Overcoming involuntary unemployment is a lonely, personal challenge at best. At its extreme, it immobilizes action. Self-esteem plummets. Depression rises. Its economic effects are painful. Unemployment interacts with all levels of family life and planning . It makes economic provision difficult, with significant disrupting of: basic daily necessities,; education; leisure ; and plans for retirement.
Research reflects shows that self-directed strategies focusing on the feelings generated by unemployment are ineffective in handling the downward spirals of economic deprivation. The consistent grit and determination necessary in tackling the ups and downs of economic renewal adds to the difficulty of achieving economic goals. The only effective leverage is a flexibly adaptive strategy of goal-directed action.
StoneSoup’s “Negotiating Transitions Together” initiative supports individuals in actively coping with unemployment’s economic tsunami. NTT is a supportive, task-driven platform for attaining goal-directed success. NTT operates from a team model that articulates strategies and attainable action steps. NTT provides a task-focused platform, responsive to participants’ specific sets of challenges and strengths. Negotiating Transitions Together offers consistent structure and support in: 1) continuing task-focus; 2)environmental assessment; and 3) effective results-oriented feedback necessary for new success and hope.
Sunday, October 26, 2008
StoneSoup?
StoneSoup gets its name from an old story about a group of soldiers returning home from the Napoleonic Wars. Hungry and without means, they rely on their capability for collaborative work, and in the process, bring material and emotional satisfaction to themselves and others. The setting is a war-torn village, with its traumatized population, hoarding their resources: little bits of food, against some future need. What the narrator doesn’t tell us, but what we know from reality- is that hoarded, unrefrigerated food rots- and that in the end, through understandable dynamics of self-protection and fear, everyone involved is going to starve.
The soldiers act to bring the villagers hope. They tell a story about a delicious meal of meat, vegetables, and steaming broth, which all can share. It develops as a function of a central belief: in a magical stone, placed in a large cauldron, volunteered by a villager.
The soldiers’ implicit knowledge- probably gained in the foxholes through the work of soldiering- of teamwork is instrumental in mobilizing the villagers’ pooling of their hidden resources with the yield of thriving rather than starving.
The StoneSoup Project works in a similar way: though instead of a stone, we rely on managerial and psychological research and practice.
The soldiers act to bring the villagers hope. They tell a story about a delicious meal of meat, vegetables, and steaming broth, which all can share. It develops as a function of a central belief: in a magical stone, placed in a large cauldron, volunteered by a villager.
The soldiers’ implicit knowledge- probably gained in the foxholes through the work of soldiering- of teamwork is instrumental in mobilizing the villagers’ pooling of their hidden resources with the yield of thriving rather than starving.
The StoneSoup Project works in a similar way: though instead of a stone, we rely on managerial and psychological research and practice.
Hearing the Tree Fall In the Forest
Are team consultations, based in accomplishing task goals and sub-goals, possible in the absence of formal organization?
The Accord Advisory Group’s StoneSoup Project says, “Yes!” However, the effort requires a catalyst, a common need. In a fast changing world, such imperatives may not be so difficult to find. They present themselves to us in the newspapers every day.
Business analysis of external threats and opportunities are continual. The perennial question is, “what to do?” In the absence of a formal business enterprise, the pragmatic answer is: organize!
That’s what StoneSoup sets out to do: we address challenge by turning an old adage on its head: to someone who has a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
Our conviction is that interpersonal engagement and the sharing of knowledge, supported by mentorship and facilitation, yields benefit to all involved.
So, while an organization might not have existed before, in addressing common need, a temporary organization may be guided into either short or longer lasting productivity, based on the willingness of its membership to contribute.
One of our projects is called, “Negotiating Transitions Together”. It focuses on supporting the determination of downsized individuals to re-shape their economic future. It emerged when we looked at the numbers: increasingly, people who were either downsized or retired beginning in their mid 40’s, were having a terrible time finding an “onramp” back to the workforce.
Then, the larger, global economic turbulence of 2008 expanded the pool of individuals seeking both relief from sudden economic uncertainty and productive preservation of their “knowledge capital”, their skills acquired over lifetimes of work.
The Accord Advisory Group’s StoneSoup Project says, “Yes!” However, the effort requires a catalyst, a common need. In a fast changing world, such imperatives may not be so difficult to find. They present themselves to us in the newspapers every day.
Business analysis of external threats and opportunities are continual. The perennial question is, “what to do?” In the absence of a formal business enterprise, the pragmatic answer is: organize!
That’s what StoneSoup sets out to do: we address challenge by turning an old adage on its head: to someone who has a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
Our conviction is that interpersonal engagement and the sharing of knowledge, supported by mentorship and facilitation, yields benefit to all involved.
So, while an organization might not have existed before, in addressing common need, a temporary organization may be guided into either short or longer lasting productivity, based on the willingness of its membership to contribute.
One of our projects is called, “Negotiating Transitions Together”. It focuses on supporting the determination of downsized individuals to re-shape their economic future. It emerged when we looked at the numbers: increasingly, people who were either downsized or retired beginning in their mid 40’s, were having a terrible time finding an “onramp” back to the workforce.
Then, the larger, global economic turbulence of 2008 expanded the pool of individuals seeking both relief from sudden economic uncertainty and productive preservation of their “knowledge capital”, their skills acquired over lifetimes of work.
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