Notes from NTL Bay Area Meetings 2003

Proposed Agenda:

We will be meeting at Tony Kortens house (Lafayette, East Bay, hm ph 925-945 1166) on Wed, 24th of September.

1:30-2:00 Welcoming with nibbles and drinks
2:00-4:00 Check-in followed by 1st Agenda
4:00-6:00 2nd Agenda
6:00-6:30 Wine/snacks then Dinner together-- whoever chooses to do so (Walnut Creek has many good restaurants).

The professional and personal topics will be:

· Frank Friedlander will a lead discussion related to Identity and Transitions.
· Personal: issues related to (our) Intimacy, led by Thoraya Halhoul
 
(More details may be sent out shortly by Frank or Thoraya)

Best wishes,
Tony 

Notes

Notes from Bay Area NTL members meeting Sept 24^th @ Tony’s house.             

 [Written up by Tony K – all mistakes, gross inaccuracies, projections and transferences are wholly attributable to someone other than me.]

Onboard: Tracy Gibbons (straight from the airport and Boston), Jack and Flo (who picked up Tracy from SFO and arrived in racing car style earlier than anticipated), Judith Noel (almost directly from her daughter’s wedding), Frank Friedlander (from his tennis match in his tennis shoes), David Bradford (from a design meeting with Carole) and Tony Kortens (arriving from cleaning the house). Craig didn’t make it because he said he only had a 1 in 10 chance of making it and we hope that didn’t mean anything about his bike riding skills … Thoraya did participate in the before-meeting design by phone, but unfortunately was not feeling well and stayed at home in her pyjamas.

Check-in: I was instructed to report that we did in fact check in, at length - and that we had many meaningful things to say …J (You had to be there).

BTW Birthday wishes to Frank who had a birthday on Sept 22.

Serious agenda stuff:  Part 1. We discussed for over an hour a two page paper that Frank had prepared on the topic of transitions, his own personal and professional transition/s etc.

See paper distributed by Frank to the mailing list.

Some sound-bites from same: Choosing to use the word transition versus retirement as an active choice, to be growing towards – rather than simply letting go of. Of the need to let go and hold on as we transition – and actively acknowledge when either action is enabling us to grow in ways that we wish to.

We spoke of our own transitions of mother-daughter to mother to married daughter, from student to prof, from non-US to US based, from sabbatical to full-time work mode, of age-based changes, from draftee to non-soldier, etc.

Part 2. Growing Intimacy in the group – the group partly linked the prior discussion on transitions to how a growing understanding of each other’s transitions and the group’s transitions influences the feeling of intimacy in the group. David introduced the notion of discovering and exploring what is “salient” to each other.

A few of my clearest recollections: of Jack’s central, poised, relaxed presence on the sofa alongside Flo sharing their recent experiences of attending a very special wedding – and the way they touched each others hands as they recounted same. David holding Jack’s hand at another related moment. Of realizing that three “Fielding folks” were sitting together and noting the differing sub-groups within the “group” e.g. Stanford, Fielding, non-Stanford/Fielding, and all the diversity variables we might choose – e.g. religious affiliation (Jewish, atheist, gender, sexual orientation, etc …) Acknowledging how the group can hold its homogeneity and heterogeneity together …. And what intimacy comes as a result of doing so ….in the process of doing so. It was commented that as the group adds members it needs to be most conscious of how its own norms are allowed to be malleable to newcomers as they transition into the group. The noted paradox is that as the group’s sub-culture grows and affords more intimacy – that it also becomes perceived to be less adaptable to newcomers. Further, Judith noted (my rough attempt at paraphrase) that the extent to which as each person can observe and articulate their own “cultural experience” of the group the more enlivened and healthy it might be.

Tracy arrived with a new edited book from Schein et al, including her own chapter on developing leaders. Book title – DEC Is Dead, Long Live DEC: The Lasting Legacy of Digital Equipment Corporation.

Announcements:

Latest Business 2.0 magazine rate Stanford B school number 1 in the USA and specifically relate the MBA touchy-feely course as a primary factor. More to come … 

Authentic Influencing courses filling really well.

Next meeting:

Nov 12 Arlene & Tom’s house (in Marin County). Topic is being developed by Arlene.

Meeting with new NTL president (Margaret Tyndall), 1800 hrs, Oct 30^th, @ David’s house in Berkeley

Future meeting dates: Dec 17^th, Jan 28^th.

Directions to Tony's

We will be meeting at Frank Friedlander's place [meeting co-sponsored with

Craig Schuler] on Wed, 6th of August. As usual, we will convene around 1:30

for coffee and dessert with our session running from 1-6. [With those

after wants who want to, going out for dinner].

Two Items on our agenda:

First <<Co-Facilitator-Lanz.doc>>  half of the meeting will be on

"co-trainer issues we have faced." [This can be co-training in a T-group or

co-training in a consulting engagement including between internal and

external consultants]. We will share our difficult experiences, discuss how

they can be handled and see if we can draw some generalizations. In

preparation, you might be interested in this paper written by two of our

advanced Stanford Facilitators.

Second half led by Jack will discuss the proposition: "In an intimate

relationship, each partner has an obligation to affirm the other."

See you there. Should be fun.

David

Notes

Notes from Our Meeting of 8-6-03

 We had a well-attended and interesting meeting at Frank Friedlander’s home in Mountain View.  Attending were (in circular order as seated) David Bradford, Scott Bristol, Carole Robin, Judith Noel, Frank Friedlander, Craig Schuler, Mai Vu, Thoraya Halhoul, Flo Hoylman, Jack Sherwood, and Tracy Gibbons.

The first item discussed was the start time for our meetings.  For this meeting, various emails led folks to believe that the start time was either 12:30 pm, 1:00 pm, or 1:30 pm.  Let it hereby be known, from this day forward, that the schmoozing phase of our meetings will begin at 1:30 pm, with the “formal” phase running from 2:00 pm to 6:00 pm.  It is also customary for some folks to go out to dinner afterward.

There was also mention (by Scott?) of a book titled Emotions Revealed, by Paul Ekman.  This book makes the case that expressions of feelings are not simply culturally specific.  You can read some reviews of this book at the following website: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0805072756/qid%3D1061332702/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/002-8051818-0285604.

 Carole then offered the idea that our group might together make a gesture of support for Julie Noolan, who has breast cancer.  We decided to take up a collection for an “NTL Scholarship” that will be offered, with Julie’s name, to a Bay Area facilitator who can use the money to help them attend an NTL lab.  If you would like to contribute, please contact Carole at CaroleR@AOL.com.

The last, up-front, logistical note is that we now have a website, courtesy of Scott, at www.LJMap.com/NTLBayArea/.  The site contains meeting schedules, group norms, meeting notes, an email list, and more.

The “formal” phase of this meeting began with a check-in by all eleven participants, with each person talking for about 5 minutes about one or more notable things going on in their lives.  These check-ins are usually quite “meaty”, and this check-in definitely was.

From approximately 3:00 pm to 4:30 pm, David facilitated this meeting’s “professional” topic, namely co-training issues.  Regarding our discussion process, we discussed the impacts of framing the discussion in various ways, such as the differences between telling “war” stories vs “success” stories.  As for the discussion content, we covered a lot of ground, including such topics as: types of pairings (peer to peer, external consultant to internal staff, etc.); when one of the trainers has lower status or power or self-confidence; different styles (intra-personal, inter-personal, etc.); different cognitive frameworks (therapy, t-group, etc.); different values and beliefs.  There was also discussion of the types of up-front conversations that co-trainers can have in order to surface and appreciate such differences.

 After a short break, Jack facilitated the “personal” topic, which was a discussion of the premise that in an intimate relationship, each party should understand and accept the responsibility to enhance the self-esteem of the other [party].  There was discussion of how “enhancing your partner’s self-esteem” is similar-to/different-from “supporting your partner”.  Participants offered personal examples of self-esteem-enhancing behaviors both from their personal lives and from their relationships with others at this meeting.  The premise being discussed is actually the second of three that Jack and Flo proposed in a letter to their children and their children’s spouses.  The third premise is to abandon your agenda for changing the other.  This third premise was also discussed, along with some challenging counter examples.

 Also during the meeting, there was some discussion about the participants’ interests in making our discussions a bit more t-group-like, at times, by using our here-and-now processes and interactions as additional material to include in our topical discussion.  This has been discussed in some previous meetings, and will likely get some attention in the future.  The general attitude of the participants seemed to include some openness to trying more of this, trusting each of us to initiate such a focus when it seems helpful.

 Upcoming meetings include:

• Sep 24 at Tony Korten’s

• Nov 12 at Arlene and Ted Scott’s

• Dec 17 at Carole Robin’s

• Jan 28 at a location TBD

On September 24, the professional and personal topics will be:

• Professional: issues related to Consulting vs Training, led by Octave Baker

• Personal: issues related to (our) Intimacy, led by Thoraya Halhoul

• As a backup for September 24 (or a future date), Frank Friedlander may lead discussions related to Identity, for both the professional and personal halves of the meeting.

Notes by Craig Schuler

Our next Bay Area NTL meeting will be Tuesday [not Wednesday], June 24th at

David's house. [Directions Attached].

We will assemble 1:30ish for coffee and dessert.

2:00 Our meeting

-- our initial check-in

-- David will [briefly] describe new training activities planned for the Bay

Area [6 Authentic Influencing Labs for the next year]

-- Professional Aspect -- Arlene will lead us in an interesting session

where each of us is to bring a training/consulting dilemma problem for the

rest of us to discuss (and learn from) how we might handle it. Doesn't have

to be a present one, but an issue that we found challenging.

-- [After our break] the Personal Aspect in which we decide on an issue that

we have some energy on [often it arises from our check-in]

-- wine and cheese

-- and those who want to, go out for dinner afterwards.

Please let me know if you can make it. Should be great fun.

David

p.s. The following meeting is August 6th at Frank's house

We had another interesting meeting at David's house -- the group was Arlene,
Craig, David, Flo, Jack, Joe, Octave, Scott & Tracy. 

Arlene facilitated the first half of the afternoon's discussion around the
interconnected topics of what is therapy and what is T-grouping? And how
does that related to discussion of `there and then' [often family of origin
issues] that come up in a T-group? [especially in the Weekend in the
Stanford course.]  We agreed that experiences could be therapeutic without
being therapy and that T-groups and therapy could deal with the same
content, but in a very different way.  In terms of the last, we discussed
how a trainer and a therapist would handle the same incident in very
different ways [and maybe seek different outcomes.]

After a break, we picked up an issue that had been discussed a couple of
sessions previously about "how has doing this work [consulting and training]
influenced the sort of relationships that we want socially?"  We talked
about how much does one move toward "being authentic" and what are some of
the issues with that?

The next meeting will be August 6th at Frank's house [co-hosted with Craig].
We will start at 1:30 with coffee and dessert with the meeting from 2-6
[with those who want to, going out for dinner afterwards.]  Please let Frank
know if you can make it.

The agenda:

First half -- professional. David will facilitate a discussion on Issues in
the co-training role.  Two of our advanced facilitators, Giovanna Gherardi &
Lanz Lowen, have written a very interesting paper on co-training [that we
will send out shortly].  That will be a kick-off to our taking this issue
where we want it to go such as what sort of co-trainer issues have we faced?
How do you work with a person with very different styles?  What issues do
you bring to the group vs. work outside? etc.

Second half -- personal.  Jack will lead a discussion on the proposition: "I
believe we each have a responsibility actively to enhance the self-esteem of
our spouse or significant other."  Do you agree?  Issues in how to do this?
etc.

Notes by David Bradford

March 12th Meeting

We had another interesting meeting at Carole Robin's house in Palo Alto. In

attendance were: Octave Baker, Freeman Barnes, David Bradford, Scott

Bristol, Frank Friedlander, Flo Hoylman, Tony Kortens, Judith Noel, Craig,

Schuler, Arlene & Ted Scott, and Jack Sherwood.

Based on a couple of articles that Tony and Octave had sent out earlier, we

started off with a rich discussion about Appreciate Inquiry as both an

intervention and as a philosophy. We discussed what it wasn't and how it is

being misused to stand for any positive questioning. In terms of

intervention, we concluded it should be used mainly for major change within

an organization feels stuck in negativity. We concluded by briefly exploring

how A.I. might be applied to specific T-group situations.

For the second, more personal, half of the session, rather than having a

pre-assigned topic, we decided to see what was "up" for members. The areas

we covered:

* [Especially for those of us who are older], how do we feel about

what we have (and haven't) accomplished and what sort of legacy did we want

to leave?

* What sort of choices and trade-offs have we made and how do we feel

about them?

* How has working in T-groups effected the sort of relationships we

have [many of us expressed boredom with superficial relationship which

limited the nature and number of friends].

* Did we hold back from confronting friends when they did something

that bothered us? If so, why did we (given that we have skills in how to

raise difficult issues)? Out of that discussion came the challenge, before

the next meeting, to raise risky, but important issues that were blocking

friendships.

A

ll of these felt more personal and self-disclosing than we had been before.

That raised the question of what norms did we want. It has been some time

since we discussed our norms and we have 6 new members so it was decided

that should be an agenda item for next time.

[We also decided to start an hour later and run from 1:30 to 6:00 which made

it easier for those who wanted to go out to dinner together as well as

decreased traffic for those who needed to leave.]

Notes by David Bradford

Our Bay Area NTL meeting on Wed. Feb. 5th will by at my house (Flo and

Jack's kitchen is being torn apart). Attached are directions. (And can you

let me know if you are coming).

Our proposed agenda is two-fold.

-- We will assemble around 12:30 for coffee and cake

-- Start at 1:00

-- do quick "check-ins" on what has been happening to us

-- Review the Authentic Influencing workshop that has just been completed

(to help with new ideas for the April program)

and after a break

-- talk about clinical issues in T-groups; how to spot them, prevent them

and deal with them.

Hope you can make it. The last one at the Scotts was quite rewarding.

David

We had one of our best meetings thus far. Attending were Frank, Scott, Flo,

Jack, Judith, Carole, Tony, Ted, Craig and joined by Freeman Barnes who is

moving to the Bay Area!

We started with Scott debriefing us on the first Authentic Influencing

workshop held January 26th-31st down at Chaminade. We discussed the various

innovations (including having participants come with prework and also doing

follow-up consultation). The lab went very well even though, unfortunately,

it didn't fill [other NTL programs have also had trouble in January and

February), but there were enough participants for one group. We talked

about whether the restricted attendance wad due to the time of year, the

focus of the program or the length (with managers being increasingly

reluctant to be away for a week). [The next A.I program is going to

experiment with a shorter venue and a slightly different design.] One

conclusion was that it is too early to make any definite decisions and this

program may take time for the momentum to build up.

The second half of the meeting was around the type of trainer style that is

needed for a lab dealing with authentic behavior. That it requires more

self-disclosure (and even vulnerability) on the part of the trainer than is

common with the more traditional NTL style. Each of us talked about ways

that we bring ourselves to the group and how we would handle various

situations. In fact, the discussion became so involving, we went past our

usual 5:00 break time and over wine & cheese continued the discussion until

6:30.

The other characteristic of the evening is that we became more personal in

our interactions with each other with a couple of incidents of people

calling each other on their behavior. As is true in a T-group, this

deepened the level of conversation making it more personal and more

rewarding.

The next meeting will be March 12th at Carole Robin's house. Directions and

agenda will follow. But mark your calendar.

David