Action Design Consulting Services
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Facilitating conversations Action Design helps individuals and groups in organizations improve the quality of inquiry, choice, and action on their most difficult issues. In our consulting we help directly by designing meetings and facilitating conversations, and we help developmentally by building capability for clients to raise the level of their game. We can describe our consulting services under three headings:
Facilitating conversationsConversation is the medium of organizational intelligence. Individuals talk together to understand complex situations, consider options, and commit to joint action. But sometimes talk does not produce movement. People continue to see things differently, the discussion becomes repetitive, or seeming agreements are not acted upon. Action Design helps important conversations go beyond where they otherwise bog down. We draw out reasoning, help players better understand each other, and move inquiry forward.The quality of business conversation depends in part on the working
relationships among individuals and groups. Sometimes the important
conversation to have is about the working relationship itself. Naming
how players are getting stuck can often help them to resume the business
conversation in a new way and also lay the groundwork for improving the
relationship.
Developing leadership teamsClients often invite us to help design and facilitate off-site meetings in which a team reflects on how it is working, the challenges ahead, and how best to move forward. Sometimes these meetings focus on issues that have been inhibiting progress or that will prevent the team from moving to the next level.High functioning leadership teams require unusual competence at sustaining
inquiry into difficult issues and using differences to improve insight
and performance. Action Design helps teams develop this competence
in customized sessions using the powerful learning approach that is the
foundation of our workshops.
Reflecting on case situations from their own experience, team members enhance
their skill in dealing with those kinds of situations and improve their
ability to work with each other. The reflective conversation stimulated
by this work can lead to breakthroughs on business issues raised in case
situations.
Building organizational inquiry capabilityMaking an organization work better depends on how individuals from different groups and with different perspectives work together. Action Design helps to structure inquiry and offers concepts and methods for engaging key players in making change.Valuable organizational knowledge resides in the know-how of practitioners and often does not travel well. Action Design's customized case workshops create stimulating exchanges in which participants learn from each other and improve their handling of difficult situations. Bringing together individuals with linked responsibilities in such a session can be a powerful instrument for redesigning how processes actually work. Some clients use our in-house workshops both to build critical skills
in the organization and also as a culture-shaping intervention. As
significant numbers of individuals develop their ability to discuss difficult
issues and to reflect on their own responsibililty, the tenor of the organizational
conversation changes. The leadership must set an example, but it
cannot be left only to leaders to create an adaptive, intelligent organization.
Contact usA general description of our services can provide only limited information about how Action Design might help in your particular situation. To arrange a conversation, contact us: info@actiondesign.comAction Design Tel: (617) 499-0007
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