What is Participatory Leadership and why Art of Hosting?
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Groups and organizations practising Participatory Leadership in their work report better decision-making, more efficient and effective capacity building, and greater ability to quickly respond to opportunity, challenge and change. People who experience Participatory Leadership typically say that they walk away feeling more empowered and able to help guide meetings and conversations towards more effective and desirable outcomes.
The Art of Hosting is a highly effective way of stepping into Participatory Leadership. Based on the assumption that people give their energy and lend their resources to what matters most to them – in work as in life – the Art of Hosting blends a suite of powerful conversational processes to invite people to step in and take charge of the challenges facing them, harness the collective wisdom and self-organising capacity of groups of any size. |
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Using all the ingredients of good conversation
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Why is conversation so powerful? Conversation, more than any other form of human interaction, is the place where we learn, exchange ideas, offer resources and create innovation. Not every conversation works like this, though.
Many people experience meetings that waste time, conversations that feel more like debates, and invitations to input which turn out to be something altogether different. People want to contribute, but they can’t see how. Leaders want contribution, but they don’t know how to get it. |
Powerful methods to create open and meaningful conversation
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The Art of Hosting blends a few powerful participatory methods to create open and meaningful conversation that leads to commitment and good results. Collaborative methods used in Art of Hosting include:
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An art that takes practice and care
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Finally, the Art of Hosting is also a practice. We call it the Art of Hosting because it is an art to become skillful at helping ourselves and others work well together, especially in times of increasing complexity. We talk about hosting, because what is offered here is not a typical facilitation or moderated session:t gives attention and care to all aspects of people’s work together, intending to host them in being successful, just as any person welcoming guests will make sure they have everything they need to make their visit fruitful
The Art of Hosting takes into account the whole process – all the preparations before the participants come together, what happens while they are working together, and how the results of their conversation – the ‘harvest’ – support next steps that are coherent for their purpose and context. |
The Art of Harvesting conversations that matter
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Anyone who plants a garden is planning for results. Whether the result is a fruit or a flower, a gardener is planning for a harvest. In the same way, anyone who plans to host a meeting also wants to get a good result from their efforts. In this case, the harvest might be in the form of a project plan, or an agreement to action or a better relationship.
In the Art of Hosting community, we plan our conversation design around the harvest we want to produce. The results we are seeking help to determine what methods we use and how. We are continuing to grow our harvesting capacity and experiment with different forms of harvesting – digital images, photographic, musical, social media, multi-media, narrative – you name it! We think good harvesting is one of the most potent ways to assure that the agreements and decisions arising out of conversations that matter lead to action. |
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More Concepts & Methods Videos
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