Exploring Difference 2019 TORONTO

We are pleased to present the 3rd annual Exploring Difference workshop, an experiential group workshop in the Tavistock tradition. Join us for this two-and-a-half-day workshop as we work to make sense of difference, authority, and irrationality, developing a “curious regard” for rethinking equity. The workshop will take place from April 26-28 at the University of Toronto. Register by April 15, 2019 to secure your place.

Director's invitation

We are in a time of increasing inequality, painful exclusions and polarizing conflicts, violence and rupture. And at the same time new and creative work is arising in our communities, networks and organizations. New connections are being forged and some new ideas are taking hold. Now more than ever before, we need to:

explore and find new ways to connect with one another through and across our differences;
think anew about who we are and what we are trying to accomplish;
practice what we call curious regard – recognizing systemic and structural inequalities while nonetheless pursuing connectedness.

The Exploring Difference Workshop offers an opportunity to openly and intentionally study ourselves and others in real-time groups. It is not therapy but rather a learning opportunity to develop insight in an immediate and direct way about our own experience, feelings, and thoughts. Through here-and-now and reflective experiences, the Workshop is intensive and challenging. It offers the opportunity for insight about how we can make sense of the differences with which we must contend.

Come join us as we work to study difference and authority and the complexities of curious regard. Join us to sharpen awareness about what is happening inside and around us to build stronger impacts for the world we need.

Learning opportunities

The Exploring Difference workshop and ICI method offers the opportunity to study:

How we explore, defend, rely on difference to make sense of ourselves and others – including but not limited to race, class, gender, age, ethnicity, sexual orientation, education levels, and occupation.
How we block or enable curious regard.
How we join and engage in groups, resist or passively comply with authority, and develop roles and identities.
How we take up and resist the freedom to think and learn.
Explore the difference between the stated task of a group’s work and the task it appears to pursue.
How we contribute to and obstruct getting the group’s work accomplished.
How members of a group exercise authority, power and influence in meaningful and appropriate ways — both as leaders and as followers.
How we apply what is learned after the Workshop.

Events

Workshop Opening: The opening welcomes members and consultants and presents the design, underlying concepts, roles and administrative details.

Storytelling groups – Large and Small (STG): The task is to explore a difference dilemma that you experience now in your life in small and large group exchanges, with the view to reviewing how or if this dilemma shifts over the workshop.

Here & Now Events
Small Study Group (SSG): is comprised of 5+ members and 1-2 consultants. The task of the Small Study Group is to study difference and authority in the here and now as they unfold in face-to-face exchange.

Large Study Group (LSG): is comprised of all conference members and 2-3 consultants. The task of the Large Study Group is to study difference and authority in the here and now as they unfold with limited face-to-face exchanges.

Reflection Events
Role Analysis Group (RAG): comprised of 5+ members and 1-2 consultants, where the task is to examine the roles you have taken up, been assigned, or found yourself playing and experimented with and the differences you saw as the conference progresses.

Application Group (AG): 5+ members and 1-2 consultants. At the close of the Workshop, the AG Application Groups provide you with the opportunity to review and discuss the meaning of the events of the conference, your dilemma, and how to apply your learnings to outside roles and organizations. This offers a bridge between the here and now workshop experiences and the dynamics of life outside of the Workshop.

Workshop schedule

Friday, April 26: 4:15-8:30 PM
Saturday, April 27: 9:00-7:00 PM
Sunday, April 28: 9:00-4:00 PM

Schedule is subject to change. A full daily agenda will be shared in the days prior to the workshop.