This document discusses using conversation to increase innovation, improve group performance, and share knowledge. It provides tips for having more innovative conversations, including making individuals smarter through discussion, being open to new ideas, taking equal turns in discussions, and bringing together diverse groups of people. The document emphasizes that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts when it comes to group work, and that new ideas often emerge through casual conversations rather than solitary work. It also stresses the importance of online collaboration and using tools like microblogging and networking sites to connect people.

1. The Innovation Conversation:
All of us are smarter than any of us
Keith De La Rue
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dragunsk/

2. Using conversation to:
• Make us individually smarter
• Improve group performance
• Increase innovation
• … and share knowledge!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/antonymayfield/

3. Getting there
• Individual performance
• Openness to change
• The power of groups
• Innovative places
• Getting people together
• Online spaces
• Putting it all together
• … Have a conversation and have some fun!

4. Individual Performance
Table 7
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-n4eSIsr2c

5. Activity – Introductions
• Introduce yourself by giving:
– Your name
– Where you were born
– One interesting true statement about yourself
– One false statement about yourself
– (Not necessarily in that order!)
• The rest of the group will decide which is which

6. Introductions
• Have you got to know people better now?
• Did you discover any false preconceptions?
• How does this help with performance?...

7. http://www.flickr.com/photos/zoetnet/
Friends with cognitive benefits
- Ybarra et al, 2010
Talking to others improves individual
mental function

8. Brief, friendly conversations
improve executive function -
working memory, focus
http://www.flickr.com/photos/chipgriffin/

9. Put yourself in other shoes
http://www.flickr.com/photos/zoonabar/

10. The Johari Window
© Alan Chapman 2003 http://www.businessballs.com/johariwindowmodeldiagram.pdf

11. Openness to Change

12. Conversation
doesn't just reshuffle
the cards: it creates new cards
– Theodore Zeldin
From David Gurteen - http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/theodore-zeldin

13. Activity – Changes
• Form into groups of two
• Spread around the room
• Wait for further instructions…

14. Changes
• Stand face to face
• How many things can you change in your
appearance?
• Look at your partner
• Turn back to back and change three things in
your appearance
• Turn face to face and take turns identifying the
three changes
• Then…

15. Changes
• How did you feel?
• How easy was it to find three changes?
• Does change always mean taking away?
• How easy is change?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/sookie/

16. "...The kind of
conversation I'm
interested in is one which
you start with a
willingness to emerge a
slightly different person.
It is always an
experiment, whose
results are never
guaranteed. It involves
risk. It's an adventure in
which we agree to cook
the world together and
make it taste less bitter"
http://www.flickr.com/photos/88691054@N00/

17. In conversation we…
Transform facts
Reshape them
Draw new implications
Develop new trains of thought

18. We must be open…
http://www.flickr.com/photos/timpatterson/
“We risk
impoverishing
ourselves if we
ignore the personal”
- Gurteen

19. http://www.flickr.com/photos/atomicjeep/
Conversation is intrinsically creative

20. … If we are prepared to change.
The way we talk shapes what we do
If we talk differently, life can be more interesting
http://www.flickr.com/photos/aturkus/

21. Positive language
Words > Pictures > Emotions > Actions
Anyone have children around?
“Don’t spill the milk!”
“Don’t take out all the pencils!”
“Don’t forget…”
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8431398@N04/

22. So which gives the clearer picture?
https://www.flickr.com/photos/58071821@N04/

23. The Power of Groups
The Courage Beer Conversations Survey
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_r9Quv4o5Q

24. Evidence for a Collective Intelligence Factor in
the Performance of Human Groups
- Woolley et al, 2010

25. Ability to perform group tasks
Independent of individual intelligence
Whole greater than sum of parts
Based from how the team works together
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gregloby/

26. Collective intelligence
Social sensitivity
http://www.flickr.com/photos/36238874@N02/
Equal turns
No domination

27. Women and conversation
More sensitivity
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cmi_managers/

28. Leadership
challenge:
facilitation,
not control
Not easy for hierarchical organisations
- or rugged individualists
http://www.flickr.com/photos/http2007/

29. Discussion – Meetings
• When have meetings failed?
• When have they worked well?
• Would they have worked better if these patterns
were followed?

30. Innovative Places
The Geography of Genius
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnaPHWFh8DE

31. The recipe
• Mentors
• Freshness
• Chaos
• Discernment
• Diverse groups of people
getting together
https://www.flickr.com/photos/cuttingboard/

32. The Enlightenment – C18
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_Enlightenment

33. Social Entrepreneurs – C21
http://socialmelb.com/

34. Casual Conversation
• Steve Jobs bought Pixar in 1986
• Designed single building with large open space
• Moved key functions to atrium
– Mailboxes
– Meeting rooms
– Cafeteria and coffee bar
– Gift shop
– Bathrooms
• “Best ideas arrive when having a chat”

35. Getting People Together
Where Good
Ideas Come From
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NugRZGDbPFU

36. Innovation – the Eureka moment?
Progress is more about
one door leading to
another door
Sharing and recombining
ideas
-> Conversation
http://www.flickr.com/photos/karrienodalo/

37. http://www.flickr.com/photos/gastev/
… Don’t isolate the genius in the laboratory!
The adjacent possible: eg printing press
The multiple

38. Expect the unexpected
The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the
one that heralds new discoveries, is not ‘Eureka’
but ‘That’s funny...’
- Isaac Asimov
New ideas in science
emerge more from
lab meetings than
from solitary research
- Kevin Dunbar
http://www.flickr.com/photos/karlfrankowski/
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/12/fail_accept_defeat/

39. Casual Discovery
Spanning boundaries
https://www.flickr.com/photos/avlxyz/

40. Wisdom of crowds – cognitive problems
Diverse membership
Members thinking independently
Knowledge pooled
http://www.flickr.com/photos/24888116@N06/
From: James Surowiecki

41. https://twitter.com/ValaAfshar/status/731328508832690176
http://pm.gc.ca/eng/news/2016/01/20/canadian-opportunity-address-right-honourable-justin-trudeau-prime-minister-canada

42. Get people together in conversation
http://www.flickr.com/photos/MrTopf/
Community

43. Conversational tools
http://www.flickr.com/photos/44709316@N03/

44. Conversations for knowledge sharing
and innovation – the Café…
http://www.flickr.com/photos/stephanridgway/

45. A Tale of Two Cafés
World CaféWorld Café Knowledge CaféKnowledge Café
Started 1995 Started 2002
Community focus Business focus
Uses community language Uses business language
Addresses social issues Addresses business issues
Defined structure Adaptable structure
Uses Table Hosts No Table Hosts
Results “harvested” Knowledge surfaced
http://delarue.net/blog/2011/06/a-tale-of-two-cafes/

46. Discussion – Conversational tools
• What tools does your organisation use?
• When have they worked well?
• How could they work better?

47. Online
Spaces
We Think
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiP79vYsfbo

48. Microblogging
https://www.yammer.com/

49. Networking, awareness, chat
http://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/323447999676/
Any conversation helps!

50. Discussion – Online spaces
• What online spaces does your organisation use?
• When have they worked well?
• How could they work better?

51. Putting it all Together

52. Activity – Knowledge Café
• All except one person at each table move to a
different table – choose the people who are
the most different to you
• Discuss:
How can we use what we have learntHow can we use what we have learnt
about conversation to makeabout conversation to make
our workplace more innovative?our workplace more innovative?
• Discuss for 10 minutes, then move to another
table with a different group of people
• Wrap up with open discussion

53. http://ozcollab.com/
Conversations help us to …
… find the missing pieces

54. … face complexity in organisations
http://www.flickr.com/photos/odreiuqzide/

55. … engage people
https://www.flickr.com/photos/minubeit/

56. Five rules for more
innovative conversations
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bytemarks/

57. Have we all been introduced
and learned about each other?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lionheartphotography/

58. Is everyone open
and willing to
change?

59. Are we being
sensitive to each
other and taking
equal turns?

60. Is the talk friendly and constructive?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ryanready/

61. Do we have sufficiently diverse viewpoints?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/untitlism/

62. Knowledge workers are
simply those people whose
job consists of having
interesting conversations
David Weinberger, The ClueTrain Manifesto
@kdelarue
0418 51 7676
keith@delarue.net
http://acknowledgeconsulting.com/