Hi, I am currently employed as a Quality Management Facilitator at medium
sized (about 8,000 employees) chemical company in Tennessee (USA), and
have been reading these notes over the last few years. This, however, is
my first post to the L.O. I see the things Terri talking about as a
classic case of grief. Terri says:
[Big snip by your host... ]
> I had a sense that these people had made some agreement
> prior to our
> meeting that this is the way they were going to handle the
> focus group. (duh?)
These people are in grief. There has been a tremendous change in their
lives, and their "hero" is wounded. A major ideal has died, the "leader"
is not the "official" leader.
These people are going through, or they are stuck in one of the five
stages of grief. (Shock, Emotion, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance)
They are certainly confused, and the only thing they can think of is to
coalesce to gain strength from each other. The last thing they need is
someone from management to come to their rescue and tell they what they
need to do. One on one sharing is probably the only way they will open
up. And it takes a long time, weeks/months not hours/days. I have seen
the same thing at my place, and I know these people. So it is not like
the situation you are in, I have worked with these people for years, and
they still put barriers in place to keep me out. The fear of management
intervention seems to be the most prevalent fear. Resource: Ben Bissel
video, "Managing Change and Transition" . Address; LuBen Associates,
9420 Donachy Drive, Richmond, VA. 23235. (804) 272-2979
Leadership has never been about control-only management and wielding of
authority have been about control.
Leaders never set out to lead, they set out to go somewhere.
Other people just choose to go along.
David
--"Guinn, David I" <dig@eastman.com>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>