Practice #4 of 8 Create Practice Fields
You would not expect a sports team to be successful if the players only showed up for the match. You would not expect a theatre group or an orchestra to perform their act without rehearsal.
Yet when it comes to learning – this is what happens in most organisations. They do not practice how to learn.
A key part of the infrastructure in learning organisations is to create what Peter Senge refers to as “practice fields”. Practice fields are not classrooms for passive learners.
Practice fields are places where people practice doing whatever it is that they want to do well, making mistakes, reflecting, stopping and trying again.
Practice fields are essential in complex environments filled with unknown unknowns, environments where knowing is impossible no matter the level of expertise (prior learning) available. In complex environments, you need to learn in real time.
The best way to do this is to create practice fields where you can engage in safe-to-fail experiments, learn on the go, amplify what works well and dampen what does not.
Practice Field Case Study
In April 2020, I joined the Originize Project as a practice field for higher level dialogue skills. The founding premise of the Originize Project is that the uncertainty engendered by the pandemic highlights a shortcoming in traditional approaches to sense-making, problem solving and decision-making.
Through Originize, I work with two peer groups of eight members. Participants engage in “leaderless” and purposeful dialogue where the agenda emerges from what the participants bring to the room.
Participants report that attendance at the meetings engenders a sense of calm and heightened energy. They note that by practicing dialogue skills in their other day-to-day work, they amplify their service and impact. They observe that their self-awareness is sharper and that their capacity to be effective in complex situations is enhanced.
I believe that “emergent facilitation” is a practical and relevant skillset in environments that are marked by complexity, a fast pace, and a sense of urgency.
Originize is an excellent example of a practice field and potentially a great starting point for you. Learn more here.
Practice #3 – Become Bi-cultural
Practice #2 – Start with Ripe Issues
Practice #1- Integrate Learning and Working
Read about the Five Disciplines of Learning Organisations
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