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Stewardship and Self-Organization

  • 1.  Stewardship and Self-Organization

    Posted 10-17-1997 15:55
    Hello to all on this list.

    My name is John Dicus. I'm a recent subscriber to Mg-Ed-Dv, and I look
    forward some enlightening conversations. In the short time I've listened
    in, I've heard many good thoughts shared by the members on this list.

    Charlie Wankel invited me to post this invitation with respect to a learning
    experience we're hosting in a couple of weeks. My passion is in creating
    experiential learning opportunities that create shifts in consciousness with
    respect to leading and working in all types of organizations.

    The learning experience is entitled "Experiences in Stewardship." We
    selected this title because we seek to give people new sets of guiding
    experiences which are different from the predominant experiences associated
    with today's organizational life. For example, the lure of wielding power
    in command-and-control environments is very intoxicating and has tremendous
    influence over people -- being deeply internalized and governing behavior at
    a tacit level.

    We seek to give groups of people a new set of experiences grounded in the
    concepts of Stewardship and Servant-Leadership. When these new experiences
    become internalized and understood at a very deep level, they perform as a
    new set of guiding beliefs and behaviors. It is a powerful experience to be
    part of a collective wherein each individual is fully themselves while at
    the same time is able to be fully in service to the learning community.
    People who have shared these experiences have gone through deep shifts in
    insight and consciousness -- changing (by choice) how they believe and act
    in organizational settings.

    During "Experiences in Stewardship" we will explore the concepts of
    Stewardship in the context of Self-Organizing Systems ( -- or Living
    Organizations). We want to learn how exploring this construct will shift
    our thinking and subsequently our organizational leadership and actions. We
    don't suppose to have all the answers, but rather we propose a sound process
    and context to create a very rich learning environment for exploring our
    questions about Stewardship and Self-Organization. The gathering itself
    will take place through modeling and living the concepts while surfacing and
    rooting our insights and learnings.

    If you are interested in learning together with us -- throwing your
    questions and experience in with ours -- you are warmly invited to join us.
    The dates are November 2-5, in Hancock MA. I can send you more details if
    you wish. There is also an electronic version of the invitation at
    http://www.ourfuture.com. I've put some of the background thinking on the
    site, if that interests you.

    Please don't take this invitation as a commercial imposition. We consider
    this activity as part of our ongoing exploration into what tomorrow's
    organizations will look and feel like. And as such, we know we can't do
    this alone -- we need to do it together. We also know we can't do it all in
    our heads alone - we need to experience it as well -- in safe practice fields.

    We want to make these experiences as accessible as possible and as such try
    to set tuition costs as low as possible and still cover the expenses of
    convening. We also offer some partial scholarship help for non-profits and
    individuals.

    Thanks for the opportunity to share this with you.

    I'm also very open to suggestions any of you might have to continually
    develop and enrich this type of experiential learning.

    Warm regards,

    John Dicus

    --

    John Dicus | jdicus@ourfuture.com
    CornerStone Consulting Associates | http://www.ourfuture.com
    Building Learning Communities Through-Whole System Change
    Consulting | Facilitation | Workshops | Seminars | Speaking
    2761 Stiegler Road, Valley City OH 44280
    800-773-8017 | 330-725-2728 (fax)
    **Experiences In Stewardship Gathering - Nov 2-5 **