New Book!

You can find out more at www.conferencesthatwork.com, which offers five free chapters, a condensed introduction to peer conferences, a blog, and free downloads of many supporting resources.

Check it out, Adrian loves to get feedback!

On the Paris run I transferred the basic choreography to Emmanuel Gaillot and Raphaël Pierquin so they could make it their own. We were assisted by a group of local agilista from mostly Octo and Orange. And it was amazing. Their solution was to all focus at the Treasure Island, and get the cap’n from his cabin by using the cabin boy’s access. Filipe played an amazing role of drunk cap’n. Hilarious. When getting the loot, they threw the coins in the air, and declared the problem solved. Apparently their treasure is to make as many crew members as possible happy. The debriefing and tie-in went smooth. Several insights about coping with stress and intent appeared. After that we all had dinner. Good moods all around. Thank you all!

Underway to Bordeaux we transferred the game frame, the wheel we use and that allows for a quick draw of other sculpt metaphors. And Emmanuel and Raphaël facilitated the session well. I particularly loved how Emmanuel played the stances with the participants in a circle, and how Raphaël’s calm affected the debriefing. I could follow more of it than I expected, and in some one-on-one’s afterwards less.

The participants gained the loot, and then threw the cap’n overboard. I later told Colin that the new cap’n had set himself up for more mutiny fear and paranoia than the previous cap’n had. “You are probably right”, he replied with a “I’ve just been hit” smile. In the paid for versions we rerun solutions to check for unintended side-effects. Sadly, in a session on an event with the preset worst case typical plot scenario, we can’t. It’s a teaser in a limited time frame.

A short video with an improv 5 mins after the debriefing was made. Hope to publish it soon.

Marketing Loot

And we received a perfection game! Thank you Luc Mazardo. An 8 out of 10, plus some really useful “perfections”. Maybe we’ll receive some more later. I hope so. I’m greedy for loot! Teach us how to make these sculpting practices meet your needs better please?

We definitely need wapons

In the context of code development, the weapons and ammunition are of course things like version control. In a business setting it is political patterns. Knowing the patterns and some counter tactics that do not turn us in the petty pirates we fight may be extremely useful.

The intelligence of the creature known as a crowd is usually sqrt(n), where n=the number of people in it. At #agileopen it was exp[n].

I enjoyed meeting new people, known people, and some people I hadn’t seen in ages, in sessions on tools, business and enterprise architecture.

Great new insights, we freed ourselves from BDUF but we’re still trapped in some other old patterns. We seek exploration of the blank spots on our maps, but we do not investigate what we believe to be “known” enough. Verification, validation, and communication can easily solve that. The second day I picked up the courage to run a Ship of Fools session.

A surprise was that Agile people did the Ship of Fools sculpt with pre-determinded organisational elements in around 60 minutes, and in the midst of chaos, managed to decide to and have the ship steer away from the reef. Amazing.

I thought they would be fast, but did not expect lightning fast. Thank you all that participated. I am now busy using what I gathered from the session at Agile Open for improving the sculpt. The new version will reflect your wisdom, in an unserious serious way of course.

And I’d like to thank all that also played rowdy perjured rascals around round tables. I enjoyed all the authentic story telling. Very much. Not boring. Thank you.

1. Mask yer captainliness: Ignore an event or a key, then freeze bein’ absolutely surprised when its effects upset yer life, then blame th’ energy.

2. Do nay confore: Expect energy, wait fer ‘t, surrender yersef t’ ‘t, then keel haul others, or desert. Don’t forget t’ mention afterwards “I told ye so”.

3. Do nay deal wi’ reality as ’tis: instead, question yer skills, knowledge, an’ abilities. Throw lots o’ doubt in th’ water, an’ only pay attention t’ what reality ortin’ ta be like.

4. Push th’ energy: make ‘t harder, nay easier. After all, ‘t can only be worth somin’ if ye be havin’ t’ swashbuckle fer ‘t. Enjoy battle, nay life! At least ’tis nay borin’ me ‘earties …

5. Accept challenges in th’ flow: Use th’ above foolishness consciously fer (in)congruence on the good Ship of Fools.

… and there is no such thing as a free lunch!

I knew it! There’s a catch!

In nearly all instances, sculpting and simulations evoke powerful feelings of dismay when participants see the representation of what they are dealing with. After all, that is why the agreement to not talk about it existed in the first place.

What may be revealed are perceptions on functioning of others and yourself.

• While you believe you are perceptive and surfing chaos to find what’s mired in the muck (because the demand isn’t clear while clearly, there is a demand), others may perceive you as chaotic, maybe even irrelevant.
• While you believe you are focused and determined, others may perceive you as draconian, maybe even irresponsibly harsh.
• While you believe you are respectfully providing others with data to make up their own minds with, others may perceive you as incompetent, unbalanced or not centered.

Q: “Why don’t you summarise it for me?”
A: “I don’t spoon-feed mature others with pre-chewed food. I believe you to be quite competent in making meaning and assigning significance for yourself.”

Everything doubtful can come up when suddenly a group gets a handle on just how bad the situation really is. Non-confrontational confused responses, victim type tune outs, procrastination, emotional freezes, and total panic responses are not uncommon.

If, as a consultant, you are not willing and prepared to help the group work through its feelings and identify positive actions or sculpt a positive resolution of the situation, don’t do it.

If, as an organisation or individual participant, you believe in free lunches, and are not willing to challenge yourself and surface some of the real problems, don’t do it.

Consultant and organisation must be prepared for receiving critical feedback, before they take this road less traveled by. That makes all the difference.

The workshop serves between 8 and 16 people, and is facilitated by 2 facilitators, plus a local consultant or facilitator. After the workshop, the local facilitator or consultant is required to address specific organisational problems and for working on manifesting solutions. This may require following up on controlled folly with problem solving workshops on priority areas, and choosing early projects where success can come quickly and visibly.

Rates

20.000 euro facilitator fee total, plus expenses (travel and stay) if a local organisation organises the workshop.
Or else, if we have to organise location and catering, participants pay euro 4000 each for the workshop, and all income minus operational costs is split between the facilitators/organisers.

Run up and context setting

This is some of the meditative music we used.

Sculpt The sailmaker was made to walk the plank so the cap’n could buy time. This would have caused a mutiny later, had we not stopped the sculpt, having gathered more than enough information, and getting tired. Back stabbing of the cap'n by the first mate Turning the outlook to take a starboard view does not make the ship turn

Reflections More communication between cap’n and first mate Clarification about job descriptions More time to observe the system in order to make informed decisions Swabbies are fine More background Find allies for a mutiny more quickly More time for preparation Ah, and when do we have all of these In Real Life? We don’t. But in general we can ease communication between roles and do more asking instead of assuming. Who to ask, and how, in order to not lose perceived authority or face? Ask those around you that you have a lot of credibility with, and build up just walking around the company. Likely people will desensitize after a while, and not find it odd at all that you appear regularly. It may be appreciated and that brings down the risk of disrupting the system by your appearance in other than positive ways. And, as a Cap’n you can always play around with the Byzantine Generals problem.

Improvements for sculpt

1. Have a catching and compelling story to set the stage.

2. More of a note: A version with a simulation will require a whole day, with reflections and tie-in on the day after. Another workshop that is. But, clearly, this sculpt can easily be turned into a simulation.

3. Change the ship pastor’s role to fool, now that it turns out to be a Pirate Ship. Every community has one, even Pirates. Besides, not many people know that Pirates are of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster faith. We believe that Pirates will evolve into more fully humane beings, regardless of others knowing about our faith.

4. Business model

Additional resources for sculpt

• Helm
• Eye patches
• Shark
• Cutlasses, knives, swords
• Pirate’s flag
• Swabs
• Plank

Appreciations

Thank ye Mona, Henrik, Otto, Marco, Bent, Cor, an’ Graham. This makes fer a grounded an’ powerful kick-start t’ get Ship o’ Fools goin’. An’ ’tis extremely important how we kick start, fer any imbalance in that, can come aft t’ haunt us later, an’ probably fairly smartly at that.

Let us know if an’ when ye (co-)facilitate an instance o’ ‘t, or if ye wish t’ work together on an instance? We be eager t’ know what happens, an’ excited about further facilitation an’ development o’ congruent memes!

What else ye got? An’ be quick about it, I be shippin’ out soon! Ya horn swogglin’ landlubbers!

Inspiration is not born in a vacuum; excellent ideas are seeded by other excellent ideas and fertilized by still more excellent ideas.

Controlled folly was originally re-designed from the balancing act, to support consultants coaching executive teams and managers. The demand was taken from the AIM UAW alliance executive coaching webpage, and from exchanges with Peter Schoonens, a local consultant.

Inspiration for the Ship of Fools sculpt idea came when listening to Reinhard Mey – Das Narrenschiff (live) — the lyrics in German and English are included below as pdf’s. Thank you Reinhard.

The concepts used are Satir organisational sculpting (pdf) concepts, and a run up for being able to take in such critical feedback as a sculpt delivers, also uses Satir concepts: coping stances (pdf), ingredients of an interaction (pdf), and temperature reading (pdf).