{"id":49,"date":"2012-06-20T06:01:33","date_gmt":"2012-06-20T05:01:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/knowledgeetal.wordpress.com\/2012\/07\/30\/kmuk12-taking-the-plunge"},"modified":"2016-10-26T13:34:26","modified_gmt":"2016-10-26T12:34:26","slug":"kmuk12-taking-the-plunge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/?p=49","title":{"rendered":"KMUK12 opening: taking the plunge"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"post_title\">How do you set the tone for a two day event (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.km-uk.co.uk\/\" target=\"_blank\">KMUK<\/a>) with a large gathering of skilled km practitioners many of whom can do such sessions in their sleep? Over a cup of tea at the National Gallery, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sparknow.net\/victoriaward.html\" target=\"_blank\">Victoria Ward<\/a> and I recalled an exercise <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sparknow.net\/philipgibson.html\" target=\"_blank\">Philip Gibson<\/a> had run a few years back for an EDRM event I\u2019d chaired.<\/div>\n<p>\u2018Taking the plunge\u2019 is intended to<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Get people involved<\/li>\n<li>Get them to interact with colleagues outside their immediate teams<\/li>\n<li>Generate energy at the start of an event<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Here\u2019s how (with Philip\u2019s help) I ran it:<\/p>\n<p>I had six large signs, placed conspicuously around the room, reading:<\/p>\n<p>pool side<br \/>\nchanging room<br \/>\ndiving board<br \/>\nshallow end<br \/>\ndeep end<br \/>\nbar<\/p>\n<p>I introduced the exercise with a picture of a swimming pool (actually Pells Pool in Lewes where I live which is the oldest outdoor pool in the country)<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"toggle_inline_image inline_image\" src=\"http:\/\/media.tumblr.com\/tumblr_m5syctMUic1qcsgne.jpg\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/p>\n<p>I then said:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>I\u2019d like you all to imagine that you\u2019re at the KMUK swimming pool. Where would you be?<\/p>\n<p><strong>at the pool side<\/strong> \u2013 for those still observing rather than being involved<\/p>\n<p><strong>in the changing room<\/strong> \u2013 for people who are preparing but not yet ready to take on their km role<\/p>\n<p><strong>on the diving board<\/strong> \u2013 for those who are about to \u2018take the plunge\u2019<\/p>\n<p><strong>at the shallow end<\/strong> \u2013 for those who are \u2018testing the waters\u2019 and not too sure if they want to get deeper<\/p>\n<p><strong>at the deep end<\/strong> \u2013 for those who are already well and truly \u2018immersed in\u2019 their km role<\/p>\n<p><strong>at the bar<\/strong> \u2013 for those who are celebrating achievements.<\/p>\n<p>Now please would each of you go to the sign which you feel best represents where you personally have got to with your km role. You have two minutes to do this. Go to the stations which best represents where you think you are now in your role and NOT where your colleagues are going to!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>At this point there was a lot of tooing and froing as the delegates decided where they should assemble. Once order was restored I invited them to:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Please take a minute to reflect in silence about why you\u2019re where you are.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>And then<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>I\u2019d like each of you to pair up with someone near you, preferably someone whom you don\u2019t already know well and take a minute or two each to share with them your reasons for being where you are. Let the first person in the pair begin while the second listens.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"toggle_inline_image inline_image\" src=\"http:\/\/media.tumblr.com\/tumblr_m5szjyf46p1qcsgne.jpg\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>Some of the delegates (including <a href=\"http:\/\/www.organizationalzoo.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Arthur Shelley<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.gurteen.com\/gurteen\/gurteen.nsf\/id\/knowledge-management\" target=\"_blank\">David Gurteen<\/a>) at \u2018the Bar\u2019 <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>After a couple of minutes I asked them to switch and repeat the process. At the end of the first round (which took 6 minutes) I invited them to:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Now pair up with someone else near you whom you don\u2019t already know well and repeat the exercise.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The session concluded after 15 minutes with this<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>I hope that\u2019s got you thinking about your km role as well as helping you to get to know a few of your colleagues a bit better. I also hope that all of us will get further along through the day ahead. Now please take your seats.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Over the course of the 2 days many of the delegates and speakers referred back to the swimming pool and the individual locations became a good metaphor for discussions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How do you set the tone for a two day event (KMUK) with a large gathering of skilled km practitioners many of whom can do such sessions in their sleep? Over a cup of tea at the National Gallery, Victoria &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/?p=49\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[595,597,599],"tags":[32,40,61,91,105,115,122],"class_list":["post-49","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-events-masterclasses-observations-reports","category-knowledge-capture","category-knowledge-techniques-technologies","tag-closing-session-techniques","tag-edrm","tag-kmuk","tag-philip-gibson","tag-sparknow","tag-swimming-pool","tag-victoria-ward"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=49"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2149,"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49\/revisions\/2149"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=49"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=49"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knowledgeetal.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=49"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}