Hosting Generative Change

When the future is uncertain and the past is contested, good hosting can bring hope and co-operation into the present.

Any Dialogic OD practice will bring people together for creative conversations, expanded horizons, mutual connection and committed action. The way these events are hosted can make all the difference. Mark McKergow offers an image of superb hosting as a mix of detailed planning and openness to whatever emerges, taking the lead when needed, with the intent of stepping back as quickly as possible so participants can lead themselves.

This is an important resource for anyone who wants to entice groups of disparate individuals into generative conversations that stimulate new ideas and prompt committed action. It builds connections between big ideas like complexity and emergence with the small practical details of preparing, inviting people and convening a workshop, engaging people on the day, building new possibilities and refining the next steps.

Dr. McKergow brings over a decade of research into the etiquette of hosting in different cultures and eras and combines it with three decades of practice in organizational development and change. The book offers a framework of six hosting roles to help navigate the inevitable ups and downs of working with large (and small) groups.

Written in an engaging and witty style, the principles of hosting are brought to life in a lively and detailed case example which shows the practical impact and importance of insightful and flexible hosting.

Chapter Titles

Why hosting for generative change?
Key elements of hosting
Six roles and four positions for a generative change host
Doing the groundwork
Building the container and finding the space
Crafting the invitation
Preparing for the event
Diverging and emerging
Consolidating and converging
After the event
Online Hosting
References

Watch a ten minute video of Mark talking about the book

Link to bonus material for Hosting Generative Change

Buy it from Amazon

About the Author

Mark McKergow MBA Ph.D.

Dr Mark McKergow is an international speaker, trainer, consultant, author, and director of the Centre for Solutions Focus at Work based in Edinburgh, Scotland. He has been working with groups and change for three decades, and is known around the world for his ability to present innovative ideas with a signature mix of scientific rigour and performance pizzazz. He combines a PhD in the physics of self-organisation with a lively, pragmatic and careful approach to working with groups.

Mark co-founded the SOLWorld community of Solution-Focused organisational practitioners (still going after close to 20 years). He is the co-author of six books including Host: Six new roles of engagement for teams, organisations, communities and movements (Solutions Books, 2014) and The Solutions Focus (Nicholas Brealey Publishing, 2007). His most recent book is The Host Leadership Field Book (Solutions Books, 2019). He also plays jazz saxophone. He can be reached at mark@sfwork.com

Endorsements

Chris Corrigan

Steward of the Art of Hosting and author, The Tao of Open Space

Written for people who are deepening their hosting practice, even experienced hosts will want to keep this book close at hand. Using a case study approach, Mark McGerkow provides a practical, usable, step-by-step process for designing dialogic containers and hosting good meetings. But this book isn’t merely a collection of tools and practices. Mark provides essential counsel on the design and preparation of dialogic spaces, and helpfully guides readers through some of the history and the there of this way of working.

Susanne Burgstaller

Usolvit, Vienna, Austria

People who do Organisation Development on the ground and aim to foster effective organisational change will find this book extremely useful. Mark McKergow combines two models – Host Leadership and generative change – in an insightful way, illustrated by a detailed application case. This approach fits perfectly with the needs of both OD workers and organisational leaders.

Mike Brent

Professor of Practise, Ashridge Executive Education @Hult International Business School, co-author of The Leaders’ Guide to Influence and the Leaders’ Guide to Coaching

If ever we needed an apt metaphor for leading change in complex times, it is now. Hosting rather than directing seems to be a much more useful way of thinking about leadership and consulting. There has never been a better time to start engaging our communities in facing up to complex collective problems, and Mark McKergow’s book is a well written and lucid guide into how to do exactly that.

Peggy Holman

co-author, The Change Handbook and author, Engaging Emergence: Turning Upheaval into Opportunity

McKergow offers a practical guide to the mechanics of hosting constructive conversations. In a practice that anyone with a good heart can do yet can take a lifetime to master, Hosting Generative Change provides a roadmap to start walking the path.

Carey Glass

Organizational psychologist, Melbourne, Australia

In times of constant flux, how do we host generative change? First, our diagnostic approaches need to give way to the generative discussions that create emergent change. Mark McKergow writes another first, providing the guide on how leaders and facilitators can transform themselves to host these generative change events.

Trevor Durnford

Chair, International Association of Facilitators

“Change the way people think and things will never be the same” epitomises the impact that Mark McKergow has had over the years. His work in Solutions Focus is now being used in many of the world’s leading organisations. I have every confidence that in years to come, his most recent profound work about hosting will become common knowledge and practice too.