Collective Story Harvest in the Strategic Programming and Planning CoP

It is now the second time we used the collective story harvest as a tool in that community. It is great for several reasons: it is community building, people understand they are not alone, we learn to celebrate achievements, others see peers in action who sometimes have stood in the fire and can learn from more easily.

It allows in the harvest to see any red threads and the essences of the issue. We can identify learning needs, and strengths and weaknesses of the system.It is a beautiful tool to give space to both: content and process.

And finally a beautiful feedback came from one of the story tellers herself: she wanted to give something back to the community in return for all the learning she has benefited from as a new practitioner in the past.

One ingredient that helped was making the extra effort of organising coffee and tea ourselves. With the austerity measures our internal coffee is cut, so it is an extra effort which on the other hand enables collaboration and contributing. Getting a room without fixed tables is an additional challenge these days, and we are lucky to be able to use our well being room occasionally.