concerns Archives

Discover where people are coming from and their expectations – Build greater awareness and ownership for the outcomes

Why take this challenge?

Clear the air and understand where people might be coming from.

Understand any initial differences in expectations.

Build greater awareness and ownership for the outcomes.

Simply build a shared understanding, a shared hope.

Graphic image reflecting different pathways to take the adventure

This weeks challenge for you and your team is called Hopes and Concerns.

At one level Hopes and Concerns is extremely simple. It is a flipchart divided down the middle, and people place their hopes on one side and their concerns on the other.

Hopes and concerns for what? Well it could be for anything: A meeting; the week ahead; a new project; the business; a change initiative – whatever.

However, its simplicity belies its power. Hopes and concerns is a great tool for: Aligning people behind objectives; surfacing hidden agendas; developing balanced perspectives; understanding each other; building ownership and getting things started.

If you are using a virtual whiteboard in your meeting, people can stick up their thoughts on sticky-notes, and then they can be grouped and discussed. Alternatively, you can use a virtual flipchart to capture contributions offered by the group verbally.

A couple of important tips that help ensure the quality of this exercise:

To get balanced contributions, get people to write down two of each silently, and confirm they have all done so before inviting them to stick them up or shout them out
Say to the group: “We’ll keep these visible so that we can all work toward fulfilling the hopes and avoiding the concerns”. In this way you share responsibility for them and make the desired outcomes more likely

Also, it there are any items on either list that you will not be able to do anything about. Simply make that clear from the outset, and say that we can pick it up again after the meeting.

+ Green track - taking it in your stride

What are your hopes & concerns?

Try hopes and concerns out for yourself. Download the hopes and concerns flipchart template (you will find a link to it in the pack section below) and consider an upcoming change you are facing personally. Start with the hopes, and write down at least 5 before you move onto the concerns.

We do this first to counter a human tendency to see the risks before the potential benefits. Then write down at least 5 concerns. And keep going until you think you have covered everything.

Then look at the list, and ask yourself how you are feeling about it. And whether there is anything else you could be doing now to make yourself more confident and comfortable about how this is going to pan out.

+ Blue track - a bit of a workout (click to open)

Exploring your team’s hopes & concerns

Repeat the green track exercise for the next meeting you are leading that is 90 minutes or more. Use the Hopes and Concerns exercise like a check in – asking each person in turn for a hope and a concern, and adding them to the board or flipchart. Then ask if there are any other hopes or concerns which people have, that are not yet included.

If you are not a very experienced facilitator, ask the group simply to keep these things in mind as we progress through the meeting, so that we can all help realise the hopes of our colleagues, and protect against their concerns.

If, on the other hand, you are quite skilled and confident in facilitation. Then ask the group whether it would be useful to make any adjustments to the agenda to best meet these. Or whether they are happy to keep the agenda as it is and pick any issues up at the end. (The latter is the most likely response. But, if you get the former, at least you are then in a position to resolve any issues of expectations or politics before the meeting starts).

+ Red track - stepping up to bat (click to open)

Building a hopes & concerns habit

Having tried hopes and concerns on yourself, and in a meeting, the next step is to extend its use to other things.

Think forward to events, activities and situations where it might be useful to: Clear the air and understand where people might be coming from; Understand any initial differences in expectations; Build greater awareness and ownership for the outcomes; Simply build a shared understanding, a shared hope.

And then put it into use in those situations where you feel it will add value.

You may find the following resources helpful in tackling your challenge or in gaining further benefits from the skills and insights you develop

Explanation of Hopes & Concerns
Hopes and concerns virtual flipchart – PowerPoint file
Whiteboard template for Hopes & Concerns – Conceptboard

To catch up on past adventures you may have missed, feel free to browse our Adventures Library

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Useful links:

Introduction to Leading by Adventure  |  What we mean by spirituality?  |  Why Adventure
Adventures to date   |  I did it, but it didn’t work very well   |  How do I know if it is working
Bringing this thinking into your meetings   |  Adventure & Mental Health
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