Positive about Change?

'Learning is the discovery that something is possible.' 

Fritz Perls

'The problems of the world cannot possibly be solved by skeptics or cynics whose horizons are limited by the obvious realities. We need men who can dream of things that never were' 

John Keats

Dr Martin Seligman is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. He is famous for his work in the field of Positive Psychology. This school of psychological thought doesn't seek to replace mainstream psychology but complement it through the study of what gives life meaning and what makes it worth living. It asks how we can extend and amplify the good that is already working in our lives and shining the light on our creative assets and seeking their growth and unfolding.

One of the authors at the beginning of his academic career attended a presentation where Dr Seligman outlined his early ideas about the need for Positive Psychology. Dr Seligman received a series of challenging questions around 'why bother with all this positive stuff?', Dr Seligman replied that he had to because he was a born pessimist. He said he needed a practice that helped him see through problems to positive options and be more optimistic about outcomes. His natural temperament would lead him to be locked in the problem. He needed a key to unlock this process and move to another place to address the issue. This echoes well the comments of Einstein and Jung that we often cannot solve problems on the same level of consciousness that generated them. We need new spaces and thinking to break the code of the problem.

This positive, more optimistic approach echoes much of what we see crossing our services and on forums like Twitter. People and networks are sharing fresh, kind and affirming ways of being and doing as the future framework for change. These new movements offer such promise, potency and energy. Yet it is not always an easy walk although a much needed one, especially if we are talking about the deep, sustainable change that so many of us see as possible and work so hard to achieve. All too often we have experienced changes in services that only touch surface structures, policies and procedures rather than going to the heart of the issues. And sometimes people propose a ‘be positive approach’ as part of these initiatives, failing to really appreciate the complexity of issues, acknowledge the scale of the challenges or engage the difficulties that the people involved deal with on a day to day basis when they see the potential of what could be possible in the face of a reality that seems intractable.

The kind of positivity Seligman is promoting has nothing to do with creating false positive-ness that can only ever skim along the surface of change. Rather, a Positive Psychology approach invites us to name the problems and the pains and see how we can learn from them to work them through in constructive and compassionate ways. Positive Psychology offers much for us to learn. It is not just about being positive, its about engaging with the complexity of a challenge and bringing positive approaches to working with it. Authentic listening, mutual support, empathy, knowing we don't have all the answers, a commitment to deep and open dialogue and the creation of new ways to think and do health and care is the DNA of these new movements. At it’s heart is the belief that all of us have tremendous goodness, gifts and potential. We believe that is from the activation of these wellsprings that the solutions and new forms of service will emerge.

- John Walsh. York Street Health Practice, Leeds Community Healthcare NHS Trust

- Dr Andrew McDowell  http://www.theperformancecoach.com

(The authors of this met recently at an initiative of the NHS Health Trusts and Public Health in Leeds. They have brought Health Coaching into the city so we can look at and change the quality of our health conversations with patients. The old model is where the patient is the passive recipient and the clinician the expert. This is a move to a new terrain where both are experts and co-create health plans and solutions together. At the heart of this approach lies a view of people as not problems but as people with assets, gifts and potency. This more humanistic and positive model offers great promise to people and the city.)

No.

On a bus in 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama a bus driver ordered a black woman to stand up and give her seat to a white passenger. This was the rule of bus segregation introduced in 1900. The woman, a seamstress called Rosa Parks, looked at the driver and said 'No'. As a result she was arrested and the civil rights movement in the United States developed to a new level. It resulted into a bus boycott that lasted a year. Rosa explained her word, 'I had given up my seat before, but this day, I was especially tired. Tired from my work as a seamstress, and tired from the ache in my heart.' She also said, 'All I was doing was trying to get home from work'.

Rosa's 'No' changed the world. It played a pivotal role in the movement led by Martin Luther King for racial equality and respect. Today where she boarded the bus there is a plaque to Rosa. Her statue is in the US Capitol Building in Washington DC. She received countless awards, met American presidents and had streets named after her. What Rosa symbolises is an ordinary person doing an extraordinary thing. Here was a black woman who said 'No' because her conscience wouldn't allow her to go along any longer with a system that discriminated against people on the basis of their skin colour. Rosa is a call to integrity. Her name is a byword for having principles and holding them when the going gets tough.

Principles and values are what make us what we are. They shape and hold us. There is a saying that says, 'To betray oneself in order not to betray another is the greatest betrayal of all’. This is a very insightful comment. It tells us that there has to be some space or line written within us that is inviolable. This line says that we may compromise on some or even many things but not on this. We all need this line. Without it we have no deep identity. The word integrity comes from the word integer meaning whole or complete. Without integrity we cannot have completeness or wholeness. Without a core set of values or principles we cannot have what we all seek in so many different ways- that sense of oneness, wholeness and completion.

At work and life we can be challenged to go along with things that may conflict with our centre. There is a point when we have to make a stand for what we are. There is a time to say 'No.' Without this possibility we are not really free. We are not of course advocating that people fight everyone and everything. What we do assert is that principles are key and without them and standing for them we find something fundamentally missing in our life and what we can bring to work.

So how do we keep our principles? Rosa's life and words gives us some clues. She didn't go looking for trouble or fights with authority. 'All I was doing was trying to get home from work.'  She had given up her seat before but now knew she couldn't to be true to herself and her values of justice and fairness if she did. A moment may come for us all when we have to make a stand or lose our integrity. Rosa was filled with a sense of what was right. 'You must never be fearful about what you are doing when it is right',   She also said,  'I have learned over the years that when one's mind is made up, this diminishes fear; knowing what must be done does away with fear.' This to us adds us to the following. We need to have our core values and know them deeply - not just on an intellectual level but on a intuitional one also. There is nothing wrong with avoiding trouble and confrontation. However if we are faced with a situation where we need to make a stand then we need to do that  - trying to have sensitivity,grace and dignity. There is a moment when the issue that faces us is a values question and our answer is about whether we are true to ourselves or not.

This article is all about Rosa but it's also about you and us. It's about the sort of people we will choose to be. And the sort of people we decide to be is the sort of world we will create for ourselves and others.We started with Rosa and we will finish with Rosa. In doing so we dedicate this piece of writing to her and all the other Rosa's who say 'No' to whatever is wrong in our world. They are the real heroes and heroines. Rosa expresses this better then we ever can. 'Stand for something or you will fall for anything. Today's mighty oak is yesterday's nut that held its ground.'

Lisa Falkingham, Service Improvement Team, Leeds Community Healthcare

John Walsh, York Street Health Practice, Leeds Community Healthcare

Day at the Opera

On Monday 7 July we attended the annual NHS Organisational Development conference - DoOD. This saw 200 staff from the NHS gather to look at the issues and direction of organisational development (OD). It was a great event, which featured Professor Michael West and Dr Pat Oakley as keynote speakers. It was good to meet or re-meet colleagues such as Paul Taylor from NHS Employers, Karen Dumain from the NHS Leadership Academy and Dr Maxine Craig from Sunderland University. We were happy that colleagues from our own organisation, LCH could also join the conference.

We were to present the after lunch session on 'Finding Our Voice'. We did this work with Tracey Gray, Head of Head of Education at Doncaster and Bassetlaw Hospitals and her daughter, Victoria. Tracey shared her personal and professional story of vulnerability, growth and finding her voice. She then introduced her daughter as her inspiration and 'rock'. Victoria emerged from the back of the room and started to sing from 'Carmen'. Victoria is an opera singer and went through the audience singing. She then, from the stage, shared her story of vulnerability and finding her voice. The audience were then invited to find their voice and Victoria led us in singing the chorus from the opera, 'Carmen' by Bizet.

We spoke to the audience about how we can create the cultures to find our voices and support staff to grow. We started to outline what good OD work looked like. There were three things OD practitioners could do and were doing. The first was visibility. To go out into the highways and byways of the service and talk and engage with staff. To be a presence that offered options, hope and possibilities. The greatest thing we can offer another is our own self and an OD practice that doesn't offer this has both missed the opportunity and lost the heart of the work. The second was vision. The call was to let a vision inspire us and then let others hear our passion and catch the fire. Movements for deep cultural and organisational change will not emerge from weighty documents but where individuals and groups see a vision and ignite it in others. The third was making the space for the voice of the staff. OD practitioners had to be able to create a positive circle and invite others into it for the OD dialogue to start and spread. This work created the ever increasing circles, like a rock thrown into a pond, drawing in more hearts and minds into making compassionate OD a reality. We then spoke of how we can create the cultures where OD can flourish and grow. 

The basic message was that culture doesn't fall ready made from the heavens. It is constructed and made by all of us and therefore we all hold in our hands an awesome power. We can create the best or worst cultures. Every time we open our mouth we create culture. Every time we act we create culture. The challenge was to be the best people and staff we can be. We might sometimes miss the mark but our work for best practice and best culture would bear fruit and make these things start to happen. 

It came down to - if we want the most inclusive and supportive cultures we need to be truly inclusive and supportive. We need to make the difference every day for the better. We ended by asking the audience to talk with people on their tables about what conversations they should have 'to make the difference for the better' in their practice and services.

We ended by offering the acronym OPERA as a sign of great OD work.


   O - Open to Possibilities

   P - Persistence

   E - Emotion and Passion

   R - Receiving and Giving Feedback

   A - Awareness of Self and impact on others

When we think of the conference this was what resonated in the speeches and also in many of the private discussions too. OPERA is an OD charter. It calls us to be what we are and can be. To be flexible to options and opportunities. To not see organisational life as a static fixed entity. To see, as Hegel the philosopher would, reality and organisations as in movement and development. To see life and where we work as dynamic realities which we can work in and direct. We can only be open if we are humble and create a space for the richness of others. We need to be a people of patience and persistence. Rome was not built in a day and cultures will not be changed by next Tuesday. We need to be a people of passion and commitment working for a cause greater than ourselves. The feedback and awareness are really key here. We are not called to be lone ranger figures riding into town to sort out the bad guys. We need a deep awareness of our own weak points. This is about 'us' not 'them'. This can demand radical honesty, deep and authentic self-reflection and the courage to start to change oneself. Big stuff really but then the best OD is transformation not tinkering.

The presentation had a quote from the great Dr Viktor Frankl - 'When we are no longer able to change the situation - we are challenged to change ourselves'. This is an interesting enigmatic statement. Maybe Dr Frankl was pointing to a secret but not stating it. The secret is - if we change ourselves the world will change and we will find that either the situation has resolved or we are able to deal with it in new and better ways. The conference was for us all about the power, potency and possibility we all hold in our hands. One person tweeted that she had realised she was holding power, potency and possibility as a result of her learning at the conference. That's the message and the means. We hope - we really hope - we can use these incredible energies wisely and kindly for this service that means so much to us. A big thank you to all who made this conference possible.

Steve Keyes, Head of Organisational Development, Leeds Community Healthcare

John Walsh, York Street Health Practice, Leeds Community Healthcare  

Work lessons from Oz - Doorways of hope and possibility

Einstein once said, 'If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be very intelligent, read them more fairy tales.' Stories are part of our human way to articulate lessons and meaning. They allow us to connect and express our deepest wishes and dreams. They raise us up and open up doorways of hope and possibility. It is probably a sure sign that a civilization is losing its soul and its way when it can longer tell stories in a meaningful way.
 

The Wizard of Oz ( or to give the book its proper title 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz' ) is something many of us remember from childhood when the film was always shown at Christmas. This story, told in a meaningful way, has many significant lessons for the workplace and office and  here we explore just a few . The ones we choose will hopefully have a relevance to the ongoing discussions in the NHS about how we produce the best cultures for staff and the best services for our clients. 

The Three Companions 

The story is that a young girl from Kansas journeys to a mysterious and wondrous land called Oz. It's very different from home. She tells her dog ( who makes the journey too ), 'I've got a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore' and she needs to get home. She meets three companions on the way who become friends. They all seemingly lack something. The scarecrow a brain, the tin man a heart and the lion courage. In the 1939 film they all sing the same song bemoaning what they don't have. The scarecrow sings 'If only I had a brain'. The tin man sings 'If only I had a heart' and the lion 'If only I had the nerve'. The plan is to go to the Emerald City to see the great Wizard of Oz who they hope will solve everything for them. So off they set along the Yellow Brick road with their dreams and wishes. Does this resonate with our work  and life ? We have hopes, wishes, passion and dreams and we go looking for something, some place or someone to make them come true. 

When working with people and teams in the NHS  we often hear a difficult story. It is that people are waiting for someone else to make life better.

They seek a ' hero' who may  come along, make the difficult  stuff stop and allow the good times begin. Working with people and teams teach us that we all have to own our own contribution to the present situation. It may be small or major. This is a critical first step to improving any difficult situation. Self discovery and owning ones ' whole self' are critical skills.

The three companions in our story make an amazing discovery. They see at the end of their journey that  they already have what they went searching for. For them courage, brains and a heart. But what about for the rest of us? Seeking what we desire, want, and feel we need is most definitely a journey. It is a painful process for teams to  consider what a 'great' team looks and feels like and then benchmark their own current situation against this finding how near or far away from this they are. It is also, and always an enlightening process. To do this work in our teams is challenging and needs courage. If we want our NHS and social care to be a great work place and as a result deliver excellent services we must look at ourselves in the mirror each day. We  need the courage, capability and the ability to create a kind and caring work environment. We learn, from our characters in Oz that  it starts from within. 

And just like the characters from Oz, teams realise it takes the event and experience to see this. The traveller to Oz discovers what they need is what they have in and through each other. This is an important lesson. We all have great gits and qualities. Yet we only see, own and release these through our journey. We also experience the manifestation of these with and in others. There is a friendship and social aspect to our becoming what we wish to be and how we choose to live our work lives. We can be kind and supportive to each other or unfairly competitive and harsh. The choice lies in our hands. We 'become' through and for others. We spend many hours with our colleagues at work - let us seek to build supportive communities in our workplaces  that value and include. Happily the three companions find what they are looking for. The three things they found - courage, a heart - compassion and intelligence are things we all need too.

What sustains them on their journey is a growing friendship, mutual support and hope. We would suggest this is the same  in our teams. 

The Wizard 

When our travellers  get to the Emerald City they enter into the awesome habitation of the Wizard. In the film in his room they see no one except a face that keeps appearing and disappearing. There is smoke, fire, a booming voice and an authoritarian presence. They discover a shocking secret.

These are all tricks - mere smoke and mirrors. The Wizard is actually a man behind a curtain working levers to create the atmosphere. The 'great and powerful Oz' is a little man working a machine. Dorothy accuses him of being a very bad man. The Wizard replies, 'Oh, no, my dear; I'm really a very good man, but I'm a very bad Wizard, I must admit.' This is the lesson here. We actually think the Wizard was very wrong. He was saying he was a good man but had no magic, no power. The truth is that we all can choose to be good and we all have power. The problem is one of three things:

.       We don't see that we have power.

.       Or we don't really own that we have power.

.       Or that we don't find the ways for the power to flow and function.

The fact is if we don't see we can't own and if we don't own we can't have the power. It is a great error to think we don't or can't have power in our lives. 

Again a feature of teams facing difficulty is that they often describe feelings as powerless and being over powered. It always strikes us that having no power is such a disabling state. Yet as we explore the issues of power and becoming disempowered we discover an interesting fact. When the going gets tough we often defer to those above us ( just like we did when we were children ). We ask those above us to make difficult decisions then we complain about the decisions they have made and we distance ourselves from those decisions. We often wonder about this dynamic;  do we fear being part of the decision making process so much we would rather act as a victim to the decision of others?  Within this dance we have given away our power.

 We have also seen the opposite - the liberating picture of staff finding their power and voice. In Oz, Dorothy finds that when she confronts the Wizard, he is a little man, another human being just like her. And so it is our world. We are all human, trying to do the best we can with what we have. We may get it wrong. We will make mistakes. The people above us are not bad people. Just human beings doing their best often in difficult circumstances. We work in one of the most politicised health systems in the world ( in our humble opinion ) and a key commodity we all have is our personal power. We should never play games with it or give it up. We should guard it with our lives.

It is what gives us identity, stability and hope to work for change . Our patients and clients should expect no less from us. They deserve a staff force which holds its power and uses it positively and effectively. 

The End 

Finally Dorothy discovers what it's all about. At the end of the story Dorothy can't get home to Kansas. She is understandably upset. In the film the good witch tells Dorothy, 'You don't need to be helped any longer. You've always had the power to go back to Kansas.' The  scarecrow asks if this is so, why didn't the witch tell Dorothy. The good witch says, 'Because she wouldn't have believed me. She had to learn it for herself.'

Again we find here the need for Dorothy to find her own answers and power.

The Wizard couldn't give her this. It was her own inner wizard she needed to find - her will, energy and gifts. If the good witch had told her this she wouldn't have seen or believed it. Dorothy needed the journey of self discovery just like her three friends. The story of Oz calls to how we must learn from work and life, it asks us to consider how these journeys can support our growth, how the  friendships and relationships we make on the way co-develop us. And finally we are asked to consider our inner most ability and the  treasure that lies hidden within each one of us. The North East of England and Yorkshire may be a long long way from Oz - certainly a rainbow away. Yet the lessons are the same and we commend them to you

John Walsh, York Street Health Practice

Dr Maxine Craig, Head of Organisation Development at South Tees NHS Trust and visiting Professor at Sunderland University.