Session 1: Introduction to Theory U
Session 2: The Current Transformation of Global Capitalism
Session 3: User-Centered Design and Prototyping
Class Sessions
Preparation
Pre-reading
Scharmer, C. Otto. “Presencing Principles: Reflections on Practice.” Paper prepared for Presencing-In-Action Lab, Presencing Institute, Cambridge, MA, October 2010, pp. 27-30.
In-Class Practice
After-Action Review; Speaking with Authentic Leadership Presence
Assignment
Write a final reflection paper (2 to 5 pages). You can choose any form for that paper. Here are a few things that you may want to include:
- Your key insights on the topic.
- Your key insights on your self.
- What touched you and why?
- What do you want to create going forward: the life and leadership intention that crystallized for you over the past couple of weeks? What was clarified? What is essential for you?
- What questions are you sitting with now?
- What support structure are you going to create for yourself (your self) in order to continue your journey (practice; deep listening; coaching; “do what you love, love what you do”)?
Preparation
Pre-reading
Scharmer, C. Otto. “Presencing.” Chapter 17 in Theory U: Leading From the Future As It Emerges. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler, 2009. ISBN: 9781576757635.
Video Clips
StanfordUniversity. “Steve Jobs’ 2005 Stanford Commencement Address.” May 14, 2008. YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd_ptbiPoXM&feature=related.
In-Class Practice
Stepping Into the Field of the Future
Assignment
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Review your responses to all 15 questions found in the document below. What was the most surprising? What is the essence of what’s emerging for you from the Field of the Future exercise?
U Journaling Practice: A 15 Step Journey Through Your Field of the Future (PDF)
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Create a daily reflection practice (maybe in the early morning?) that allows you to connect to the essence of what has emerged for you throughout this class: Who are you? What difference do you want to create going forward? Where do you feel your journey is heading? Simply create a quiet moment every day in which you reconnect to the inner place that you left class with last night. During this time (10-30 mins.) allow yourself to connect to what is most essential for YOU.
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Create at least two conversational situations in which you share with each other your views on the 5 questions, particularly the fifth question (What is it that you want to do now?). The main focus this week is on the fifth question: What change do you want to bring into the world? Explore that question by talking about your experience with the Journaling/Field of the Future practice we did last night: What frustrates you the most? What did you see from the helicopter view? What footprint do you want to leave behind? What have you experienced when you crossed the Gate? What advice did you pass on from Self-to-self? What vision and intention do you have for the next 5 years? What do you need to let go of? Etc.
All of this will lead you to the most important question: What mini-prototype project do you want to create that will allow you to explore your future intention by doing?
Summing up: Have at least two conversations: one with your partner/friend, the other with 2 to 5 fellow classmates. Make arrangements for the second conversation today. Your group can be any size, but the bigger the group, the longer the process will take. Have a generative conversation. Enjoy the process—go with the energy and go with the flow!
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Continue your listening reviews in the evening. Notice that every personal encounter you have throughout the day can lend itself to a mini-empathy practice. Notice also that you can direct your listening in two directions simultaneously: listening to the other, and listening to your inner knowing and feelings. Think about this dual attention.
Preparation
Pre-reading
Scharmer, C. Otto. “The Blind Spot of Institutional Leadership: How to Create Deep Innovation Through Moving From Egosystem to Ecosystem Awareness.” Paper prepared for World Economic Forum, Annual Meeting of the New Champions 2010, Tianjin, People’s Republic of China, September 2010. (PDF)
———. “Introduction.” In Theory U: Leading From the Future As It Emerges. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler, 2009. ISBN: 9781576757635.
———. “Facing the Fire.” Chapter 1 in Theory U: Leading From the Future As It Emerges. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler, 2009. ISBN: 9781576757635.
———. “The Journey to U.” Chapter 2 in Theory U: Leading From the Future As It Emerges. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler, 2009. ISBN: 9781576757635.
Video Clips
“Nic Marks Discusses the Happy Planet Index at TEDGlobal.” August 30, 2010. The New Economics Foundation (NEF).
globaloneness. “Riane Eisler: Caring Economics.” October 17, 2007. YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USUeF4YauF8&feature=player_embedded.
GenerationWe. “Generation WE: The Movement Begins…” October 22, 2008. YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vknHKTy1MLY.
Session Introduction
Introduction to U-Lab: Leading Profound Innovation for a More Sustainable World (PDF)
In-Class Practice
Effective Listening
Assignment
Reflection Paragraph
Reflect on the discussion we had during the first class and write a paragraph that responds to the following questions:
What interest and intention brought you to this class?
What is the core question that you want to explore?
Empathy Walk
Purpose:
- To develop empathy for someone very different from yourself.
- To develop some skill in establishing a relationship across a significant boundary.
Procedure:
- Divide up into pairs. Choose a class partner on the basis of your similar schedules so that you can find time to complete the exercise together in the next week.
- With your class partner, spend some time talking about what kind of person would live in a world that is most different from the one you are in. This person may be very different from the two of you. Be creative, let your imagination run.
- Having identified a type of person from a world that is very different from yours, figure out how to actually find and meet such a person in the next week in the greater Boston area.
- Make contact with and plan to spend several hours getting to know the person you choose. Try to get a feel for what it would be like to live in that person’s world. How you go about this, what you say to the person, what kind of time you spend, etc., is all up to you and your class partner. There are no rules or guidelines. Be creative.
- You and your class partner will each write a one-page reflection paper on what you learned from your empathy walk.
Preparation
Pre-reading
Scharmer, C. Otto. “Epilogue.” In Theory U: Leading From the Future As It Emerges. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler, 2009. ISBN: 9781576757635.
Jiménez, Juan Ramón. “I Am Not I.” Poetry Foundation.
In-Class Practice
Cross-Team Coaching
Assignment
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Crystallize and clarify your vision and intention going forward.
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Define, develop, and create a mini-prototype this week that allows you to explore the future by doing (and by learning from the feedback). A prototype is not just the development of an idea. It’s also the testing of that idea with real-life stakeholders and in real-life contexts.
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Prepare a reflection statement for Session 6 that reports and reflects on your main takeaways from this class.
Preparation
Pre-reading
Scharmer, C. Otto. “Seven Acupuncture Points for Shifting Capitalism to Create a Regenerative Ecosystem Economy.” Oxford Leadership Journal 1, no. 3 (2010).
———. “Individual Actions.” Chapter 16 in Theory U: Leading From the Future As It Emerges. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler, 2009. ISBN: 9781576757635.
Bird, Kelvy. “Simon Johnson Interview.” Transforming Capitalism. Presencing Institute, January 15, 2010.
Johnson, Simon. “The Quiet Coup.” Atlantic Magazine, May 2009.
“BALLE Community of Practice Immersion.” Business Alliance for Local Living Economies.
Video Clips
theRSAorg. “Crises of Capitalism.” June 28, 2010. YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOP2V_np2c0.
malekanoms. “Quantitative Easing Explained.” November 11, 2010. YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTUY16CkS-k.
Michelle Long, Executive Director, BALLE, Charleston, South Carolina, May 21, 2010
In-Class Practice
Sculpting; The Art and Practice of Deep Listening
Assignment
Listening Review
1. Every evening, take 3 or 4 minutes to review the day: How much time did you spend on what type of listening?
Listening 1: downloading—more of the same
Listening 2: factual—taking in something new
Listening 3: empathic—becoming part of “another movie,” part of another person’s world
Listening 4: generative—connecting to the source of future possibility
2. Conduct at least one conversation with one or several persons around the 5 questions that we used in class:
- Introduce your personal context with one or two formative experiences that shaped you to become the person you are.
- What do you see going in terms of economic-social change—and what do you consider the root causes/issues of the current crisis?
- What do you feel is going to happen over the next 10-20 years?
- If you were to advise the president of your country today, what three action steps would you suggest him to take?
- What would you like to do right now in order to make a difference going forward?
Reflection Paper
Write one page in which you reflect on:
- your four-direction sculpting exercise (which we did in the last class): What surprised you? What touched you? What scares you? What draws you from the future? What questions come up for you now?
- your daily listening reviews
- the conversation that you created around the 5 questions.
Preparation
Pre-reading
Brown, Tim. “Design Thinking.” Harvard Business Review Magazine, June 2008.
Scharmer, C. Otto. “Conversational Actions.” Chapter 17 in Theory U: Leading From the Future As It Emerges. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler, 2009. ISBN: 9781576757635.
Video Clips
Hagel III, John. “Collaborative Innovation and a Pull Economy.” April 17, 2010. Edge Prespectives.
In-Class Practice
Training in Rapid-Cycle Prototyping at IDEO
Assignment
- Watch the 2005 Stanford University commencement speech by Steve Jobs (included in the pre-reading section for the next class). Even if you have seen it already, watch it again. Perhaps the greatest entrepreneur on the planet speaks about the essence of his own leadership process. Then, think about how his key principles (e.g., love what you do; do what you love) apply to your life and your career—your journey forward.
- In week one you did an empathy walk with a stranger. This week conduct an empathy experience with a person you know very well: your partner or a good friend. The task is to listen to that person from level 4—to have a generative conversation with that person. Level 4 means that you do not see your partner/friend on the basis of his/her past actions, but in terms of her/his highest future possibility—as if she/he was a stranger that you don’t yet know. Be creative. Create a context that makes it work. For example, you could watch the Steve Jobs speech together (16 mins.) and then have a generative conversation about it.
- Continue the “listening to your listening” reviews (3 mins. each evening). Over time, try to make your listening awareness more in real time (while you are listening to others). In principle, you can turn any human interaction into an empathy practice. Just make it a part of your “everyday vocabulary.”
- Continue to conduct one or two 5-question conversations (see questions in the session 2 assignment). Again, modify or situate the questions as needed.
- Think about the IDEO experience and what you can transfer to your work and life from the process that we collectively enacted and used during our session last Thursday.
Course Info
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2010
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