Group items tagged

the shared Christian story during the Renaissance

Church, artists, businesses and consumers all contributed to the great rebirth of culture

largely driven by the church and government institutions which we don’t necessarily want to recreate, right?

So how do we achieve the same effect?

The answer is sacred content.

I adopt what I believe in, and if the content is sacred, then it is beyond question.

An authority has determined these are sacred and therefore worthy

The Authority establishes a values framework, a ruling hierarchy directs and stewards the sacred content, and a host of intermediaries that carry it out to the faithful consumers.

We now have a strong distrust of authority, which has lost all legitimacy:

All around us there’s a collapse of the legitimacy of authorities, with much cynicism from the population. There’s never been a greater need for sacred content that can be trusted and deemed legitimate. How to achieve it without authorities? This is where we have to pivot our minds. We have to replace the dynamics of its creation within the authority with something else. This slide suggests an alternative:

We can create a values framework using collaborative culture techniques like community mythology projects. Out of these come sacred content that is legitimate because we created it according to shared values and a collective conscience. We have to put in place processes and rituals to establish, enshrine and communicate it.

healthy amount of heated discussion, even arguing.

not feel so judged

become defensive and shut down

deliberative discourse

“Argue. Discuss. Argue. Discuss.”

It refers to participative and collaborative (but not critique-free) communication.

Multiple positions and views are expressed with a shared understanding that everyone is focused on a common goal. There is no hierarchy. It’s not debate because there are no opposing sides trying to “win.” Rather, it’s about working together to solve a problem and create new ideas.

Here are five key rules of engagement that we’ve found to yield fruitful sessions and ultimately lead to meaningful ideas.

creating a space where everyone can truly contribute.

“Yes, AND”

“no, BECAUSE.”

if you’re going to say no, you better be able to say why.

We conduct ethnographic research to inform our intuition, so we can understand people’s needs, problems, and values.

accountable to something other than our own opinions, and it means we can push back on colleagues’ ideas without getting personal.

We curate teams to create diversity

bring different ways of looking at the world and solving problems to the table.

Argument is productive for us because everyone knows that we’re working toward a shared goal.

The statement of purpose establishes the rules: It reminds us that we are working together to move the ball down the field. As much as we may argue and disagree, anything that happens in the room counts toward our shared goal. This enables us to argue and discuss without hurting one another.

Deliberative discourse is a form of play, and for play to yield great ideas, we have to take it seriously.