by Clive Holtham and Nigel Courtney; Cass Business School, City of London

Background

The dialogue sheet is a mechanism for fostering shared understanding and consensus.

The origins of the Dialogue Sheet lie in the World Café movement that started around 1995 in the US and Denmark. The idea was to bring people together to debate a pre-agreed theme and set their own agenda. The events were hosted in meeting rooms decked out to resemble a café. Participants were divided into table-groups of up to six people who then used the paper tablecloths to record points made. These cloths were later photographed or transcribed as a permanent record. The pioneers assert that it has led to a learning journey for hundreds of thousands of people from corporations, NGO’s, health care organizations, government, and educational institutions on six continents (see http://www.theworldcafe.com ).

Jack Schou and fellow Danish consultants then developed the idea by using a pre-printed sheet to promote authentic dialogue in major change management exercises at SAS and Philips. Work at the Stockholm Schools Board enabled these consultants to introduce the concept to academics at. They shared it with the Wallenberg Global Learning Network for use at Stanford and four Swedish universities. This led, in 2002, to development by the Royal Technical College (KTH) in Stockholm of a dialogue sheet for new students (see http://kmr.nada.kth.se/papers/ConceptualModeling/IUT_New_methods.pdf ).

Cass researchers were introduced to this during collaboration at KTH and recognised that, if the core principles are preserved, a sheet can be tailored to suit almost any issue. Cass faculty and students have since created and successfully tested sheets for such widely differing subjects as Applied Knowledge Management, Derivatives trading, Youth training in Bermuda and ICT investment. Experience shows that it takes two to three months to develop, test and produce a new dialogue sheet.

Design principles:

The purpose of a table-top dialogue sheet is to catalyse an engaged discussion of an issue by groups of six to eight people who may not have met each other before.

Typically, a sheet will be created in PowerPoint software and printed on A0 or A1-sized 100 gsm white paper; colour is used sparingly if at all. A sheet should pose ten or so open-ended and stimulating questions that are directly relevant to the issue. These texts, perhaps including diagrams, are placed in sequence around the sheet in a board game fashion so that those in front of each seated participant are the ‘right way up’ for reading. The central area is a clear space for users’ notes or sketches. Provocative and ambiguous key words or phrases are printed around the perimeter.

The meeting room must be set out ‘cabaret style’ and tables of eight people should be filled one-by-one as people arrive. When everyone is seated, the person adjacent to the ‘Start here’ label on his/her sheet initiates proceedings by reading out to the group the very brief instructions under that label. Each participant also receives an A4 handout carrying the instructions on one side and a selection of apposite quotations on the reverse.

Questions can be addressed in any sequence preferred by the group. They can deal with as many as they choose and all participants are encouraged to write on the sheet. The person facing a selected question will read it out to the group and take the lead in note-taking of salient contributions. One question asks group members to consider the ambiguous sayings around the perimeter and decide upon one for deeper debate. Another question asks players to review the quotations on the handout and agree one for group discussion. A final question asks the group to rate, by consensus, their degree of satisfaction with the exercise. When several groups have been working simultaneously, the sheets are then displayed on a wall or screen for all participants to browse.

The QuBE Dialogue Sheet for Quality Management Enhancement

This example was developed for use by Heads of Department and aspiring Deans of UK business schools. It has been proven in tests by QuBE Partners on 16 March 06 and by delegates at the annual BMAF conference in Oxford on 7^th April 2006.

The table-top sheet is accompanied by a 2-page handout to give each participant a copy of the instructions and the quotes for question 7.

A PDF of the QuBE dialogue Sheet for printing in A0 or A1 size and a PDF of the accompanying A4 handout are available for download.