1. WHAT IS A GROUP RELATIONS CONFERENCE? www.igro.ie

2. Index of contents 1. Warning Warning 2. What is likely to happen in a Group Relation Conference? What is likely to happen in a Group Relation Conference? 3. The Primary Task The Primary Task 4. Is the Conference for You? Is the Conference for You? 5. What is a Group Relations Conference? What is a Group Relations Conference? 6. Organisations today Organisations today 7. What can you get from a Conference? What can you get from a Conference? 8. Benefits to Organisations Benefits to Organisations 9. Method Method 10. What’s the Model behind? What’s the Model behind? 11. Group Relations Conference Worldwide Group Relations Conference Worldwide 12. Contacts Contacts 13. The beginning The beginning

3. This presentation gives you a general idea of what a Group Relations Conference is. However you have only one way to know what really happens in the next Group Relations Conference....experience it Warning

4. What is likely to happen in a Group Relation Conference? You live residentially With 15 to 50 other Members and up to 10 Consultants In a Learning Organisation with a Primary Task…

5. The Primary Task You practice and study the development and exercise of Power, Authority, Leadership…..in the context of Change of a real life experience....through the inter-personal and inter-group relations that develop within the Conference as an Organisation..

6. Learning from Diversity Is the Conference for You? It is for Everybody: Leaders and Followers Individuals and Organisations Profit, Nonprofit, Public Organisations, NGOs Workers and Unemployed From any culture, age and faith, from all over the world You don’t need any specific knowledge or skills to attend it

7. What is a Group Relations Conference? An accelerated learning experience Highly professional staff Unforgettable: you can learn from it for the rest of your life An experiential event in which to reflect on the life of organisations and the participants’ roles within it Where many knowledges live together: arts, roleplay, spirituality, social studies, psychology, management… A workshop in a dedicated venue

8. Organisations today Leadership is: Anticipating new realities. Finding new ways to excite managers and employees. Managing a complex network of partnerships with other branches and organisations, locally, nationally and internationally. Management is: Implementing leaders’ vision. Work and organisations change quickly. It can’t be taken for granted that leaders and managers share the same visions. ‘The Thinking Organisation’ The main assets today are the psychological and emotional capacities of the major role holders and clear relationships between them. Hierarchies often disappear, replaced by matrixes and temporary work teams, held together by short-term aims. New leadership and management capabilities are crucial.

9. What can you get from a Conference? Leadership Analyse your leadership styles and performance Experience a wider repertoire of leadership skills Lead effectively Organisation Examine different models of organisational functioning Network Add local and international high profile contacts to your network Power Better understanding of the management of Power Dynamics in any formal or informal organisation, any hierarchical level you are Knowledge of underlying dynamics that impact on people and groups Be more effective, integrating feelings, values and beliefs with your intellect Change Know your resistance to change

10. Benefits to Organisations include.. Attention to the potential of staff’s minds, gives an organisation an extra competitive edge that helps in being successful today Effective management, understanding people as individuals, members of groups, organisations and the society Developing others’ leadership potential, by generating management goodwill and employee “buy-in” Improved Creativity Dedicated Small Groups where members from an organisation can reflect on their organisations‘ life and the participants’ roles within it Power Relations better understanding Improved Strategic Thinking Leading and managing in changing environments

11. Elaboration of conscious and unconscious dynamics of leadership and management in organisations Emotional engagement, intellectual study Method Experiential and Theoretical methods of learning

12. Based on the Intensive Experiential Learning that had sprung from Kurt Lewin’s work Wilfred Bion developed models of group work and group behaviour Systems Theory another milestone The first group relations conference in 1965 Developed by the Tavistock Institute of London since the 1950’s: social scientists and psychodynamically- oriented psychiatrists More about the Theory The basis: groups move in and out of focusing on their task and some defensive positions based on unarticulated group Phantasy. Group Relations Conference: grounded in a Scientific Model. What’s the Model behind? Always updating: in every Conference you can find something new

13. Group Relations Conference Worldwide Great Britain Germany Belgium France Israel Brazil Ireland Finland Denmark Australia South Africa Norway Spain Israel Italy Peru Mexico Sweden Netherland United States Find out more

14. Contacts Next Group Relations Conferences in Ireland: www.igro.iewww.igro.ie The Tavistock Institute of London: www.tavinstitute.orgwww.tavinstitute.org Group relations: www.grouprelations.comwww.grouprelations.com

15. Group Relations Conference Where you experience what other courses talk about. www.igro.ie