Sylvia's Journal

When the rains come pouring down we cannot hear ourselves think – we have to use the mic to get ourselves heard about the noise on the tin roof. Outside the rains come down in sheets that wash all the cars in a minute or two. And then, usually, the rain moves on and everything dries up in no time, as if nothing happened.

People here like the rains as much as we dislike them in Holland or London – rain is a life force in many parts of Africa. One of my colleagues told me, “when I arrive from the air I look down on the green mountains around the city I am so proud and happy.” I can’t imagine saying that when landing at Schiphol airport.

Today we entered into more delicate reflections about behavior of self and behavior of the bosses. Some people’s bosses are in the room and there is a slight nervousness about this dynamic and unease, understandable, to even acknowledge this dynamic – but it is the elephant in the room. And so we are treading lightly.

We did an exercise about team roles in group discussions. On purpose we had given the people who we have seen initiating a lot (initiate is one of the four roles in Kantor’s Four Player System) the role of observer. Not surprisingly they got so caught up in the conversations that it took a lot of coaxing by us to get them to actually observe. They admitted that keeping their mouths zipped up was very difficult.

I am adding some of the exercises I used to do with participants before we had a standard leadership curriculum. I had forgotten about them an am rediscovering my overflowing electronics materials library which I carry around the world in my dropbox. These exercises and think pieces are about things that are very relevant to this group: managing one’s boss, dealing with team dynamics, political thinking, public sector managers who want transformational change – what are they up against? There are many private sector gurus who are copied and whose words are put on powerpoints for audiences that can’t possibly do much with them because public sectors are different – missing control over two key resources: people and money.
We are getting good feedback from the group – their heads buzzing with ideas that explain things they took for granted. Just what we wanted.

Day two has come and gone and the ‘free and open’ dialogue that participants wanted is starting haltingly – a move of a few inches. The progress was recognized by the same person who mentioned it missing yesterday – “I was a little holding back myself,” she admitted today. An amazing remark from one of the more senior people in the room.

If they acknowledged yesterday that inspiring was their weak point, today they started to see how one can inspire – how energy gets produced when people create together a picture of the future they would like to create. Together they had dreamed and talked about that until we had five sheets of drawings with tons of information. I took it all back to the hotel. I got up early this morning to pull out major themes from the mass of data. Last night I was too pooped to do that and unable to see any patterns. This morning they danced off the page. We verified the words against the pictures they drew and it was right on, no energy lost in the process. Pfffh!

We compared this vision (albeit it with a slightly different focus) with the one that was in the formal strategic plan, probably produced by a consultant – and everyone could see and feel the difference. It was a demo of what a shared vision does, not what it is. QED.

The rest of the day went fast as the participants tackled a variety of tasks, all aimed at helping them be more systematic and intentional in their behaviors and actions toward their vision. We had to do with one facilitator less who was pulled away to deal with a very serious family crisis. If ever one needed a team it was today, and we pulled together, weaving in and out of each others’ sessions as if we were twins, thinking nearly alike. It was a great experience.

We are also working closely with another USAID project and trying to produce a strong piece of fabric, they the warp and we the weft.