>>Replying to LO4918 --Ron Dickson quotes then states;
>>In discussing which metaphors are best suited to communicating with general
>>managers, jzavacki@epix.net wrote:
>>snip...
>>Albeit complexity and chaos theory are beyond the perceived needs of most
>>of my clients, it is still necessary to use "their" language to describe
>>"my" ideas in order to make them think they thought them up and
>>consequently get their support for work important to change in the domain
>>of relevance.
>I hope never to be in a position of working for a general manager with
>such an overweening need to conscript the ideas of other. Having entered
>the cycle of using words to manipulate others into thinking a certain, it
>is very hard to back out of it again. And if the change is to be
>sustained within the organization, the change in thinking must be genuine,
>not based on the consultant's verbal finesse. Otherwise, the burden of
>organizational manipulation is merely transferred from the manager to the
>consultant.
Ron,
Have you ever wanted to get a new idea across to someone who doesn't seem to
know why it's important to "get" the new idea?
As you know, it's better to express the idea in a language that person will
understand rather than use the "new" language.
We accept change more readily if we can understand it in terms we're already
familiar with. The consultant's challenge is not to "verbally finesse" the
client, rather find the language that communicates something new and
different in terms the client will UNDERSTAND. The method that works best
is called---the Socratic Method. No, not the stand-up-and
I'll-embarass-you-by-your-ignorance-style portrayed by some law school
movies. Rather, the method I'm still learning has the one who knows, guide
the one who needs to discover by asking questions...leading them to
understand for themselves so it becomes their idea.
There is an excellent book on developing this quality for executive
management called, _Enlightened Leadership_, published in Colorado. I
loaned my copy out and never saw it again otherwise I'd give a complete
bibliographical reference.
-- Ginger Shafer The Leadership Dimension "Bringing Leadership to Life" vshafer@azstarnet.com