This is the first post in a two part blog on "going mainstream". This one is an overview of some of thoughts and the next blog has some specific learnings that have turned up so far. Part two will be published July 2nd, Wednesday next week. Back in the day![]() Back in the day, when I looked like this (that's me on the left with the magnificent side burns), Art of Hosting and Participatory Leadership was a fringe effort. In 1999 Toke, Monica and Jan had done their first Hosting training in the USA with Pioneers of Change and then I met them at Castle Borl in Slovenia in 2000, where this picture is taken. It was a massive period of awakening for me. I discovered a whole suite of theory and methodology that aligned with my innate understanding of how humans could organize together to achieve their potential. The World Cafe, Open Space Technology, Appreciative Inquiry, Future Search, Chaordic design and so much more poured into my life and invigorated me into all kinds of action, including the founding of Engage! InterAct in the Netherlands. It felt radical, counter cultural, edgy and most of all, needed. In the last 15 years Art of Hosting has grown into a world wide community of practitioners and along with many other trail blazing folks has helped build a broad culture across many sectors of reaching solutions though conversation - figuring it out, rather than fighting it out. Now days you can't swing a cat without someone talking about meaningful conversations, participatory democracy, employee engagement, collaborative leadership, communities of practice, relationships being essential to our capacity to achieve results etc. It's out there. People are making big bucks touring the speaking circuit talking about it. The Harvard Business Review writes about it, there's books galore! You get my point. My direct experience is that my work is more and more invited into mainstream society - public consultation, organizational change management, community lead responses to economic downturn, government responses to the incredible stress of delivering public service in rapidly changing circumstance, to name a few … The work is going mainstream. It is just a question of whether we are ready to go with it, whether I am ready to go with it. Getting beyond right and wrongThis isn't just a trend that is inexorably taking me along, though. I want to be part of something that influences society, that has an impact on the mainstream way of working and living. I don't think we can do that as a fringe experiment in making participatory change happen. It is not enough for me to stand on the sidelines and pass judgement on society, political leaders and corporate giants. It is not enough for me to just take the exciting pieces of work that build the new. I want to roll up my sleeves and get into some of the toughest, darkest, most confusing places and apply participatory methodologies and world view there. It is in those places that I find I learn the most about who I am and what I do. In my own personal journey it has been entering the parts of me that I am most afraid and ashamed of - the dark, long avoided parts of myself - that has helped me discover the crystal clear kernel of clarity at my centre. It is the same in my work. So many of the people, organisations, ways of working that I villified as a young man have now become my most interesting and powerful practice grounds. I am shedding all my ideas and concepts of right and wrong and working with the reality of people who are trying to figure out how to live a meaningful and productive life. “Beyond our ideas of right-doing and wrong-doing, there is a field. I’ll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about. Ideas, language, even the phrase ‘each other’ doesn’t make sense any more.” - Rumi ![]() I want to engage the dominant system because it is inviting it. That means I have to change some things about myself though. If I want to work with CEOs, I have to find the CEO in me, to meet them where they are at. If I want to engage power, I have to find the power inside myself and trust I will not be corrupted by it. I have re-branded, bought some nice ties (I now love ties - see the pic!), taken some jobs with corporations I would not have taken 5 years ago, listened to advice about my business from corporate clients and friends … I am in training about how to lead change in the mainstream. This is my work now and I am loving it because I am learning so much. I am letting go of the high expectations of my earlier ideology and meeting reality where it is at. It feels great. The magic in the mainstreamSo here's my rant … I think it is time to get out of the fringes of community, organisations and society at large and bring the work of participatory leadership and art of hosting to the mainstream. We are not going to make change by using language that the majority of the world thinks is hokey. (Someone recently asked me why people talk about 'the work' like it is god!) All we end up doing is going round and round in re-enforcing circles of increasing irrelevance as the world moves on and co- opts something that so many of us have been a part of launching. If we want to steward and protect this work and its DNA we must find ways to follow it on its inevitable course into the heart of the very thing we are seeking to change. That means branding, sharpening language, having solid business models and making choices about what we stand for. It's not for everyone, I get that - but for me I no longer want to be embedded in something that is so diverse it is diluted and is articulated so vaguely is gains no traction in the systems it is seeking to transform. So maybe it is now time to let go of the shore - the safe place of being the radicals leading change - and swim in the mainstream as leaders of transformation. It puts the 2001 Hopi message in a different light for me: There is a river flowing now very fast. It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid. They will try to hold on to the shore.They will feel they are being torn apart and will suffer greatly. Know that the river has its destination. Going mainstream. Let's do it! I hope this has inspired, provoked or validated you in some way. Keep an eye out for part two coming next week with some specific learnings.
I would love to hear your thoughts and comments so we can continue to talk and evolve our work some more, Change Ahead. TM
23 Comments
Hi Tim,
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Tim Merry
25/6/2014 13:17:50
Hey Ursel - thanks for posting. Yes, I think ambiguous would have been a better word than 'hokey' . Love this idea that new social behaviours develop outside the realm of language and the more they are practiced the clearer the language becomes. Makes sense to me. Absolutely a personal preference where to put one's energy and focus … and I think there is call now for me to become adept at navigating the mainstream with our work and I wonder if that is broader than just me, whether there is bigger timing as well as personal preference?
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25/6/2014 21:50:34
Your post made me quite happy, Tim! On Monday I received a call out from a dear friend, mate, and force of nature bringing participatory leadership into the heart of the European Commission. Her very own team (it's often our most intimate professional circles that are the greatest challenge), in a crisis, is calling for 'her' magic methods to help them out of their impasse, as the only solution they can think of. That for timing. It is time indeed, and things are morphing 'all by themselves', because of the good work we have all being doing around the world, that mean that enough people have experienced participation 'on the fringes' to know that it can also help 'in the mainstream'.
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Tim Merry
26/6/2014 09:11:32
Thanks Helen. I was chatting to a friend and colleague Lalith yesterday and we were asking: what is clarity of language that creates the conditions for people to surrender to ambiguity? I am happy to hear it is settling in the EC. After being here over 10 years now, I have made the decision to let go of the language and focus on the practice. Whatever the language/ model / concept that fits the need, I want to l work with that … that way we develop and articulation that is true to the place. I think we can do that without compromising the DNA of participatory work. The language is not sacred to me, nor the models … it is only the practice that has my unconditional loyalty and even that, I find, is constantly changing and evolving.
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Hi Tim,
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Tim
26/6/2014 09:15:37
Yes! It is interesting how the more mainstream we go the greater the diversity that can turn up in the room (if we run good invitation). My experience has been that it leads to better conversations and deeper transformation - the more difference people are confronted with and able to be in together the more opportunity there is for something truly new to come out. Good luck bringing them all together. It would be great to hear the story!
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Cheryl Lyon
29/6/2014 03:56:26
Tim et al,
Aerin Dunford
26/6/2014 03:27:26
This reminds me so much of a recent conversation Tenn and I had about the Art of Hosting when I was in Utah last month. Particularly this line: "I no longer want to be embedded in something that is so diverse it is diluted and is articulated so vaguely is gains no traction in the systems it is seeking to transform." At the same time we shared this sentiment, we also noticed that there seems to be a tendency towards rigidity - e.g. "An AoH training has to look exactly like X, Y & Z." Maybe that's a certain kind of dogma emerging. I wonder if these are patterns people are noticing more broadly across this rapidly growing AoH "system" -- particularly for those of us that have been part of it for 10 - 15 years now.
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Tim
26/6/2014 09:19:54
Thanks Aerin - lovely to hear you on here. I would love to hear more about what you are experiencing as the dogma … I feel there is a line between delivering something we know works well and getting stuck in a rut ...
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Thanks once again for offering your journey Tim. I love the way that you reflect that courageous moment when those of us who come from 'the fringe' make the conscious decision to work intimately with people in the mainstream systems that were once 'the problem' or metaphors for what is wrong with this world.
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Tim
26/6/2014 09:33:01
This is a great question … thank you. The only way I have found to hold my integrity in my work is to build experience through my own journey inside myself. What is equipping me to go places I have avoided all my life in my work is spending some time going to the places inside myself I have avoided all my life. I feel like if I can navigate those places inside myself I am well prepared to navigate those places in the world. It was actually by going into my inner work that I found the courage, conviction and desire to do the work I am now doing in organisations and communities.
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Yes, the play between the intuition that you describe and analysis and frameworks is what works for me in real time or in a beginning-middle-end project. I also get very clear with myself and clients about what it is we are really trying to do here... it's usually less about an invitation to ‘change our system of operating' than it is about getting unstuck or moving to the next level.
François
2/7/2014 00:00:51
Hi Tim.
Violetta
27/6/2014 10:58:31
So great to read your evolution Tim. I love the fluidity you embark on in your innerwork, learning to pick up your power, to find the CEO in you, etc. This is resonant with my own journey as I map my next path and its really heartening and encouraging to read your sharing.
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John Mortimer
30/6/2014 08:04:44
Well, its an interesting question that I have been seeing as two different areas for some years - the alternative, and the conventional.
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Tim
3/7/2014 04:16:35
I love this questions. Thank you Kelly!!
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3/7/2014 14:53:30
Wow - what a smart, provocative post you've written, Tim! And these comments are fantastic as well.
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3/7/2014 22:34:48
Hi Tim. I worked hard to get in authentic touch with 'mainstream power' and offer occasions and methods to look more-dimensional to the possibilities. But sub-streams made me to leave this ambition for a while. Now I have time to look at the WorldFootball at my mainstream neighbours place. And the morning that I was wondering how I could bridge the gap to his sometimes racist language and my own sympathy for some immigrant-players, I found a little card in my mailbox, where they invited me for dinner the evening of the next Red Devil-match.
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Allen Kwabena Frimpong
4/7/2014 06:43:41
I totally understand where you are coming from Tim (part 1 and 2 of this blog is AMAZING! as I say), and I am just reading the comments here too, so I would like to offer my perspective on the points your are making in the blog because I think the conversation that its generating is really DOPE and important to this creative work of art we are putting on display.
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Tim
8/7/2014 06:38:15
Yes! Love this. It is not that we have to lose our radical nature - just that it can turn up as a gift. Moving from fighting it out to figuring it out. Perhaps more that a gift it can turn up a strategic necessity to get the results we would all like to achieve. How can I bring what I have to offer in a way it be seen, used and spread?
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Stephani Roy McCallum
4/7/2014 09:02:16
Hi Tim - I loved this blog and thank you for sharing your thoughts. I referenced it in my recent blog about insights from the Spartan Race - reflecting on courage, resilience and connection in community engagement. You can find it here: https://medium.com/@RedheadSteph/surprising-insights-from-the-spartan-race-1ed6fb9472c1
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19/9/2014 09:04:48
I loved reading all the opinions here. My team and I have been struggling with the language as well, as we attempt to leave the shore and dive into the deep waters of corporate or industrial clients. I was recently referred to a machine shop to do some team-building work. Without using any particular language, I sat 30 very "unlikely customers" in a circle, used a talking piece, built a center, and got them sharing - sure, some complained, some whined, some were downright nasty, and in the end, the process stayed together and we were invited back to continue the progress.
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Howard Stanten
20/9/2014 18:36:12
Mike, your idea of translating the language into something even the far side of mainstream adds a new dimension to the depth of this discussion. Where 3 day AoH trainings among relatively like minded folk occur at one side of the main stream, the work on the factory floor may very well occur at the other. In that space, even "mainstream" language, whatever that really means, may be less than effective. On the factory floor, working to build an atmosphere of trust based on a willingness to be vulnerable will require facilitators to be able to listen to the unspoken stories first while at the same time modeling their own vulnerability in such a way that the walls of fear built by years of marginalization start to break apart. Tim's notion of clarifying the ambiguous language makes a lot of sense. Categorizing this clarity as "mainstream" however may not reflect the depth of the challenge. To me, the work needs to move into the trenches and become more accessible. This means we, as change leaders, need to above all else be able to listen nimbly and reflect the language that is presented to us, be it AoH- esque, mainstream, or "something on the far side of mainstream" all to use to being swept up on the factory floor.
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