Mark McKergow's Blog (29)

You may have read something about the Solution Focused approach, perhaps even tried it out… but how to get first-class learning in applying SF thinking and practice to your work?  Mark McKergow’s latest online course, SF Business Professional, is starting on 15 September 2012.  Run in association with…

The J-SOL 5 conference in Kyoto, Japan was a huge success.  Read my illustrated report on the event at http://www.sfwork.com/pdf/J-SOL5report.pdf.

Steps to an ecology of conversation

An exploration of the word and the world

with Nora Bateson

with

Mark McKergow (Centre for Solutions Focus at Work)

Greg Fisher (Synthesis)

Cath Greenwood (Unicorn Theatre)

Alex Steele…

Last year I was lucky enough to be lead facilitator at the TED Fellows Collaboratorium event in New Orleans (link).  The event was to bring together the brilliant young TED Fellows group with coaches and mentors, working on real issues in quite large groups – something of a facilitational challenge. As part of my role I wrote a facilitators’…

It’s ten years to the day since the first edition of The Solutions Focus book was published.  I’ll always remember 8 February 2002 – because it was the first day of the SOL 2002 conference, the first of the astounding series of SOLWorld events over the past decade.  So, it’s a good moment to look back on…

I was very honoured to be asked by Heike Schemmel to host a discussion group on the 'evolution of SF Theory' at the recent EBTA conference in Dresden, October 2011.  The invited participants alongside me were Gale Miller, Rayya Ghul and Kirsten Dierolf.   Also participating were Michael Durrant, Michael Hjerth, Carey Glass, Jenny Clarke, Bertil Andersson,  Wolfgang Gaiswinkler, Klaus Schenck and Aviva Suskin-Holmqvist.

I have had the session transcribed.  You can read it by clicking…

Thirteen intrepid coaches, consultants and managers joined me on the first online SF Professional course this summer.  Running online in conjunction with the University of Milwaukee Wisconsin (with its historic links to Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg), the programme featured sixteen weeks of readings,…

This year saw the TENTH international SOLWorld conference!  It’s all come a long way from the initial plans of a few people (including me) in the Hatchet pub, Bristol in 2000 to hold a meeting for anyone interested in applying Solution Focused ideas to organisational work.

This year we were beside Lake Balaton, Hungary in the delightful setting of the Grand Hotel Anna.  Over 120 people from 23 countries gathered to share and build SF practice in organisations, including people from…

Discussion at the 1st International Workshop on Complexity and Real World Applications, Botleigh Grange Hotel, Southampton, 21-23 July 2010

Present: Mark McKergow, Ed Olsen, Eileen Conn, Stefanos Michiotis, Martin Reynolds and…

At the recent 'SF summit' gathering in Malmo (see my report at

http://tinyurl.com/3xttyus), Gale Miller suggested that we start playing the game of 'fantasy academic centre'.

It works like this: Suppose that someone has given us $10 million to set up an multi-disciplinary academic centre, probably based at a university, to produce excellent and provocative material in support of the 'SF paradigm' - the framework within which our…

We were honoured to have Professor Daniele Moyal-Sharrock join us in Bucharest as a plenary speaker. Daniele is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Hertfordshire, UK, and one of the world's leading Wittgenstein scholars. She is also President of the British Wittgenstein Society (http://www.britishwittgensteinsociety.herts.ac.uk/).

Daniele presented her paper Coming to Language:…

The 2010 SOLWorld conference was held last week in Bucharest, Romania. I have just returned from an exciting, thought-provoking and exhausting few days, and wanted to jot down a few thoughts about it all.

The event was held in two adjoining hotels (the Ramada Parc and Ramada Plaza) – this worked very well, with a big plenary room in one and nice workshops rooms in the other. We met on Wednesday evening for a buffet meal – always so many people to say hello and reconnect…

I have just completed a very interesting online course (four 3-hour sessions over two weeks) in Holacracy – an exciting new way of organising. I use the verb ‘organising’ carefully here, as one of the most interesting aspects of Holacracy is the way it embraces continuous change and movement, with careful language and structured processes that embrace and utilise the change that’s inevitably happening.



Holacracy (the word comes from holarchy, not holistic or holon) is described as…

UPDATE January 2010 - Alistair has posted his comments on SF and how to use punchier language at http://alistair.cockburn.us/Solutions+Focus+aka+Delta+Method. Go and check it out, and see my comments there.

As you will probably know, I enjoy meeting people who have led developments in other field which seem to have some resonance or connection with SF practice. (See the Karlstad Group section of the site…