press. Patti has published over 100 articles on diversity and intercultural issues, having traveled and worked in over 60 countries. She was formerly the Vice President of International and Diversity Programs for the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) where she created the Institute for International HR and the award-winning SHRM Diversity Initiative and its educational programs including the Diversity Train the Trainer Certificate Program and National Diversity Conference.

David Robinson is a strong artistic leader with extensive experience in theatre, visual art, creativity, and education innovation. David’s 20 years of professional directing experience help him design educational programs for academic and corporate environments—utilizing theatre techniques and related creative processes to facilitate the discovery and recovery of the creative impulse, personal and cultural mythologies, and transformational experiences. His unique skill set affords experiential, multidimensional approaches to stimulating creativity and innovation in contemporary organizations. He often utilizes powerful story, improvisation, theatre gaming and visual arts techniques. David has been Artistic Director of The Dimensions Theatre Project, General Manager of The Seattle Shakespeare Company, Conservatory Manager and Acting Instructor at PCPA Theatrefest. He was founder and director of The McCandless Communications Academy, dedicated to teaching core curriculum through experiential learning processes.

Patti and David are co-founders of The Circle Project, an international consulting and training firm that helps organizations and the people in them work more effectively and authentically together across differences. Their book and toolkit, TOAST RULES: Fifty Ways to Burn Your Company (and Yourself), are due out in the summer of 2008.

Details

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