The Circle Way: A Leader in Every Chair (Paperback)
Description
All modern group processes that are open to collaboration or to flattening the hierarchy are based in some way on circle practices. As organizations of all kinds move increasingly toward shared and rotating leadership, they are calling on the circle model to form sustainable teams and adopt circle-driven group processes such as World Café, Open Space, and Art of Hosting. Meetings in the round have become the preferred tool for moving individual commitment into group action.
This book lays out the structure of circle conversation, based on the original work of the co-authors who have studied and standardized the essential elements that constitute circle practice. It takes readers through a circle visual (the Components of Circle) and presents both structure and story so that readers understand how these elements come into play and how they interrelate and interact. It also embeds circle process experience in stories and examples drawing on the authors’ 15 years of experience as global thought leaders and originators of this form, and it presents detailed instructions and suggestions for getting started, setting goals, and solving conflicts.
About the Author
Christina Baldwin is a writer and seminar presenter of 30+ years experience. She is the author of Life’s Companion: Journal Writing as a Spiritual Practice, revised and reissued in 2007 after 100,000 original sales as well as Calling the Circle: The First and Future Culture, The Seven Whispers: Spiritual Practice for Times Like These, and Storycatcher, Making Sense of our Lives through the Power and Practice of Story.
Ann Linnea is writer and educator with decades of experience serving the art of dialogue . Ann co-authored the award-winning Teaching Kids to Love the Earth, and Deep Water Passage: A Spiritual Journey at Mid-Life, which her self-imposed challenge to become the first woman to circumnavigate Lake Superior by sea kayak. In 1994, Ann and author/educator Christina Baldwin co-founded their educational company, PeerSpirit, Inc.
Foreword author Margaret Wheatley is a management consultant and author of bestselling Turning to One Another, and Leadership and The New Science, among others.
Praise for The Circle Way: A Leader in Every Chair…
“A perfect travel guide for all who are committed to making the world a better place. The circle deserves to become an independent field of study, and this book gets that going. Read it.’
—Peter Block, author of Stewardship, Flawless Consulting, and Community
“This superb book, put into practice, can transform the way you work and live.”
—Parker J. Palmer, founder, Center for Courage & Renewal, and author of A Hidden Wholeness, Let Your Life Speak, and The Courage to Teach
2012 Chuckanut Writers Conference
