leader as coach (lac hub) community meeting 

LAC Hub – Coach for Life

How can the LAC hub run more smoothly and effectively?
Leader as coach community (LAC hub) is a community of coaches who are committed leaders, either in their company or in their community. After over 6 months of working and learning together, they wanted to set intentions and actions for the next 6 months. At the same time, the community wants to invite more participation, co-creation, and collaboration from its members.

As co-creation and collaboration are the key outcomes, we invite the team to practice those principles with us from the very beginning. Together with the core team of LAC hub, we help define focus areas to work on by setting up interviews and surveys before the meeting to understand where the members are in terms of needs, satisfaction, and frustrations. We co-design the meetings with the core team and make sure that the design allows the participants to work together as much as possible and make use of the collective wisdom. Through interactive games and simple frameworks (like Triple A Feedback), the team reflects on their collaboration, what works and what needs to be adjusted. We use graphic facilitation and graphic recording to help the participants keep track of their own discussion and make sure that all important information is documented in a clear and useful way.

The result is a clear template of next steps, people in charge and timeline, with excitement to implement. The team also learns how meetings can be interactive and participatory. They decide to invite more people from the community to contribute by opening up their meetings and establishing more chances for co-creation.

Building a resilient and energized workplace

The United Nations Development Programme Viet Nam

Duration: 3-day retreat in 2020, 2022, and 2023

The United Nations Development Programme has been playing a critical role in helping Vietnam to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. Tackling immense challenges like inequality and climate change, their work is complex and demanding.

The office has around 100 people, and every year they only have one chance to come together at their annual retreats. This is the time to deepen connections as well as co-creating plans for a resilient and energized workplace.

We have designed and hosted three retreats for the UNDP, and every year the program was modified to meet that year’s focus. For example in 2020, their office was building the 5-year country vision, so the main outcomes were to get the team’s feedback and help them align with the plan. Then in 2022, after two years with the pandemic, the office needed to build resilience to face such unexpected and complex challenges.

With every year’s design, we maximize the participation of every member, making sure all voices are heard, and tapping into the collective wisdom of the whole team. We also invite members of the retreat committee to co-design and facilitate the sessions that they best understand.

After each retreat, the office feels recharged and has a concrete action plan to prototype for the coming year.

Reflection and Future Planning for Innovation

CSIRO – Australia 4 Innovation

Aus4Innovation is a development assistance program that aims to strengthen Vietnam’s innovation system and help shape the country’s innovation agenda in science and technology. The program is managed by CSIRO—Australia’s National Science Agency.

After five years and $16.5 million dollars, the program is extended for double the amount of time and money. The A4I team needs a space to connect and celebrate their achievements, as well as create plans for the next phase of their work.

Location: Ha Long, Quảng Ninh

Duration: one-day workshop

Even though consists of only a dozen people, the A4I team is quite diverse; their members are based across three continents with backgrounds ranging from scientists to policy advisors. This will be the first time many of them meet face to face. Therefore DDL places extra emphasis on helping them build connections as a team. Activities like storytelling and collaboration games deepen the relationship as well as help them celebrate their achievement.

To help the group build the vision, we guide them through a 3D mapping process, where their complex project is physically represented as a sculpture. From there the team can see the knots and pain points in their collaboration, as well as finding creative pathways for the future.

The team has greater appreciation for the similarities and differences among themselves. They also identify key challenges to work on for the next phase on the program

Co-creating the path forward with team flow game

Client: Coach for Life

Entering a new year with the task of reflecting and planning for a new cycle seems daunting for the team. So they decide to do something differently: experimenting with a process that invites more playfulness, creativity and collective wisdom.

We introduce Flow Game as a tool to reflect on their current situation with different perspectives, and open up possibilities by tapping into personal and collective intelligence. By putting the purpose of the organization in the center, each member learns to share their points of views with a lens of contributing to the whole.

By the end of the game, the team was more clear on their shared goal, but also on their personal intention and commitment toward that goal. They also come up with a list of actions to prioritize and a list of ideas and potentials visualized.