CoCreation

I have found conflict to be inevitable – with most of us choosing the fight or flight pattern. I have also found that conflict can be transforming if we surrender to it in humility and hope.

Conflict is a vital and healthy part of life. It is where supposedly incompatible perspectives, values, and desires compete for control. It is apparent in both our inner and outer world – internal and relational conflict often overwhelms our lives and the world we live in. Our orientation toward judgment and dysfunctional patterns fuels our fight or flight response.

Conflict is vital for empowerment. Successful collaboration embraces conflict in an attempt to meet the needs of everyone. In the context of awareness, communication, and agreement, conflict can be transfomed  for win/win solutions and co-creative synergy.

Conflict Transformation

The mediation model is designed as a collaborative approach to problem solving. In contrast to the win/lose approach of competition and litigation, mediation moves beyond compromise to craft solutions where everyone’s values are repected and needs are met. The process incorporates conscious communication and participatory decision making principles:

1. Identify the problem – with respect of everyone’s perspective without evaluation
2. Clarify the issues – with exploration of all aspects
3. Generate options – with priorities and creative solutions that meet everyone’s need
4. Negotiate resolution – with clarity of agreement

I find the mediation process to easily be incorporated in conscious communication and is inherent in the process of Sociocracy.

Agreement is an area I have often found elusive – with relationships ranging from unspoken expectations to formalized contracts, with a vast disconnect between. As part of our struggle to communicate, I have found clear agreement to be a challenge not to be overlooked.

Agreement is the foundation that must be laid for relationships and organization to be built upon. Without clear agreement we only have personal expectation and assumption to guide the process. Graceful agreement is another prerequisite for successful collaboration. The following law and principles are taken from The Book of Agreement: 10 Essential Elements for Getting the Results You Want by Stuart Levine. You can find the 10 Elements of Agreement are here.

LAW OF AGREEMENT

Collaboration is established in language by making implicit (talking to yourself about what you think the agreement is)  and explicit (discussing the agreement with others) agreements.

PRINCIPLES OF AGREEMENT

1. The source of productivity and fulfillment in personal and professional relationships is effective collaboration.  The more seamless the collaboration, the stronger the results.
2. We work and live in a “sea” (context) of agreement.
3. We never learned the essential elements of an effective  agreement.
4. Clear agreements are empowering.  They express a shared vision and a road map to desired results.
5. Clear agreements improve the chances for satisfaction.  They set up the conditions that produce delighted clients, customers, teammates, colleagues, vendors, and family members.
6. Practice enables you to craft masterful agreements.
7. Collaboration and agreement for results is simple, but it is not easy.  It requires thoughtfulness and clear thinking on the front end, before you move into action, and a commitment to get through conflicts.
8. No matter how clear and complete the agreement, everything will not be addressed–conflicts and differences will arise that you must be prepared to resolve.
9. Breakdowns are not a cause for alarm; they are to-be-expected opportunities for creativity.
10. Resolving conflicts leads to new agreements.

Establishing Agreement

I use the Blueprint of We as a collaborative process for building agreement. The process and components provide a creative structure to continue to cultivate interpersonal awareness and conscious communication, and paves the way for ongoing dialogue, decision making, and conflict transformation. It provides a clear path to custom design your relational and organizational container, establish authenticity, clarify agreements, navigate conflict, and determine time frames.

Decision making, as part of a group process, has been a fascination and frustration in my journey. I have struggled in meeting with decisions based on one (or even the majority) perspective. I have also struggled in meetings with that decision, based in a consensus model, coming from the person (or minority) that is least accommodating. Along the way, I have been thrilled to find tools that empower everyone’s voice and harness the creative synergy of the group.

Participatory decision making is a requirement for collaboration. It is built on the foundation of agreement and in the context of interpersonal awareness and conscious communication. It is the dynamic process of a co-creative path.

I have worked with a variety of decision making models and have found the consent based process of Sociocracy (AKA Dynamic Governance) to be the most efficient in my experience. In contrast to autocratic or democratic models, it involves the voice of everyone to guide solutions that meet all needs. In contrast to consensus, it does not seek uniform agreement but solutions based on resolved objection, the sweet spot where our range of tolerances overlap. In contrast to other models, sociocracy cultivates equivalence and empowerment of all rather than the “power over” created by the leader, the majority, or the minority.

The decision making process of Sociocracy cultivates the “rule of the socios”, those in relation to to one another.