Scenario:My Time
As an action learning coach, how would you handle the following situation:
Well answering the question “What could be better?” the team slips back into problem solving even though you have not concluded the check in.
Tags: Action Leaning, Action Learning Coach, WIAL, WIAL Talk
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Prasad Natarajan
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Please listen carefully to my question. All I am asking now is What could be better? Please respond to that question alone.
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Savath Kuch
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As an action learning coach, I would ask the question, hello team, In what stage is the discussion? How you already can know that a question goes beyond the depth and significance of the problem.
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Marsel Gareev
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There are two options I would use: 1. “What is the second ground rule? Thank you! So I’m intervening with the question “What could we do better?” Who has an answer?” 2. “What question have I asked the team? Thank you! Who has an answer to that question?”
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Heather-Jane Gray
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I like Marsel’s response & I’d like to build on her first option:
I always like to bring the group back to check their understanding of the Groundrules, which gives me more confidence in their ability to be self-managing as an Action Learning Team (ALT) in future. They are also so clear!
I prefer (1): “Who can remind us of the 2nd Groundrule please? Thanks – I’m intervening with: What can we improve?” After they have responded, if there was not a better supplemental question to help generate double/triple loop learning, I’d ask “How do you perceive that this intervention at this time may help/hinder us from identifying underlying systemic causes & enablers? (How can we improve? What enables that? What’s an example of that? What’s the impact/benefit?)
At the later debrief, if the Observers didn’t pick this up, I may even ask the ALT how they think I felt when I was ignored! 😉
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Savin Oeun
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Ask team, do have have an agreement to the problem statement yet – yes, no or quit clost, and let team write down the problem on the paper?
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Hua(Grace) Pan
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As coach, I have two ways to deal with it. A light way is to simply remind participants to focus on the question first, and be patient as the improvement area part will come. A heavier approach is to leverage the group for such realization. “Hey team, what questions are we answering now? “. “What was my question for discussion now?”.
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Alicja Pawlaczuk
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I would intervene again, explaining the rules that the coach has a role in the session and the right to intervene when a great learning opportunity is seen. While we are all excited about helping the Problem Presenter, I shall ensure that we are also learning during this process. I would then pose the question again ‘what could be better?’
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Benjamin Solomon
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I would say, “Team, a question was asked which has gone unanswered. What is the impact on the group when a question goes unanswered?” As a follow up question I might ask, ” What are some of the advantages for a group to examine how it can function at an even higher level? Who, here, would not want the group to function at an even higher level?”
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Min Zhao
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I will say, ” What is happening?” If nobody says anything, I would continue, “What is the level of our listening ability from a scale of 1 to 10 where one is the least and 10 is the best?” I would ask each of them to rate their listening ability. Then I will share my thought: “It is great that everyone is so excited about helping the problem presenter with the solutions. Thanks for your enthusiasm! At the same time, I feel sad when I asked you the question, ‘ What could be better?’ and there was no answer. ” If this happens in a real life situation and one of the team members keeps getting ignored, what is the impact on the team morale? How can we prevent this from happening again?” After we talk about listening, I will go back to the debriefing again, ” Now what could be better after our first round of discussions?”
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Erica Venema
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I would directly intervene and ask the team if this answer is an answer to the question. I probably get ‘no’, say ‘thank you’, and would repeat the question again. And I would say that (depending on the phase of the session) that later there will be more time to investigate the problem further.
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