Success in
achieving and sustaining organizational health and balance
through the Genuine Contact™ program is dependent
on building the capacity of individuals and organizations to navigate
with change. This requires a healthy, balanced foundation for
the organization to work from as an "operating system".
It is an accurate metaphor to say that Genuine Contact provides
an operating system for a living organization. It provides patterns
of simple, elegant processes that can handle, and benefit from,
all the complexity within and outside the organization (conflict
included). Genuine Contact™ process doesn't dictate a particular
organizational culture - each organization has its own unique
culture, based on its purpose and its people - but the patterns
it provides work to invite the gifts of all the people involved
fully and effectively into engagement.
Through this
program, we equip you with simple and practical "how to"
methods, processes, and key ingredients of achieving organizational
health and balance that are duplicable throughout the organization.
The Genuine Contact™ program achieves amazing results in
working with what Stephen Covey calls the new “Whole Person
Paradigm” that is required for organizations with knowledge
and service workers to succeed.
The purpose
of the Genuine Contact™ program is to assist leaders and
organizations to achieve successful healthy and balanced organizations
creating what we refer to as the Conscious Open Space Organization.
Individual workshops
in the Genuine Contact™ program also have great benefit
taken on their own without commitment to the whole program.
What
is achieved through working with the Genuine Contact™ program?
Through its
holistic approach to business success, the Genuine Contact™
program provides an effective and quick means to access the issues
that need to be addressed in your organization, and the solutions
that need to be implemented. A participatory architecture is created
to foster a solution-focused base for your organization, achieving
results that surpass expectations. It provides a nourishing environment
in which the human spirit can flourish creatively and fulfill
its potential. Solutions come from the collective genius and passion
of the organization's existing human resources, generating the
energy to implement them in the process.
We designed
the Genuine Contact™ program with simplicity in mind, using
meetings as a catalyst to develop healthy and balanced organizations
for successful, sustainable optimum effectiveness. We chose meeting
methodologies that tap into the intellectual and intuitive wisdom
of the individuals involved, and of the whole collective. We then
identified key ingredients that needed to be in place to support
the new or enhanced way of getting work done. The resulting healthy
and balanced organization is life nurturing, working as an interconnected
learning organization. The process is organic, so every organization
brings about its own unique change from within, simultaneously
enhancing skills, capacity and competency for working with change
in our rapidly changing times.
The Genuine
Contact™ program is also a program for building the skill
and capacity within the organization to address change. It is
designed to keep external consultant involvement to a minimum,
providing training and mentoring work only so that working with
change is led from within the organization. Leaders within an
organization are taught to develop and use an operating system
in which business is conducted with genuine contact at all levels
on an ongoing basis. Upon completion of the nineteen days of training,
leaders are authorized to teach the components of the Genuine
Contact™ program to others within the organization, in an
ongoing internal process, until the new operating system is functioning
fully in a growthful, sustainable and effective way. During year
one, during and following the initial training, a consultant to
the organization coaches and mentors this "in-house"
team as the "in-house" team leads the change process
for its own organization.
Tangible
Results from using the Genuine Contact™ program include:
1. Breakthrough
learning resulting in solutions to complex challenges
2. Appropriate structure
3. Genuine community and effective communication
4. High morale and commitment
5. Spirited performance
6. Engaged involvement
7. High efficiency
8. High productivity
9. Shared leadership
10. Shared vision
11. Clear purpose
12. Growth from within
13. Elimination of barriers to doing a job quickly with excellence
and pride
14. Increased creativity including creative problem solving
15. Sustainable and renewable organizational health and energy
for further successes
16. An ability to navigate with change and take quick advantage
of the opportunities it brings
17. An environment where the creative human spirit can flourish
18. Benefits from intuitive knowledge and rational knowledge working
together in tandem
As an organization
develops greater health and balance, change in actions, behaviors
and patterns are required. More important are the changes in the
way that purpose, values, assumptions, and structure are understood
and worked with. For both individuals and organizations, growthful
change comes from deep within. For both, change uncovers our fears
of the new and unknown, yet we know that we must face the unknown
if we are to grow and flourish. In the Genuine Contact™
program, change is viewed as life nurturing rather than life depleting.
Leaders within
an organization are taught to develop and use an operating system
in which business is conducted with genuine contact at all levels
on an on-going basis. These leaders are then empowered to teach
others within the organization in an ongoing internal process
until the new operating system is functioning fully in a growthful
and effective way. This way of working is duplicable and self-replicating
throughout the organization, and is customized to suit every specific
situation.
What
is required to bring the Genuine Contact™ program into your
organization?
*
Commitment of the senior management team. Establish the
commitment of the CEO and senior managers to developing an organization
that recognizes and draws upon its workforce potential, is open,
participative, interconnected, and working to improve its learning
and capacity. The commitment of the CEO and senior managers includes:
1. a commitment
to 12-16 days of training for skill, capacity, and competency
development over a one year period of time in 4 blocks of 4 days
for an internal team chosen to implement the transformation of
the organization
2. a commitment for up to 24 days of mentoring/coaching from an
external consultant for the senior management team and for the
internal change team
3. a commitment of a number of days over the first year to working
with the consultant as the senior management team. The consultant
will work closely with the senior management team during the change
process
*
Develop an internal team to lead the change. Form an
internal team to be trained by the consultant who is authorized
in the Genuine Contact™ program. It is recommended that
this team include managers, human resource specialists, organizational
development specialists, and in the case of unionized environments,
union leaders. The maximum recommended size of this team is 35.
At the completion of the training phase, each member of this team
will be authorized as a trainer of the Genuine ContactTM program
for others within the organization. The consultant will work closely
with this internal change team during the change process. This
team will implement the transformation of the organization into
a Conscious Open Space Organization capable of navigating change
effectively and productively.
*
Orientation session and start of the change process.
The consultant takes the internal change team through a three
day process learning to do a simple diagnosis of the health and
balance of the organization. The session includes the development
of the change plan. The internal change team is coached and mentored
in working with the whole organization to begin the change process
using what is learned in the three day process. Sessions are scheduled,
according to the change plan, for training of the internal change
team for particular skill, knowledge and capacity development.
It is not necessary for the training to be in place prior to the
start of the change process.
* For
larger organizations, training can be done for the internal team
on-site. Smaller organizations may choose to arrange
to send the internal team to external training programs organized
in various locations in the world.
A statement
of values considerations for working with the Genuine Contact™
program is also available as a printed document. If you would
like a copy, please contact us with
your request.
For information about copyrights surrounding the Genuine Contact™ Program click here.
