Development with the Medicine Wheel Tool©

I would like to share with you a tool that has become an essential part of my way of working. I use it when I want to create a project or start a business, gather people around a vision or plan and also evaluate a conference or workshop. I use it for my personal health and balance to see where I need more focus or when I write, such as writing this article. This tool is founded in ancient traditions but adapted to our world of today. It actually provides me with a structure that feels very natural.

The Medicine Wheel Tool© (MW) from the Genuine Contact© program provides leaders with a multi-dimensional and multi-functional framework that could be used for many purposes and in many situations. It could be used as a roadmap. It could also be used as a ground that can give you a deeper understanding and more perspectives of your work. You can use the tool to create a picture that shows the wholeness of the organization and to get everyone on to the same song-sheet. Still, it is so simple to use that you might mistake its value. Sometimes we think that the more complex a tool is, the more valuable. The truth is that the value lies in the simplicity and the adaptability to complex situations. Not one organization is similar, not one person is similar either. All are unique and need tools that suit them. The business world has a way of thinking that since one way of working is successful in one organization, it could be moved and create success in others too. Benchmarking and best practices are only useful as inspiration, knowing that if you bring them into your organization without any changes, they will create different results. LEAN has become a really popular framework, that when it is taken out of its Eastern cultural setting, might give surprising results to many organizations that have a different value foundation than Toyota.

The Medicine Wheel Tool© has a history that comes from ancient traditions among aboriginal people. Antropologist Angeles Arrien gave some of the foundation for the way we use it as a tool for development. In the book ”The Four Fold Way” she explained the four quadrants of the wheel in a way that connected them to the four parts of the human being, mind, spirit, emotions and body. This was translated to the language of organizations, leadership, vision, community and management. When an organization or a person works with the MW these four quadrant make it possible to see and acknowledge the wholeness.  

 

 

 

The Medicine Wheel Tool© has a certain order for our work, taking first things first and starting with purpose, which allows us to focus on why we are there. My experience is that when organizations want to change, they start with management, re-organizing, shifting the outlook, changing people in different positions or hiring a new CEO or consultant to downsize. When they have done all this work, they find that their people is lost in the grief cycle and they are not doing any better than before. When you start with management issues, you will soon end up in discussions about purpose and might have to re-organize once again.

In the MW we bring in leadership after purpose. Who will lead the work for this purpose and what kind of leadership is needed? Are the leaders in the organization hired for the qualities that are needed because of the purpose? I see many schools hiring headmasters for their management and economic kompetencies so I assume that the purpose of schools is to be an low cost administrative unit. They have certainly mixed the role of leadership with the role of management. The leadership decides which mountain to climb and the managers decide what is the best way to do it. I think many schools are wandering around in the dark forest without any sight of their mountain.

Vision is the next step in the Medicine Wheel Tool© and sometimes organizations think it should be out of reach! Vision is not something above the clouds but something you can see. The vision is the inspiring picture of the future that you can reach within a certain timeframe, more closely connected to goals than to illusions. We all need the inspiration of a beautiful future to do our very best to get there.

Community is about who works together for the purpose and how do we work together. Who do we need to fulfil our vision? Who are the stakeholders? Community can be of great importance for the staff, especially if they have lost sight of their purpose and vision and don´t know what they are there to achieve. Sometimes they know about purpose but don´t see any vision so to be able to navigate in this darkness, community and good relationships with each other is what make them go to work every day. I think it is a waste of resources when people are not invited to use their whole wisdom and knowledge in a better way. It seems that organizations, at least those in their late bureaucracy phase don´t want to take the inconvenience to  have someone rocking the boat.

The last quadrant of the Medicine Wheel Tool© is management, because when we know about why we are there, who will lead us, where are we going and who will come together to work for this, then we also know how to organize everything in a suitable way. Management should be a support for people to work for the purpose. As Peter Drucker says; most of what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to get their work done.

Now you have been taken on one journey with the Medicine Wheel Tool©, and only one! There are many more available, such as strategy building, organizational diagnosis, evaluation or personal development. Right now we are using it for sustainable growth of local ideas and initiatives. I hope to see you soon on one of these journeys.

Förändring är enkelt? Change is simple?

Please, scroll down for English.

Vem sa att förändring måste vara svårt? Det finns enkla metoder när organisationer behöver ändras. För det behöver de! Varje organisation har en höjdpunkt när den fungerar som bäst och sedan bär det utför, tyvärr. Då gäller det att hitta nästa kurva som bär uppåt och hoppa på den. Både för att hitta den nya vägen och för att få med sig alla, behövs hela personalens kunskap. Det är inte längre gångbart att några få bestämmer för de många. Då missar man viktig kunskap och stort engagemang.

Men man behöver inte leta svåra och krångliga metoder, som bara kan ledas av några få specialister. Man behöver enkla metoder som alla kan snabbt kan ta till sig. Genuine Contact™ programmet skapar ett bra förändringsklimat och ett annat arbetssätt genom att helt enkelt kombinera två mötesmetodiker, som alla kan lära sig, Open Space-metoden och Whole Person Process. Kontinuerlig användning av de här metoderna bygger in ett nytt ”operativsystem” i organisationen. Detta operativsystem gör att alla blir delaktiga, bidrar med hela sin kunskap och tar ansvar för helheten. Det är ungefär som att lära sig baka, först följer man receptet och när man kan grunderna så kan man också ta ut svängarna och skapa sin egen kaka, genom att tillföra sådant man redan har tillsammans med de nya ingredienserna.  

De här två mötesmetoderna kombineras, tillsammans med ett par enkla verktyg, på det sätt som passar organisationen just då, vare sig man behöver göra en analys, utveckla en idé, skapa en strategisk plan eller bygga nya lokaler. Personalen lär sig metoder och verktyg på några dagar och sedan har organisationen alltid tillgång till det nya arbetssättet.

Så hur börjar man? Ett enkelt sätt är att göra en diagnos av organisationen inklusive ett möte där hela personalen deltar. Redan där lär man sig verktyg och metoder samtidigt som man jobbar med det som är viktigt för förändringprocessen. Man kan också välja att använda metodiken på nästa konferens och utvärdera resultatet av den. Kontakta oss för ett samtal om vad som passar bäst i din organisation eller delta i någon av våra kurser. Du hittar mer information på www.gatewayc.com

 

English

Who said change need to be hard? There are simple methods available when organizations need to change. And they need to change! Every organization has a peak and then it unfortunately only descends. You then need to find the next rising curve and jump to it. The staffs whole knowledge is needed to both find the new path and to get everyone onboard. It is no longer viable to have a few people making decisions for many, because you will lose important knowledge and dedication.

But you don´t need to search for difficult and complicated methods, that can only be conducted by a few specialists. What you need are simple methods that everyone quickly can learn. The Genuine Contact™ program creates a good climate for change and a different work approach simply by combining two meeting methodologies that everyone can learn, Open Space Technology and Whole Person Process. Continuous use of these methods will implement a new ”operative system” in the organization. This operative system will invite everyone to participate, share their full knowledge and take responsibility for the whole. It is as when you learn to make bread,  first you have to follow the recipe and when you know the basics you can expand and generate your own cake by adding what you already have together with the new ingredients.

The two meeting methodologies are combined, together with a few simple tools, in a way that suits the organization in that very moment, whether it needs to do an analysis, develop an idea, create a strategic plan or build new premises. The staff will learn the methods and tools in a few days and the organization will then always have access to its new work approach.

Where do you start? One easy way is to do a diagnosis of the organization including a meeting with the whole staff. Already in this work you will learn tools and methods when at the same time working with what is important for the change process. Or you could choose to use the methodology for your next conference and evaluate the results. Feel free to contact us for a dialogue about what is best for your organization or attend one of our public workshops. You will find the needed information at www.gatewayc.com