Solution Focused Management

Mark McKergow Steve de Shazer - a Different Kind of Cleverness (p. 17-18)

I first met Steve in 1994 at the Interaction View conference in Palo Alto, California. Although I did not know it at the time, this was a milestone event in the development of interactional and systemic ideas - one of the few times where the Mental Research Institute group (Paul Watzlawick, John Weakland and Dick Fisch amongst them) came together with the Solution-Focused therapy crowd led by Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg.

Steve and Insoo had trained at MRI two decades earlier, and had introduced new subtleties and simplicity into the MRI model - improvements, as they saw it. However, the link between the two centres was maintained by Steve's relationship with John Weakland, his supervisor and mentor. I next met Steve in London. My colleague Harry Norman had approached him for an interview, which we finally managed to do in London in 1995. I only discovered later that he was noted for not giving interviews, and that this was a great privilege. Steve was a keen brewer and beer drinker, and Harry had managed to interest him in sampling some 'medieval beer', brewed in tiny quantities to authentic recipes. This may have been the key to our success!

In the week before the interview Steve was leading a training in Solution-Focused Therapy, with a large audience (well over 100 people). Steve ambled onto the stage with a microphone, exhaled deeply as he always did before starting, and said..."So.. you'd better ask me some questions". A shiver went around the room. Surely he was the expert, and we wanted to be told what to do. Yet here he was, refusing to tell us. There was a silence. "Does it work with alcoholics?", came a question from the floor. "I don't know. Next question." "Does it work with personality disorders?" "I don't know. Next question." Several more diagnoses were mentioned, and each time the answer was the same - "I don't know".

I was amazed and disturbed. Here I was,

1;Preface;6
2;Contents;8
3;Introduction;12
3.1;Solution-Focused Management: Towards a Theory of Positive Differences;12
3.1.1;Summary;12
3.1.2;A concept spreads in the world of consulting and management;12
3.1.3;Towards a Theory of Positive Differences;13
3.1.4;The Principle of "Finding Differences" - what is different when it works?;14
3.1.5;The Interactional View;17
3.1.6;Social Construction of Meaning;20
3.1.7;Solution-Focused Management;20
3.1.8;REFERENCES;24
4;Principles of Solution-Focused Work in Management and Organisations;26
4.1;Steve de Shazer - a Different Kind of Cleverness;28
4.2;Constructing the Roots of Solution-Focused Practices;30
4.2.1;Summary;30
4.2.2;Becoming a both/and practitioner;31
4.2.3;Complex response processes;32
4.2.4;Conclusions;36
4.2.5;REFERENCES;36
4.3;"SF-Topology": mapping manageable solution components & contexts-;38
4.3.1;Summary:;38
4.3.2;Maps of maps and territories-;38
4.3.3;What's "a solution"? The linear parts -;39
4.3.4;Model Questions (for the linear part);41
4.3.5;Multiple causes and effects;42
4.3.6;Solutions - the reciprocal part -;43
4.3.7;Towards the core topology: combining the parts -;45
4.3.8;CORFU-questions;47
4.3.9;Some examples of applications:;47
4.3.10;Possible extensions of the model:;48
4.3.11;Conclusion;49
4.3.12;REFERENCES;50
4.4;Solution-Focused Transverbality: How to keep the Essence of the Solution-Focused Approach by extending it;52
4.4.1;Summary:;52
4.4.2;I ];52
4.4.3;II ];53
4.4.4;III ];53
4.4.5;IV ];54
4.4.6;V ];55
4.4.7;VI ];55
4.4.8;VII ];55
4.4.9;VIII ];57
4.4.10;IX ];58
4.4.11;X ];58
4.4.12;XI ];58
4.4.13;XII ];59
4.4.14;XIII ];62
4.4.15;REFERENCES:;63
4.5;Creating Attraction - Is there a hidden secret in the miracle question?;66
4.5.1;Summary;66
4.5.2;1. Establishing attraction: Creating a preferred future by distinguishing outcome, effects and benefits.;66
4.5.3;2. Experiencing attraction: discovering our own influence and

Günter Lueger looks for opportunities to do things in management differently. He specialises in designing and redesigning management instruments and paper work in companies in a solution-focused way. Innovations include Solution Focused Rating (SFR) and Solution-focused Management Instruments, like FMT, which allow more appreciative assessments and analysis in organisations (www.solutionmanagement.net, www.fit-management.at). / Hans-Peter Korn started to work as a scientist (PhD) in nuclear physics. He was then active in line- and project-management on different levels in power plant engineering, the financial industries, air transport industries and software engineering. Fascinated with systemic and solution-focused management in theory and practice, he started his own business as an OD- and PD-consultant (www.korn.ch).