What a joyful exercise it has been to design a sleuthing effort to engage conversation with people who care about accomplishing Creating the Future’s mission! Using Catalytic Thinking, we are finding the potential not just in ultimately partnering with people with common goals, but the potential in the process of discovery itself.
During our February 28th meeting (listen / watch here), we began where Catalytic Thinking always begins – listening. We considered all the things that people think about that word “partner,” about traditional funding, about “resources.” We listened to our own experiences, to the conversations we have all been part of.
What do people tell us is wrong? And what would GOOD look like? What are the values at the core of that? What are the strengths in the people and systems that exist, upon which we can build these partnerships?
Through the practice of Catalytic Listening, here is what we heard.
Desired Outcomes of Our Sleuthing Efforts
• Creating relationships as a radical act
• More people in deep relationship with each other, where connection is the goal
• Being in authentic conversation and relationship around our vision, noting that the incentive is the vision for a more humane world, where systems are all bringing out the best in us
• Inviting people to join this community where every person is valued for who they are, and where we strive to walk the talk of systems that bring out the best in us
The Strengths We Have to Build Upon
• The Catalytic Thinking framework as the gift we have to share with the world
• Catalytic Thinking as a way to come back to Beginner’s Mind
• The priority on PEOPLE vs. seeing a monolithic title of “The Group” or “The Organization.” It’s about the PEOPLE.
• Our vision for a more humane world, where systems are bringing out the best in us all
• Our own curiosity, and the curiosity of others.
• The fact that it is our mission to find language that affirms
• Authenticity
• Stories of results
• Our norm of bringing people in to join us in community
• Our work is rooted in practicality and pragmatism, the proof being in the results
• The reminder that we don’t have to have the answers, that our job is to experiment, learn, and share what we learn
• Our emphasis on and ability to work with questions vs. answers
The Values Talk We Intend to Walk
• People feeling that it’s about the people, not about the thing.
• Trust, safety, integrity, consistency
• Sincere curiosity. Asking “Tell me more,” and really wanting to know
• Building wisdom upon the wisdom of others
• The value of fellowship, of community
• The value of being mindfully present
As we continue to design the sleuthing process that will guide our efforts over the next many months, we know these lists will grow as we tether our work to the outcomes we want to see, the strengths we have to build upon, and the values we seek to uphold in our work. We look forward to your being part of that journey with us!