Conflict Transformation: A Systemic Approach

Conflict Transformation intensive

Dartington, Devon

 

Book your place here
via the Schumacher College website

 

Introduction

The ability to face and address hard truths which may give rise to conflict is a core Systemic Leadership capacity. Equipped with this capacity, we become agents of the real transformation so many of us feel is needed in our organisations and wider systems. Those in leadership roles – and those aspiring to be leaders of the future – are invited to join this powerful programme to develop this skill.

We will journey together with gentleness and mutual respect through this edgy territory.  Guided by international specialists in conflict transformation and supported by the systemic perspective, we’ll look squarely at the conflicts we experience daily in this changing world. We’ll rewire our understanding and grow new muscles, enabling us to incorporate a systemic lens when facing these challenges. We’ll lean into ‘edge and tension’ and find our way through conflict issues into dynamic flow.

Conflict is expressed between people, so we usually try to deal with it there. However, it is our experience that whilst the effect is personal, the cause is often systemic and structural. We therefore need a wider and more sophisticated lens to understand it and to respond effectively. This leads to greater productivity within individuals and the system as a whole.

In this emerging reality, building our capacity to face conflict well is essential. Those of us who learn this skill will be of great value in these times, as enablers of transformation and flow.

“Throughout the experience, I have come back into contact with insights and understandings that had slipped into the background of my day to day experience of living. This experience has both enriched my present and future self. I would encourage all and any to immerse in this programme.”

 

Marina Bolton – Director of Organisational Development, UK Civil Service

 

 

Purpose of the programme

We will explore:

• What is conflict trying to tell us that we need to hear?
• How do we as individuals and organisations deal with conflict currently?
• How can we think differently about conflict so it becomes an enabler for growth and innovation, not a hindrance?
• How do we support individuals in conflict, whilst seeing the big picture?
• How do we work creatively with difference, even those stark and deeply held, to discover the solutions we need in a complex and ambiguous world?

 

Who is it for?

• Board level leadership, Heads of HR, OD leads.
• Anyone facing conflict or situations where there is significant difference of opinions in the workplace/role on a regular basis.
• Those stepping into positions of leadership, or who wish to upskill themselves to become the leaders of the future that they feel the potential to become.
• People – including conflict professionals – who seek a different approach to conflict transformation.

 

 

How will I and my organisation benefit from this programme?

Within yourself:

• Deeper understanding of personal triggers to conflict and the impact on your ability to connect with others.
• Increased clarity about yourself in situations of conflict.
• Developing more choices regarding how you act in conflict.

With colleagues, within teams:

• Understanding how ill-expressed and unexpressed conflict leads to stalemate.
• Strengthening capability to create structures allowing for safe expression of difficulty.
• Illuminating how to move from breakdown to flow of collaboration, connection and creativity.

For the organisation:

• Insight to what interpersonal conflicts tell us about the whole system.
• Exploration of structural change supporting the organisation to thrive.

For wider stakeholders :

• Knowledge of how to work with wider organisational stakeholders – who may have conflicting interests – to enable all to flourish.

 

 

Course Content

The territory we’ll be exploring together will take you through these stages:

• Starting the journey: Introducing conflict transformation with a systemic perspective and deepening our personal enquiry into a live conflict situation.
• Humanising the other: Understanding personal triggers and widening our perspectives, moving from a heart of war to a heart of peace.
• Transforming conflict: Assimilating systemic theory and practice into our understanding of conflict transformation.
• Conflict as resource: Strengthening our resilience and capacity as a systemic helper/mediator.
• Conclusion and next steps: Integrating, building on the learning, taking it into our personal and work lives.

Throughout you’ll have the experience of belonging within a group of leaders, coaches and change-makers in a richly diverse learning pool.

 

 

Faculty

Ben Yeger is Founder of Moving Conflicts and UK representative of Combatants for Peace (CfP). After serving in the Israeli Army (83-86), Ben left Israel promising himself that he would never carry a weapon again. Ben has 25 years’ experience of group facilitation and training, working with people from a variety of backgrounds and ages in conflict transformation. He creates innovative, nonviolent, and collaborative interventions which transform conflict from barriers to relationship into opportunities for change.

www.movingconflicts.org

Ben Yeger’s TED Talk on Conflict Transformation.

 

Milly Sinclair has been working as a facilitator for over 20 years, particularly around areas of leadership, conflict transformation and change. Milly has worked for many years in conflict transformation with organisations including the University of Oxford, Mitsubishi, Unicredit Bank and Amnesty International; through her interfaith, intercultural and peace work in Israel/ Palestine; and through the development of community cohesion projects.

Originally with a psychotherapeutic and theatre background, she has been a systemic practitioner and coach for over ten years, and in all her work she brings up to date psychological and business theory to life with an original and creative approach.

millysinclair.com

 

 

What people say

“Profound learning – all the exercises and the sense of narrative and evolution of the process as a whole. The constellation work was very powerful for me, and well resourced by everything that came before.”

Sholeh Johnstone – Facilitator, Mediator and Coach

 

“Milly and Ben, and the Whole Partnership provided a great service and experience for those like me, aiming to improve upon our paths of addressing (and confronting) conflicts, and working to transform them. There is a vulnerability to this process that is explored both internally/individually, and externally/collectively as well. This is a valuable process that was expertly facilitated, and I am grateful to have participated.”

Joe Culhane Systems & Ecology Consultant

 

“10/10 for the experience! Witnessing the alchemy of live constellations, even on zoom, I love the magic and insights that arise. Ben and Milly’s leadership of each constellation was so intuitive. They are almost forensic in getting it right. I loved the willingness of everybody to share some quite intimate conflicts. The trust between people was amazing. The generosity, presence, love and kindness modelled Ben and Milly and already present in the system.”

Katie Lloyd-Nunn – Education Curator, Hawkwood Centre for Future Thinking

 

“It made me look at a particularly difficult conflict within my organisation from a completely different perspective and found practical tools to address it more effectively. A profoundly helpful programme.”

Dirk Aarts – Oxford University Senior Censor and professor

 

“A wonderful balance of systemic theory and practice with lots of helpful discussion with colleagues going through similar challenges.”

Andrew Gregory – Senior Chaplain at Oxford University

 

 

Registration

For further information on the course structure, fees and to book, visit the venue website here.

If you have any general queries, or would like to register interest for future iterations of this course, please contact [email protected].

 

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