The Power of Vulnerability by Barry Kaplan

Author:Barry Kaplan
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781626344747
Publisher: Greenleaf Book Group Press
Published: 2018-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

What You Want

When you have connected to yourself first, and then fully and transparently connected with your group, you have opened the gateway to make direct requests about what you want. Start by looking inward to get clarity up front about what is important to you. Explore what you want to have happen at the meeting, or what a successful outcome looks like if you get what you want.

Step into your sovereignty. You’re the king or queen for the day and can ask for what you want. Although you may not get it, if you don’t start by asking yourself what you want, you’ll never know.

We’ve seen many individuals on teams wait for someone else to tell them what to do or defer to the boss’s wants. After all, these actions are less risky. Yet, if everyone does this, we’re severely limiting our potential. All of the ideas left on the table go to waste. So, when it’s safe enough to share, then we invite all that power to thrive.

It’s our custom to conduct pre-offsite interviews with each participant. Our favorite question is, “What do you want to have happen at the offsite?” Although we’re thoroughly briefed in advance and are often given parameters by the sponsor or boss, we still invite participants to speak to their most sovereign wants. The outcome of those conversations often dramatically changes the theme for the offsite or shifts the emphasis. In our conversations, the participant is breaking the ice, and warming up to speak their truth in a confidential, safe manner.

To paraphrase one of the great philosophers of our time (Mick Jagger): You don’t always get what you want, but you might just get what you need! We have to INpower ourselves to ask. To take a risk and not get what we want. To risk our want going unfulfilled, or risk being hurt or let down. But when we have an authentic community, we’re less likely to take these situations personally, because we have connected more genuinely, have built a real sense of trust, and have become aligned around the shared purpose of the team and organization.

If a decision doesn’t go the way you wanted, it could mean that’s what’s best for the team. As long as you’ve had your voice in the discussion and openly contributed to the debate, you’re satisfied with the outcome and ready to support it going forward.

We were working with an entrepreneurial start-up that was focused on distributing educational software in Latin America. Every member of the team was working crazy hours to get the company off the ground and generate positive cash flow. The new CFO was relocated to join the company. She was single, and her dog was her best friend in the world.

We led a corporate offsite to kick off the New Year and prioritize tactical initiatives. Once we established safety and had everyone connected, we invited everyone to check in and tell the group what was working for them and what wasn’t working for them.

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