In a rapidly changing and challenging world, organisations are constantly being shaped and altered, influencing their members knowingly and unknowingly with their cultures and often tacit assumptions and norms. Members in turn approach organisations with their own experience, values and expectations. Both as we have seen during the Covid Pandemic are deeply impacted by the wider environment - the contexts in which they exist. These domains of organisational experience exert a powerful undertow on human behaviour at work. In this turbulent context organisations are constantly adapting and evolving to keep pace with wider social, political, economic change as well as technological developments. Innovations at work bring benefits but also challenges. The boundaries and assumptions we live-by are suddenly more porous more fluid changing rapidly unpredictably.

 

Oscillating demands requires a simultaneous connection, disconnection and reconnection with our own values sentience, and aspirations. This at times can mean holding differing and discordant perspectives simultaneously to find and establish what is useful and valuable in contemporary organizational life. Increasingly the working environment is transient - more ‘agile’ more ‘fluid’ and we navigate in this increasingly complex environment towards a horizon that is also shifting and changing. This requires a capacity to examine both what we know, what we value and what we feel. Balancing both tradition and innovation to find a sustainable and effective way forward.

 

This conference provides an opportunity and invitation to participants to engage in a temporary learning institution to explore at a deeper level the frequently disorienting and contradictory experiences of group and organizational life.

 

It is perhaps more urgent than ever to understand the part we (can) play, individually and collectively, in groups, organisations and society and to explore at a particular moment in time the impact on our own ‘organisations in the mind’.

 

What is a Group Relations Conference?

A Group Relations Conference is an experiential event which develops in depth understanding of relationships in professional life. Conference activities explore issues such as individual and professional identity, power and authority, while considering the opportunities and limitations of taking up a role in the process of working to a task.

 

The conference will assist participants to explore and understand more fully the complexity of individual and organisational identity within an uncertain context. Conference participants are supported to apply those insights to their professional practice, their work with and within organisations, and their interactions in society.

 

Participants will be able to:

- Explore the dynamics of personal, professional, and group identity.

- Experiment with ways of engaging with difference (e.g., concerning gender, age,

ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, religion)

- Develop capacities for exercising leadership and authority, while exploring vulnerability and power as necessary components of taking up management and

leadership roles.

- Consider how organisations are determined by – and contribute to - their cultural, social, political and economic contexts.

- Reflect on the application of the experiences derived from the conference to their personal and professional life and to the development of the organisations where they work or study.

 

Who should attend?

This experiential learning conference is open to and relevant for anyone working in, consulting to or leading, different types of organisations.

The learning environment of this Group Relations Conference is designed for those who are interested in a deeper understanding of themselves in groups and organisations, especially in periods of turbulence. It is particularly relevant for those who are looking to develop their leadership capacity to effect change within complex and dynamic systems.

 

Director of the Conference – Dr. Simon Tucker, London

Dr. Simon Tucker is the Executive Director of the International Charity OPUS, an established charity that promotes psycho-social understanding in societal and organizational dynamics, an experienced manager, coach, trainer and Organisational Consultant. He is a teacher, consultant and Associate Organising Tutor on Masters and Doctorate programmes in Organisational Consultancy at the internationally recognised Tavistock Clinic in London.  He has been a staff member numerous Group Relations Conferences and has spoken at national and international forums. Simon has consulted to a wide range of clients, including managers within Education, Health and Social Care, and to Board level in the commercial and voluntary sectors. Through his practice as a consultant and his Doctorate research, Simon has developed an interest in stress, health and wellbeing in organisations in times of turbulence and change.