Helping is Partnership

In Walking Alongside, Design Group International consultants highlight the 12 competencies of process consulting within our core values of Listening, Helping, and Learning. In the next few months, we will take a deeper look into the competencies of Helping and tell stories to illustrate helping that is Client-Centered, Client- Owned/Inspired, Client-Specific, and how helping results in Client Success.

The first competency of Helping is Client-Centered. A helper may also think of this helping quality as person-centered.

Client-centered or person-centered helping means placing the focus on the other—putting at the center the people and organization receiving help—rather than centering on the helper's ideas of what is needed. The helper listens to their concerns, needs, hopes, and dreams, creating a partnership by joining them where they are and helping them move to where they intend to go.

Client/person-centered helping is not

• dispensing advice which circumvents the other person's engagement and learning.
  
• merely research and directing. Though gathering data is important, an organization's learning is foregone when people are simply surveyed, advised, and directed, and not included as partners in the discovery process of designing a solution.
  
• checking off a box by selecting a solution to get it done quickly.

A leader I'm working with was seeking help for his organization's capital campaign. He was new to the organization, and as an action-oriented leader, was eager to begin. He is also within an organizational system that moves quickly towards solutions. But the design process often needs to slow down, so the best solutions have time to emerge. Instead of focusing immediately on designing a campaign, I began listening for the "why" behind this desire.

By placing the leader at the center of our consultative relationship and focusing on his leadership, he recognized that he needed to develop his own voice, independent of previous administrators. To create more agency in his leadership, he was willing to slow down and review the mission, vision, and core values—the organization's core documents. We invited other stakeholders—the administrative team, employees, Board of Directors, and constituents to re-articulate these documents, and a new vision statement formed from this process. As the leader partners with key people in the organization, a new strategic plan is now emerging.

A capital campaign will ultimately result from taking the time to center on this leader, thereby building his capacity to flourish. I offered no quick solution to accomplish the task—no dispensing advice to bypass engagement and organizational learning. Together, we are participating with other stakeholders in the (sometimes messy) work needed to undergird a successful campaign—a robust strategic plan inspired by a compelling new vision.

When helping is a partnership centered on the person being helped and learning together what is needed, the person's agency and leadership are elevated. They are then empowered to partner with others, bringing them along in moving the organization toward transformational change.

To learn more about client-centered helping and how it can strengthen your organization, please contact me through the link below.

Walking alongside you,

Rose Shetler
Design Group International
Senior Design Consultant

Dig Deeper:
Want to explore more on this topic? Take a look at these resources

• Helping: How to Offer, Give, and Receive Help, Edgar H. Schein
  
• Humble Inquiry: The Gentle Art of Asking Instead of Telling, Edgar H. Schein
  
• Putting Customers at the Center of Design, Tara Malone
  
• Consulting is More Than Giving Advice, Arthur N. Turner
  

Process Consulting competencies identified and implemented through
the Society for Process Consulting.