How does it work?
Just as what we see of an iceberg is only the tip, so there is much more to creating an effective conversational process than meets the eye. Art of Hosting practitioners spend dedicated time at the beginning of any process to help the event holder get very clear about the purpose, select and support a great hosting team, design a compelling invitation and prepare both the space and the participants.
Next, attention shifts to designing the intervention itself. What kind of conversation is needed? How have participants been involved up to now? What do they know and what do they need to know? What will make this a conversation that really matters and leads to worthwhile results? The flow of the time together and the blending of processes creates the conditions for people to participate well together.
The Hosting Team looks carefully at which methods might work best and when. They create a conversational flow that will help people get to know each other, be clear about why this topic matters to them, listen carefully to informational inputs and each other, work together on meeting their challenges and taking hold of opportunities and leave clear about what will happen next.
During the event itself, the Hosting Team helps to guide the process, support those who are giving informational inputs and, especially, help the group understand what it is uncovering as it works together. This is called harvesting, the targeted capture of what a group produces together – as notes, a document, graphic recording, video, pictures or through social media: whichever form is appropriate.
One of the most important results of a group working well together is its collective sense-making. The Art of Hosting creates the conditions that allow conversation-driven processes to lead groups into deeper insights and meaningful results. The more people participate in these kinds of well-hosted conversation, the greater becomes their capacity to participate in and contribute to wise and effective collective action.
More about the methodologies we use …
I have been facilitating groups for over 30 years, but the Art of Hosting provided a new approach to engaging people around their most cherished values and working together for the common good.
Not just any talk is conversation
Not any talk raises consciousness
good conversation has an edge
It opens your eyes to something
It quickens your ears and
good conversation reverberates
It keeps on talking in your mind later in the day;
The next day, you find yourself
still conversing with what was said
The reverberation afterward
is the very raising of consciousness
Your mind and heart have been moved
Your are at another level with your reflections.