We Can Do This!: 10 Tools to Unleash Our Collective Genius, Paperback

Contributor(s):

• Author: Kate R. Sutherland

Something is trying to be born. We can feel it. The old ways of the industrial growth society are crumbling, and the new ways of a life-sustaining civilization are emerging like grass through cracks in the concrete.

Everything we need is already here.

We Can Do This is about unleashing our immense potential by harnessing the power of group work through tried-and-true frameworks for working together better.

What is group work? Hold in your mind, if you will, the soul-nourishing quality of a barnraising, the A-ha's accessed only through deep conversation, or the exhilarating joy of a team in creative flow.

The transformative magic of being in relationship, of collaborating and actively working together to achieve big goals is not only not new, but it's also the answer to how we move forward, as a society and a species.

Our deepest ailment is our disconnectedness, from self, each other and Life. The challenges we face are too complex for our old lone wolf and heroic leader strategies.

We Can Do This10 Tools to Unleash Our Collective Genius provides a roadmap for how we can leverage the power of the group to intervene in our stuck systems.

How does the book work?

We Can Do This works at multiple levels to foster transformation. The book:

1. Empowers you and others with the perspectives and distilled wisdom of 10 key frameworks used by professional facilitators and consultants. Applicable at all scales -- from self to system -- these frameworks are relevant to people from all walks of life, including leaders, change agents, entrepreneurs, bureaucrats, managers, consultants, coaches, frontline workers, teachers, parents...
2. Gives groups and teams shared language and ways of navigating through the frustrations and challenges of working with other humans.
3. Supports our personal growth and development, and especially bringing us into greater alignment with what is most alive in us, and
4. Brings it all together into a tidy package that is highly shareable so we can leverage our networks to get these tools into the hands of many many more people -- and grow a movement to revolutionize how we work together.

All these levels are important and mutually reinforcing.

More about the book

More specifically, the book introduces a complementary set of 10 frameworks:

• Appreciative Inquiry
• Chaordic Design
• Generative Dialogue
• Adaptive Cycle
• Enterprise Facilitation
• Theory U
• Process Oriented Psychology
• Integral Theory
• Systemic Constellations
• Conscious Co-Creation

Each framework is summarized from the perspective of what is most useful in the field: the framework in a nutshell, its origin, a story of the framework in action, how it applies at the personal level, finer points, possible pitfalls and finally key questions as a short cut to drawing out the insights of that framework. Icons support the reader to see connections between the different frameworks.

The tools offer complementary perspectives and pointers, each focused on different aspects of how humans are together. Just as carpenters need hammers, screwdrivers, measuring tape, drills, sandpaper and so on, no one tool can do it all, but all together they support effective action.