ReteamingA solution-focused roadmapfor personal and organizationaldevelopment
Ben Furmanwith Tapani Ahola
Helsinki Brief Therapy Institute
FOREWORD
1. WHAT IS RETEAMING?
2. WHAT’S SPECIAL ABOUT RETEAMING?
3. THE FIVE FACTORS OF MOTIVATION
4. AN OVERVIEW OF RETEAMING
5. RETEAMING PROCESS STEP BY STEP
6. RETEAMING IN PROBLEM-SOLVING
7. PERSONAL RETEAMING IN SMALL GROUPS
8. RETEAMING IN WORKING WITH TEAMS
9. AFTER THE STORM - reteaming in helping organizations recover from major major changes
10. SURVIVING APPRAISALS - dealing with the results of work environment appraisals
11. MINI-RETEAMING
12. RETEAMING IN OVERCOMING MISFORTUNES IN LIFE
13. RETEAMING WITH CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS
FURTHER INFORMATION ABOUT RETEAMING
Foreword
We, Tapani Ahola, trained as a social psychologist, and myself, trained as a psychiatrist, have been working together since 1985 as teachers of brief solution-focused therapy. In the 90’s our work started to expand and we soon found ourselves working no longer only with conventional therapy clients, that is individuals and families facing problems, but also with larger units, such as teams, units of companies, and even entire organizations.
We found that in order to work with these larger units, we didn’t have to change much of the way in which we had become used to working with individuals and families. The very same principles were suited, surprisingly well, to working with teams and groups of people.
The principles of solution-focused therapy are quite simple. Instead of focusing on the problems of the client, a solution-focused therapist focuses on questions revolving around progress. The task of the therapist is to help clients define for themselves what specific changes, or goals would constitute progress, and to identify any indication of progress towards those goals that has already taken place. Also detecting resources, information about anything that may help clients achieve their goals, is an integral part of the solution-focused approach. The model is based on the philosophical assumption that clients actually possess, beyond their immediate awareness, feasible ideas of how their problems can be solved; the task of the therapist being that of helping them to become aware of these ideas, and to coaching them in putting the ideas into practice.
As we gained experience of working in a solution-focused way in organizations we felt a need to share our findings with colleagues, students, and professionals struggling to find a way of working teams and other larger groups of people. We were encouraged by the fact that we had embarked on a model of working that was commonsensical, consistent, and sequential, following a fixed number of steps.
To share our way of working with others we produced a fancy spiral bound workbook which included cartoons to illustrate each of the steps. The workbook was specifically designed for teambuilding, for groups of people working together interested in improving their functioning and their ability to cooperate with one another. This workbook was entitled “reteaming”, a shorthand that we coined to refer to our stepwise process of helping groups of people working together to improve their functioning. The prefix “re” reflected the observation that reorganizations, whether due to mergers or other reasons, often had a negative impact on the functioning of teams and work groups. It was in particular under these circumstances that we had been recruited to help teams restore their functioning. Hence, the name reteaming.
The reteaming process consists of twelve steps. It is a generic process that can be used not only in working with teams in need of improving their functioning but any group of people in need of changing, improving or developing something. In fact, we soon found that the reteaming process was not only good for teams and groups of people. The process was also applicable when working with individuals in need of changing, improving, learning or developing something. We realized that we had come a full circle. We had taken off with the intent of discovering an approach to working with organizations based on solution-focused therapy and had ended up with describing a simple and stepwise process that was applicable for working with individuals, groups as well as larger organizations.
We also found that the reteaming process lent itself perfectly to for teaching solution-focused psychology, to allow students to have a first hand experience of the solution-focused approach to making changes in one’s life. It was a way of providing students with a personal hands-on experience of projecting oneself to one’s future, of setting goals and specifying them, of boosting motivation, of increasing confidence, and above all, of inviting friends, family members, and other important persons to play an crucial part in the achievement of those goals.
This manual is written for coaches, consultants, and therapists interested in understanding the reteaming process and in finding out how it can be used in different settings and with different kinds of clients. You will find, however, that understanding the steps of reteaming is also useful for managers steering change processes and, in fact, for anyone of us wishing to mobilize the motivation necessary for accomplishing a change in our personal lives.
1. What is reteaming?
It is not easy to define reteaming but here is our attempt of putting it into one sentence:
Reteaming is a generic, multipurpose method consisting of 12 steps intended to help individuals as well as groups of people to change for the better by facilitating setting of goals, and increasing motivation and enhancing cooperation needed to achieve them.
Let us explain what that means.
Reteaming is generic in the sense that it is just a skeleton, the bones without the muscles, the form without any content. It is scaffolding, a general and, in a way even universal structure that suits all kinds of situations where human beings have a need to change, to improve, or develop their functioning.
Reteaming is multipurpose in the sense that is applicable to a wide variety of situations in which there is a need to change or improving the way individuals or groups function. Reteaming is suitable, among other things, for problem solving, coaching, personal development, team building, change management, and organizational development.
Reteaming is a stepwise process consisting of 12 consecutive logical steps. In the first step of the process you develop a vision, a dream of how you would want things to be in the future, you then find a specific goal that will help you make that vision or dream come true… Most of the subsequent ten steps are designed to empower you to achieve your goal.
Reteaming is for individuals as well as groups of people. In the ears of most people the word reteaming refers to ‘team building’ or getting groups of people working together to “get back on track” or to improve their functioning. This, in fact, was the way in which we originally used the term but as time went by and we found that the very same steps applied also to working with individuals the term acquired a wider meaning and began to be used for both groups of people as well as single individuals.
Reteaming is for changing things for the better. Reteaming is a method for solving problems, for improving things, or developing matters. It is a tool intended for helping people set up projects to improve the way individuals or groups of people function.
Reteaming facilitates setting goals. Reteaming is a goal-oriented process. The first steps of the process are dedicated to identifying and clarifying a relevant goal to be achieved.
Reteaming increases motivation and enhances cooperation. The secret of the appeal of reteaming lays here, in its inherent tendency to boost motivation and to create among the person involved in the process a feeling of mutual appreciation and willingness to help and support each others.
2. What’s special about reteaming?
If you browse through a reteaming workbook or an illustrated outline of the 12-steps of reteaming, your first reaction could well be: “Well, what’s so special about this?” What you see does not seem that special or remarkable. After all, setting goals and taking steps to achieve them is the nuts and bolts of any system of counseling, coaching or consulting individuals or groups of people to improve their functioning. It may not be obvious at first but there actually is something special and unique about reteaming. Otherwise this book would not be warranted.
First of all, reteaming generates a lot of hope and optimism. Even individuals who are frustrated and demoralized tend to become hopeful and optimisticas they work their way through the steps of the reteaming process.
Secondly, reteaming builds motivation. We all know how to set goals and to make earnest plans of achieving them but if we lack in motivation, even the finest of goals will never be met in reality. Reteaming takes inconspicuously care of building up the motivation needed for getting where you want to go. Each and every step of the process is informed by a clear and concise understanding of motivation, one that you will soon become familiar with as you read on.
Thirdly, probably as a result of the relaxed mood generated by the process, reteaming also enhances creativity. A non-blaming atmosphere where participants feel no need to defend themselves, is conducive to the emergence of new ideas and willingness to share one’s ideas with others.
Last but not least, reteaming also enhances cooperation and concord between people. In reteaming change is seen as a collective process, something done together with others. Individuals, in order to change, need in most cases help, support and encouragement from other people. Reteaming ensures that goals are not set, nor achieved in seclusion. Other people such as friends, family and coworkers are assigned a crucial role in process. And when it comes to accomplishing changes within teams or organization, cooperation of the individuals involved is a prerequisite of any positive development. The process of reteaming strengthens, by design, ties between people and revives a sense of community.
It is possible to think of the positive effect of reteaming on the community as a bonus, or as a fortunate side-effect of the process.In our view, however, the contrary is more likely to be true: the positive effects of reteaming are, to a large extent, a result of the increased sense of community generated by the process.
3. The five factors of motivation
Before we go on to describing the 12 steps of the reteaming process, let us discuss the notion of motivation, the energy, the determination, or the driving force, that makes us want to do things and get them done.
The old dictum “if there’s a will there’s a way” puts it in a nutshell. The stronger your motivation is, the more determined you are to reach your goal, the more likely it is that you will succeed in reaching it.
So what is it that gives us motivation and makes us become determined to accomplish our goals? After all, it is not particularly difficult for any of us to know what we want to achieve. The true challenge lies in mobilizing the energy and determination needed to achieve it.
Inherent in reteaming there is a particularway of understanding motivation. According to this view there are five rules governing the motivation of achieving a given goal – be it getting the house cleaned or launching a rocket to the moon. These are:
1. You feel the goal is yours.
2. The goal is valuable to you.
3. You have confidence that you can make it.
4. You experience progress.
And last but not least,
5. You are prepared to deal with possible setbacks.
In other words, in order for you to be motivated to achieve a goal you first of all need to feel that the goal is yours, that is not only something someone else has told you to accomplish but something you have yourself decided or at least participated in deciding to accomplish.
Second, you need to be sure that the goal is valuable, that is truly something worth pursuing, something significant that will have several important positive consequences.
Third, you need be confident that the goal is within reach, that you possess the resources and the skills and have the support you need in order to achieve it.
Fourth, in order to keep our motivation up as you work on your project to achieve your goal, you will need to have the experience that you are making progress, that you are succeeding with what you do. In other words, if you fail to pay attention to your progress and overlook your successes, you run the risk of becoming frustrated and demoralized and loosing your motivation.
And last but not least, you should also be prepared to deal with possible obstacles or setbacks that may come your way. If you are not, the chances are that you will be taken aback and you will give up your determination to accomplish your goal.
Let’s illustrate these five points with an example. Imagine yourself in a situation in life where you wonder about getting married. If the idea is an expectation of your family but not something that you personally want, your motivation is likely to be weak. However, if the idea of marriage is your own, something that you personally want, your motivation to achieve that goal is on a whole different level.
Next, you need to think that getting married will have positive consequences. Perhaps you think you will be happier or your life will be more fulfilling. You may think about the joy of having children, who knows, even grandchildren playing on your knee. The more you can see positive outcomes in your mind’s eye, the more important the idea of marriage seems to you.
The vision of magnificent rewards does not, however, do the trick. You also need to have some confidence in being able to accomplish the task. In order to take action, you must be convinced that you capable of finding someone who may want to get married with you. You need to have faith, or good reasons to believe that you can attract someone to marry you.
We now assume that the goal of getting married is actually yours; that you have a clear idea of the goodies that it will bring; and that you don’t doubt that it would be possible for you to find someone to get married with. You are ready to move ahead, to take contact with potential spouses. In order for you to sustain your motivation, you need to experience some successes. Perhaps you succeed to meet a person, who might qualify as a potential spouse, or you move into a house that would easily accommodate another person to live with you. Whatever progress you make, it will be important for you in terms of keeping your motivation up, of indicating to you that you are on the right track, moving in the direction of church bells ringing.
And to play it safe, it is wise to be prepared for some setbacks. Even strong motivation can easily be shaken by setbacks or disappointments. Say, you find a perfect partner and the day comes when you are finally ready to propose. “Will you marry me my love,” you manage to say and then, instead of what you expect, a happy smile with “yes”, you get an uneasy facial expression and a convoluted speech about the importance of not rushing things. You have experienced a setback and it is of crucial importance how you handle it. Instead of allowing yourself to be let down, loosing your faith, and calling the whole thing off, it would, in most cases, be advisable to be prepared for some such indecisiveness, to be patient and find a good way of dealing with it.
Letting the dough rise
Metaphorically speaking motivation is a bit like baking bread where the final move of putting the dough inside the oven is preceded by the steps of mixing the ingredients, kneading the dough and allowing the dough to rise.
In this metaphor, putting the bread in the oven represents taking action in order to achieve one’s goal. In order for the bread to come out right, for the action to work, there are a number of motivation boosting steps to be taken in order to ensure that the action will work.
First you need to make a decision about what kind of bread you want to make and mix the required ingredients to make the dough. That corresponds to generating an idea of how you want things to be in the future and what will be the goal that you aspire to accomplish. You then need to give the dough time to rise which corresponds to building up the motivation needed to for the goal to be attained.
Building motivation – or allowing the dough rise – is central in reteaming. Before you set out to take action to achieve your goal you explore a number of subject matters which will have the effect of strengthening your motivation. You will, for example, chart the various benefits of the goal, identify persons who may helpful to you, detect your own resources, and recognize progress already made.
Reteaming is seemingly a sensible method for helping people set and achieve goals but at closer look you will find that it is more than that. It is a step by step procedure of enhancing motivation and building cooperation between the people who are relevant to the achievement of the goal.
4. An overview of reteaming
Before we go on to explaining in more detail each of the 12 steps of reteaming let us first present you an outline of the steps.