The document discusses the Gurteen Knowledge Café process, which is a structured conversation method for knowledge sharing. It involves a short presentation to introduce a topic, followed by small group discussions at tables in response to a posed question. The groups then reconvene to share insights in a whole group conversation. The goal is to have an open dialogue that allows participants to emerge with new understanding and perspectives on the issue.

1. The kind of
conversation I’m
interested in is one in
which you start with a
willingness to emerge a
slightly different
person.
Theodore Zeldin
Conversation
Theodore is an
Oxford Historian
Conversation for Empowerment
An introduction to the Gurteen Knowledge Café
The birth of the
Gurteen Knowledge Cafe
London, September 2002
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2. Introduction to the KCafé
• Background to the Knowledge Café
• Knowledge Café stories
• Business is a conversation
• Knowledge Café process
The Knowledge Café
A tool for dialogue
Global Knowledge Cafés
• Have run them all over the world
• Some interesting cultural experiences
• Format always works
• People love to talk
• Starting to discover their power
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3. Simple Process
• Short talk or presentation
• Question posed
• Small group conversations at tables
• Whole group conversation
Not just chit-chat
The most widespread and
pervasive learning in your
organization may not be
happening in training rooms,
conference rooms or board rooms
but in the cafeteria, the hallways
and the cafe across the street.
Junita Brown & David Isaacs
Many Café Applications
• More than an alternative for death-by-PowerPoint
– Surface hidden problems
– Break down organisational silos
– Management training tool
– Transform meetings
– Obtain buy-in to a project
– Share good-practice
– Instigate action
– Create an engaged workforce
– Build and improve relationships
– A stimulus to innovation
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4. Stories
• Int’l Relations & Security Network (ISN), Zürich
• Statoil, Norway
• ING Bank Academy, Amsterdam
• Flip teaching
ISN Zurich
The knowledge café has led to a dramatic improvement in
terms of inter-team dialog, collaboration & knowledge
sharing.
Many internal work processes are now being overhauled for
the better as a result of these knowledge cafes & we have
seen an explosion of new ideas & initiatives on the part of
staff at all levels of the organization.
Simply put, the knowledge cafe format has empowered all
our staff to speak up and take the initiative in ensuring the
successful development of the ISN.
Chris Pallaris, Chief Editor
ISN, Zurich
Statoil, Norway
• To surface issues as a result of a merger
• Series of Cafés to bring retiring experts together with
younger members to transfer knowledge
– In a community hall on an allotment
• Geophysicists
– Discussion of preferred technologies
– Exchange views on experiences
• Management Training
– But not called a Knowledge Café
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5. ING Bank Academy
• Two main applications
• Research Alerts
• Challenging Minds
Research Alerts
• Information Management
– Gather articles & reports about relevant trends in
management, banking & finance
– Broadcast “Research Alerts”
• Knowledge Management
– If Alert deserves attention host a Knowledge Café
– Discuss implications, impact, risks, opportunities ...
Challenging Minds
• Education programme for mid-level managers
• Abandoned lecture style training
• Small Knowledge Café style conversations around
specific topics
• Short videos downloaded from YouTube
• Carefully crafted reading materials developed by
CoachingOurselves (Henry Mintzberg)
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6. ING Bank Academy, Amsterdam
Mireille Jansma and Jurgen Egges
Flip Teaching & Conferences
• Traditional teaching
– classroom lectures where teacher explains a topic
– followed by homework, in which student does exercises
• Flip teaching
– student studies topic at home, typically using video lessons
– such as provided by Khan Academy, iTunes U or YouTube
Edu
– class is for hands-on work and face-to-face interaction with
teachers and peers
Flip Teaching and Conferences
• Speech is a bad medium for communicating
information
– so watch lectures and videos at home.
• Speech is a good medium for dialogue
– so do hands-on work and face-to-face interaction
with teacher/peers at school and speaker/peers at
a conference
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7. Capacity to retain knowledge
1. Listening 5%
2. Reading 10%
3. Audio-visual 20%
4. Demonstrations 30%
5. Discussion 50%
6. Practice by doing 75%
7. Explaining to others 90%
Our job is to have interesting conversations
Business is a conversation
Business is a conversation because the
defining work of business is conversation -
literally.
And 'knowledge workers' are simply those
people whose job consists of having
interesting conversations.
David Weinberger
The Cluetrain Manifesto
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8. Conversation is our most effective KM tool
Our most effective KM tool is conversation.
The words we choose, the questions we ask, and
the metaphors we use to explain ourselves, are
what determine our success in creating new
knowledge
as well as sharing that knowledge with each
other.
Nancy Dixon
Common Knowledge
Conversation is a learning technology
Conversation is the most powerful learning
technology ever invented.
Conversations carry news, create meaning, foster
cooperation, and spark innovation.
Encouraging open, honest conversation through
work space design, setting ground rules for
conversing productively,
and baking conversation into the corporate culture
spread intellectual capital, improve cooperation,
and strengthen personal relationships.
Jay Cross, Informal Learning
Conversation is a meeting of minds
Conversation is a meeting of minds with
different memories and habits.
When minds meet, they don't just exchange
facts: they transform them, reshape them,
draw different implications from them,
engage in new trains of thought.
Conversation doesn't just reshuffle the
cards: it creates new cards.
Theodore Zeldin
Conversation
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9. KM is about understanding
For all our knowledge, we have no idea what
we're talking about.
We don't understand what's going on in our
business, our market, and our world.
KM shouldn’t be about helping us to know
more. It should be about helping us to
understand.
So, how do we understand things? It's through
stories that we understand how the world
works.
David Weinberger, The Cluetrain Manifesto
Dialogue
The kind of conversation I’m
interested in is one in which you
start with a willingness to emerge a
slightly different person.
Theodore Zeldin
Conversation
Principles of Dialogue
• Suspend assumptions, do not judge
• Observe & listen to one another
• Welcome differences & explore them
• Allow taboo subjects to be raised safely
• Listen to your inner voice
• Slow the discussion Dialogue is based on
the work of the physicist
• Search for the underlying meaning David Bohm
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10. Dialogue
Suppose we were able to share
meanings freely without a
compulsive urge to impose our
view or conform to those of others
and without distortion and self-
deception.
Would this not constitute a real
revolution in culture?
David Bohm, Physicist
Gurteen Knowledge Café Process
What’s the process?
• Speaker makes a short presentation 5 – 10 mins
• Poses a trigger question
• Small group conversations at tables
• Three rounds 10 – 15 mins
• Whole group conversation in a circle 15 mins
• Share actionable insights 15 mins
• Two hours in total
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11. The tables
People need to
be close
enough to touch
each other
Café Principles
• Relaxed, non-threatening, open conversation
• Close to a pub or café conversation
• No manipulation; no hidden agendas
• Everyone equal; no table leaders; no reporting back
• No one forced to do anything – OK to just listen
• Trust people to talk about what is important to them
• OK to go off-topic
• No summarization or attempt to reach consensus
• No capture of outcomes; no flip charts in the room
What are the outcomes?
• Outcomes are what you take away in your head
• Deeper understanding of the issues discussed
• Deeper insight into other people’s perspectives
• Better appreciation of your own point of view
• Improved relationships
• Position to make better decisions & to innovate
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12. The Café is not about
• Making decisions
• Gaining consensus
• Capturing stuff
• Making plans
• Manipulating people in some way
In conclusion
Conversation for Empowerment
• Conversation does many things
– Conversation improves understanding
– Conversation provides insights
– Conversation helps clarify situations
– Conversation builds relationships
– …
• When people engage in conversation they move from
being passive observers of the world and are inspired
to action. The energy it generates is amazing.
• Conversation is intrinsically empowering
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13. Kindling the fire
The mind isn’t a
vessel to be filled, it’s
a fire to be kindled.
Plutarch 46-120 AD
Greek Historian
Questions and Discussion
www.gurteen.com
David GURTEEN
Gurteen Knowledge
Fleet, United Kingdom
Tel: +44 7774 178 650
Email: david.gurteen@gurteen.com
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14. Licence
• You may use these slides under the following
Creative Commons Licence
• Attribution-Share Alike 2.0
• http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/uk/
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