(1) Feedback
from the Trinidad Class: Using the Danilo Sirias' Method to Find Needs, Audrey
Taylor
NETWORKING
(2) A TOCFE Weather Forecast for the Following
Week, Philip
Bakker
(3) Sharing, Carlos Perelman
(4) Good News from Israel, Gila Glatter
EDITORS’
NOTE
(5) Kay Buckner-Seal, Cheryl A.
Edwards
(1) Feedback
from the Trinidad Class: Using The Danilo Sirias' Method to Find Needs
From
Audrey Taylor
The Global Bank of TOCFE: This
case study so exemplifies what can happen (synchronism?) when you share ideas.
—Kathy Suerken
The class practiced the day to day clouds, and
found, as all classes do, how difficult it can be to discover the needs,
especially the valid needs of the “other side.” Carol, one of the teachers in the room, developed a wonderful
conflict, which she allowed the class to use to demonstrate how to find the
needs from the conflict.
Her conflict involved a remodeling job. She wanted a contractor to do the job, while
her husband wanted to do the job by himself.
The conflict was:
A: (Our shared common objective) To ensure our home is secure
B: (My Need) To have a job well done in
the most efficient way; a sharp
roof,
fewer headaches
D: (My want) To have a contractor
C: (The other side’s need) To save
money, to in control, personal
satisfaction from his involvement
D’ (The other side’s want) To do it
himself with his work team
What is our conflict?
D’: My husband does the work
At the International
Conference for TOC for Education in Monterrey, Mexico, Danilo Sirias spoke on
the last day about methods to determine the needs in the cloud by using a
simple process. Danilo suggested that
the advantages and the disadvantages of “D” be listed. The common theme running through the
advantages is “D” and the common theme running through the opposite of the
disadvantages is “C.”
At my husband, Sears Taylor's, insistence, we used
Danilo's technique for discovering the needs in the cloud. The whole class listed the advantages and
disadvantages of using a contractor to do the redecoration work on Carol’s
house. The list follows:
Advantages: |
Job well done |
Efficient |
Less time |
Job finished |
No money wasted |
Less money spent on restaurants |
Less problems |
Less cooking |
Trouble-free construction |
Stress-free construction |
|
Disadvantages: |
More money |
No control |
Stranger in “My” house |
Trust problems due to strangers in my house |
More drinking |
More talking |
Less production |
Poor quality |
Risky |
Efficient |
Economic job |
The advantages were summarized as, Stress Free
Construction. The opposite of the
disadvantages was summarized as Quality, Risk-Free Construction. Carol stated that using this method of
finding “C” was very helpful and gave her insight into her husband’s viewpoint,
which she had not previously had. The
rest of the class agreed. Danilo’s
discovery really helped. It is a nice
addition to the TOC tool-bag. The
process also unveils the assumptions. This
is a real break-through! We love it
Danilo!
A: (Our shared common objective) To
ensure our home is secure
B: (My Need) Stress-free construction
D: (My want) To have a contractor
C: (The other side’s need) Quality,
risk-free construction
D’ (The other side’s want) To do it
himself with his work team
The
final cloud, which resulted, is a simpler, and I believe clearer picture of the
conflict. Danilo's tool really helped!
Thanks, Danilo, for putting your idea into the
global bank of TOCFE while it was still in development; thank you, Sears, for
taking the idea and trying it in a new situation; thanks to Carol and the
entire Trinidad class for using Danilo's idea to learn and letting us enjoy
your TOC work; and a special bouquet to Audrey for caring enough to allow the
rest of us to learn from the synergy of that
experience shared through the written word! —Kathy
(2) A TOCFE Weather Forecast for
the Following Week
By Philip Bakker, Netherlands
"Some heavy clouds will appear but they will evaporate
just as fast as they appeared. After
that bright days are expected."
(3) Sharing
I have got a beautiful
letter from Carlos Perelman who attended the Monterrey Conference. He teaches business management at Pan
American University. With his
permission, we all can enjoy reading it and go on developing new ideas for
e-learning on TOC tools. — Cheryl A. Edwards
Dear Gila,
Thank you for conveying your wonderful warm
feelings. I also felt myself at home
sharing with all the delegations at the Conference in Monterrey. This feeling of "brotherhood", as
you call it, probably comes from all of us sharing the same values, the same
goals and the same strategies. It's as
if we had known each other forever. And
probably the TOC philosophy has a lot to do with it!
Can we learn something from this marvelous
experience in Monterrey? At the very
least, it provides evidence that TOC is in essence a universal language for
genuine humane communication, and so it also provides evidence that our daily
efforts in building a better society (by teaching and using the TOC tools and
philosophy) are indeed worthwhile!
I understand very well what you mean when you say
you are looking into the "dark" in reference to the internet as a
tool for teaching TOC. If you see a
light out there, please share it with me.
Obvious advantages for internet usage would
include:
• quality preservation
in the spreading of the TOC knowledge, and
• efficiency for
reaching a large audience.
I don't think major obstacles for using the
internet to spread TOC are technical, and less so in "high tech"
Israel. Obstacles (in my perspective)
stem from my belief that TOC must be learnt by doing, by "hands on"
experience (learning to swim by jumping into the water), by group role playing,
by learning from others' experiences in a group, and by principle learning
through challenging of assumptions and group feedback. I still don't know how to do that with the
internet, or in a one-to-one presentation.
If you will agree with me, TOC is in essence a
tool that allows a group of people (an organization, if you prefer) to live in
peace with itself, its parts and its environment. And so, by teaching it in isolation to "individuals,"
out of context of the organizations to which they belong and out of personal
contact with other students and a class facilitator (teacher), we will not
improve our current "organizational improvement" success ratio, and
will probably decrease current individual learning experience, as provided in
the traditional classroom.
Hope we can find a creative injection to this
cloud: internet usage vs. not internet
usage. It should be something in the direction of
grounding the following flying pig:
"TOC learning and usage is spread in a consistent, efficient and
fast way." One way of grounding
this injection would be to find a way for the internet to provide a full
fledged group learning experience (as could probably be achieved through a very
sophisticated "virtual reality" machine geared to provide such a
group learning experience), rather than just providing a more traditional
personal and lonely internet learning experience.
If you find such a high tech virtual reality
machine capable of being distributed through the internet for group distance
learning, our pig would be grounded!
Good luck in your search. Please share any developments with me!
Carlos Perelman
(4) Good News from Israel
Yesterday, Vardit Wiesboym and I gave a workshop
to a group of middle and high schoolteachers.
It was held in Jerusalem, as a preparation day for the school
opening. It was a great workshop! In 2 hours we have succeeded to bring the
participants (about 70 people) to be highly involved in analyzing content texts
in different subjects and domains.
Feeling great light and insight, they can begin using the cloud as a
tool in their lessons. We prepared the
buy-in details and the "luck" was reached... we are professionals in what we are caring
so much about, and in what we put so much work thinking about... experience and
time mean a lot in POOGI.
Next week I'm going to lead a group of teachers’
teachers in Mofet Institute (an institute for the teachers' teachers). For 4 days we are going to work on TOC
tools. I just received a call from the
institute asking me to allow 2 more people to attend. The maximum number of people usually allowed is 20. Of course, I agreed.
I'm so proud of the good reputation we are gaining all over, I hope I'll have the intelligence to keep it along our long journey...
Best to you,
Gila
(5) Kay Buckner-Seal, Cheryl A.
Edwards
Word has it that the site of the 5th
Annual TOCFE Conference has been determined. Since Cheryl and I have sworn to secrecy; we can’t tell. However, we can give you a few clues. OK, let’s put it this way, Lily Tomlin would
be so very pleased that this site was chosen.
In fact, she would probably ask Madonna to fly home to entertain us
while visiting family! Is that “clue”
enough? Let us know.
We welcome your input. If you would like to share with us, send hyperlink to: <bucknek@resa.net>
or
<redwards@sault.com>.
Or, you may send it by
mail to:
Cedarville, MI 49719 USA