Ten Fundamentals of Process Consulting: Fundamental #9

Dear friends,

Born from the foundational texts of the humble inquiry and process approach, the Ten Fundamentals of Process Consulting are designed to help us understand the theory and practice of being in the Process Consulting mindset.

Whether you are a Process Consultant helping a Client, a CEO leading a team, a department head bringing together leaders to solve an emerging challenge, embodying these fundamentals can be helpful to you in charting your course. For the sake of this series of blogs, we will be using the profession of Process Consulting as our lens. Knowing full well that these fundamentals are practiced by anyone seeking to help another human.

Expressed in the triad below, the ten fundamentals form our DNA as Process Consultants. They are a starting point in our work with others and our traits as we prepare to show up in service to them. In this way, they are distinct and set apart from the core competencies of Process Consulting.

Integrating the ten fundamentals into your leadership is a lifelong journey that will help you become exemplary in their practice.

Leading up to the Society for Process Consulting’s inaugural conference in a few short weeks, we offer these fundamentals for your use, iteration, and adaptation, modeling our willingness to improve, learn, and grow as humans through this publication.

The Process Consultant joins with the Client in not knowing what to do exactly, especially as the Client faces adaptive and/or complex change.[1] The Process Consultant brings these fundamental elements alongside the Client to design steps (the process) they will follow to go from where they believe they are to where they want to be. The Process Consultant asks, What do you need to do? Followed by What are you willing to do? In partnership with the Client, the Process Consultant listens, then helps, and then learns. [2]

When a Client and a Process Consultant innovate together it can lead to wisdom. Picking up from last week's story, both me and my Client were at a loss as to what to do. We were about to learn together. Her VP of HR had just resigned earlier in the week, her director of payroll had left two months ago and she was at a loss. Not only in what to do next, but more importantly why these two key leaders had left. 

So we started brainstorming ways to innovate the office in the short, mid-, and long-term. This opened up several new avenues of thinking that leveraged our past experiences and learnings. After about 30 minutes of mapping out potential paths to take, we stepped back to consider the wisdom of each opportunity. Which one is needed in the present moment? Which path honors what we have learned? Which opportunity will strengthen the department and the larger organization?

Innovation from a posture of curiosity is a powerful tool that allows wisdom to emerge and be used conscientiously.

If you have any comments about fundamental #9, please don’t hesitate to email me. I’d love to learn your prospective. Please watch this space for the 10^th fundamental next week.

We will be reviewing all ten fundamentals at the Society’s upcoming conference on 11 - 12 November 2024 in Philadelphia. Please sign up through this link today!

As always, if you’d like to learn more about the Society for Process Consulting, please don’t hesitate to give me a call.

Best,

Lon Swartzentruber

Interim CEO Society for Process Consulting

[1] Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire, page 89-90. Penguin Random House, 1993.

[2] Listening Helping Learning, Mark L. Vincent, page 18. Tenth Power Publishing, 2022.

Please take a moment to learn more about the Society's upcoming conference.

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