Susan Ryan speaks on her session Creative Intelligence: Wisdom of the Masters
Martin Butcher talks about his session on Visioning the Future
85 Things you could learn at this years Story Conference
Wondering what you can learn from coming to this years conference? Here’s a starter list for you! 
1. learn how to explore below the surface
2. learn how to use story elicitation and action research to access the less accessible aspects of organisational life
3. learn how to use story circles for story elicitation
4. learn how to do a history trip to build the collective story
5. learn how to use fairy story for an engaging organisational diagnosis
6. learn the power of song
7. learn how the power of music and melody can be harnessed to work with individuals, groups and/or communities
8. learn how to use music and song in your work, even if you consider yourself ‘not musical’
9. learn how to rescue lyrics from the words people speak
10. learn how to craft and perform songs that give voice to preferred stories of identity
11. learn key principles and practices of narrative song-writing
12. learn how to create a collective song
13. learn about the intriguing relationship between music and memory
14. learn the secrets of flourishing in consulting
15. learn the intellectual, physical, social, mental and spiritual habits which mean you, can ride the ups and downs of clients and assignments, and still maintain your balance.
16. learn self promotion within organisations and beyond
17. learn how to frame proposals in a way that clients want to go ahead
18. learn how to network for your career
19. learn how to negotiate briefs, fee structures, deadlines and scope creep
20. learn how to deal with intimidating clients; push back to the client; keep your head together
21. learn how to take your business beyond your city, your state and your own country
22. learn how to create space for deeper conversations
23. learn how to move meetings away from top down, death-by-powerpoint models
24. learn how to have fun with complexity instead of getting tripped up by it
25. learn how to extend the emotional bandwidth within groups to get much more from meetings
26. learn the furfies of organisations the myths that are used as excuses to stay put and carry on business as usual
27. learn how to move beyond the language trap
28. learn how to snap out of the teacher trance to uncover new resources
29. learn how to trade stressful control for meaningful influence
30. learn how to uncover and disrupt status games that kill energy in meetings
31. learn a corporate approach to improvisation
32. learn ways to tailor your own creative offerings to reach a corporate market.
33. learn how you bend the creative side to adjust to the way they work
34. learn how you can shape your own practice to include more and different organisations
35. learn improv games
36. learn how to listen to stories
37. learn your own capacities in listening
38. learn your own values, beliefs, obstacles and prejudices
39. learn some helpful theoretical models to support listening capacity
40. learn how to develop and deepen listening
41. learn some creative ideas to use in workshops, training and coaching
42. learn new strategies to engage businesses
43. learn how to master authenticity and audience rapport
44. learn to identify and shift key challenges that you face in delivering your message with greatest impact
45. learn tools to improve your presentations (walking your talk, release a limiting communication style)
46. learn how to deliver your signature speech
47. learn to maximise the effectiveness of live presentations
48. learn to transform your presentation abilities
49. learn how to streamline your speech preparation
50. learn how to improve audience engagement and impactful delivery
51. learn how to strengthen your stage presence
52. learn how to put the “play” back into role play
53. learn how to facilitate well-run/relevant/fun/engaging/moving role-plays of real life situations to invigorate the learning environment
54. learn how to create an authentic play space which values warm up and spontaneity
55. learn ways to help a group warm up to playful yet real learning
56. learn an introduction to the concepts of warm up and spontaneity
57. learn how employees of an organisation used creative methods to capture employees’ personal success stories and reflect on achievements within the organisation as a whole
58. learn about a new creative reporting (and celebratory) style
59. learn about the positive outcomes of articulating, sharing and celebrating personal success stories within an organisation that works in the area of behaviour change where hard measures of performance such as tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions saved often fail to reflect significant achievements
60. learn how to vision the future
61. learn to collaborate in one of four different creative methods to express your vision of a sustainable city
62. learn to evaluate the effectiveness of different creative methods for visioning.
63. learn how to facilitate an action research project
64. learn new ways of seeing and thinking
65. learn new ways of seeing that lead to new ways of thinking
66. learn art-based tools and methods
67. learn to use modes of creative thinking beyond words that are capable of generating radically different perspectives
68. learn a new way to benefit your own development and your applied practice with clients
69. learn how to extend workings of mind and heart
70. learn how to work with disturbance
71. learn methods for working with disturbance and helping organisations, leaders and their staff to make the most of unwelcome and unexpected experiences
72. learn how to harness the potential for change in situations that interrupt our usual and often habitual ways of seeing and engaging with the world
73. learn a new way of responding creatively to apparent problems and frustrations in the workplace
74. learn practical skills for helping people appreciate and access the opportunities inherent in problem scenarios
75. learn how to get lasting results from all involved
76. learn to use the skills and knowledge of the community effectively through storytelling to develop and appreciate the complexity of living and working in the 21st century
77. learn to inspire action which expects diversity and honours a wide range of input from others
78. learn Creative Intelligence
79. learn the secret process used by the great artists, scientists, and entrepreneurs throughout history where you create your life from your highest future potential
80. learn a process to follow for congruent decision-making
81. learn self trust
82. learn the power of play
83. learn an art-therapy based process which is designed to have aha moments arise
84. learn how to create exquisite shifts in being, in lives, in human potential
85. learn how to centre yourself when you are off-centre
Wetting the appetite?
Click here to register.
20 Tips and Pearls about Working with Story
I recently asked Bob Dick to share what his 10 tips and pearls of working with Story might be… I found them so inspiring I decided to add my own along to the list! 
Here they are:
1. Once upon a time, someone told a story. And learning began.
2. You want to remember what happened? Remember it in the form of a story.
3. One person tells a story. This triggers a story from another person. This triggers yet another story …
4. Stories for diagnosis — they yield meaning at many levels
5. Homo sapiens, certainly. But also homo fabulator: story-telling humankind
6. To tell a story: where did it happen, what happened, who was involved? — setting, plot, characters.
7. To elicit a story: What happened? Where did it happen? Who was involved?
8. Stories of achievements: an energising and involving way of catalysing a change program
9. Archetypes are powerful communicative elements. Stories are their container.
10. A powerful start to a diagnostic interview: Tell me about … or Tell me what happened …
11. Collective identity is shaped by shared story. Telling the shared story revitalisea that identity.
12. All stories are true but some have happened.
13. Get a group to create a fairy tale. We all know how they begin, how they end, and the characters inside.
14. Fairy tales are like metaphors packaged and ready to use.
15. To be a great Story listener: Be totally present to yourself and the story teller.
16. To be a great Story listener: Remember that stories are told twice. Once by the teller, once by the listener.
17. Stories are irreducible.
18. Stories can embody complexity, paradox and uncertainty.
19. What’s the untold story? What’s the alternate story?
20. Stories are action methods, they both show and tell us what’s happening.
10 Questions for you to think about
1. Are you interested in learning more about how you can facilitate creatively?
2. Want to dramatically increase your confidence in Story facilitation?
3. Does your facilitation practice include the skills of Improvisation?
4. Ever wonder how we can use music and song in our work, even if we consider ourselves ‘not musical’?
5. Do you know how songs can be crafted and then performed to facilitate change?
6. Would you like to know how to use story-elicitation and action research to access the less accessible aspects of organisational life?
7. Do you have the skills to extend the emotional bandwidth within groups to get much more from meetings?
8. Would you like to discover the secrets to having a flourishing consulting / facilitation business?
9. Would you like to hear others stories of struggle and success in the business of facilitation and working creatively?
10. Are you seeking more collaborative opportunities?
If you have answered yes to any of these questions… then you might want to click here. 
Spend the Day with Tom Verghese and Cindy Tonkin: Consulting Unplugged-The Secrets of Flourishing in Consulting
About the Day: Wednesday 5th October
Come discover the secrets of successful consulting from two consultants with 19+ years consultancy experience.
Through a participant-driven agenda, find out the intellectual, physical, social, mental and spiritual habits which mean you, can ride the ups and downs of clients and assignments, and still maintain your balance.
The day will cover at least:
• You are more than you think: self-promotion within organisations and beyond
• You can do it: framing proposals in a way that clients want to go ahead
• You are who you hang out with: networking for your career
• You are worth it: negotiating briefs, fee structures, deadlines and scope creep
• You are human: dealing with intimidating clients; pushing back to the client; keeping your head together
• You are a global player: taking your business beyond your city, your state and your own country
This session is designed for both internal and external consultants.
About Tom and Cindy:
Tom Verghese, The Cultural Synergist, has had extensive experience working with a diverse range of global organisations and with global leaders from different cultures all over the world. His client list includes Shell, Disney, Honda, Autoliv, Sara Lee, Cadbury Schweppes and Microsoft. He is the author of “The Invisible Elephant – Exploring Cultural Awareness”. Of Indian origin, born and raised in multi-ethnic Malaysia, he moved to Australia nearly 30 years ago as a foreign student. His wife is English and they have two children.
Find out more about him at www.culturalsynergies.com
Cindy Tonkin, The Consultants’ Consultant, wrote the Best selling Australian Consultant’s Guide and 7 other books on consulting.
It is her good fortune that 58% of her business is repeat or by referral. Her clients number just over 50 in a consulting career which began in 1987.
Cindy works with both internal consultants in major corporates and independent consultants. She is an improviser, a painter and singer and also runs Ludic Creative, an improvisation-based creative consultancy.
Find out more about her at http://cindytonkin.com or http://consultantsconsultant.com.au.
Click here to begin the registration process.
Spend the Day with Viv McWaters and Johnnie Moore: Exploring The Edges of Work
About the Day: Wednesday 5th October
Workplace approaches that were once just fine are now struggling in the face of complexity, unpredictability and demands for creativity, innovation and agility.
Change happens at the edge: we see it in systems and in our own lives. At the edge, we are away from the routine and familiar: it’s exciting but scary territory, but it’s where new patterns and routines can emerge. How can we support people in staying in the space at least long enough for useful change?
We’ll share ideas for navigating edge territory, overcoming habitual patterns that give us a kind of safety but prevent us from making real change.
We look at three tyrannies that keep us away from the edge:
- the tryanny of excellence,
- the tyranny of effort and
- the tyranny of the explicit
And we’ll share a series of activities we’ve found powerful in getting organisations out of stuck places, rigid arguments and unquestioned rituals and into territory where it’s possible for new work to emerge.
About Viv and Johnnie:
Viv McWaters and Johnnie Moore developed their individual facilitation practices on opposite sides of the planet, but over the last few years have worked together to help organisations get to the edge.
Learn more about Viv here at: http://www.vivmcwaters.com.au
Learn more about Johnnie here at: http://www.johnniemoore.com
Click here to begin the registration process.
Spend the Day with David Denborough: The Power of Song – working with Individuals, Groups and Communities
About the Day: Wednesday 5th October
‘Music has a power, a very special power’
How can lyrics be rescued from the words people speak? How can songs be crafted and then performed that give voice to preferred stories of identity?How can we use music and song in our work, even if we consider ourselves ‘not musical’?
This workshop will be relevant to anyone with an interest in music and melody and how their power can be harnessed to work with individuals, groups and communities.
It will consist of:
- An introduction to key principles and practices of narrative song-writing
- Examples of narrative song-writing from within prisons, schools, and communities within Australia and internationally
- The creation of a collective song
- Illustrations of musical ‘definitional ceremonies’
- Explorations of how it is possible to turn anguish to art and then to social contribution
- And considerations of the intriguing relationship between music and memory
About David:
David Denborough works as a teacher, writer/editor, community practitioner, and song-writer, for Dulwich Centre. He is particularly interested in developing innovative responses to working with social suffering. Recent books/publications include:
• Collective narrative practice: Responding to individuals, groups, and communities who have experienced trauma
• Strengthening resistance: The use of narrative practice in working with genocide survivors
•Beyond the prison: Gathering dreams of freedom
•Trauma: Narrative responses to traumatic experience.
Recent teaching/community assignments have included Bosnia, Rwanda, Uganda, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, South Africa and a number of Aboriginal Australian communities.
David’s songs in response to current social issues have received airplay throughout Australia and Canada.
And his collaboration with KAGE Physical Theatre Company has resulted in the award winning show ‘Headlock’ and ‘Sundowner’
Click here to begin the registration process.
Pre-Con with Bob Dick — Exploring below the surface: Eliciting stories for cultural diagnosis
About the Half-Day Pre-Conference Workshop: Wednesday 23rd November 2016 from 9-12 noon
You can incorporate story into many diagnostic processes. Doing so can open up the possibility of using the processes for cultural diagnosis and cultural change.
The learning objectives for this workshop are:
- learn specific and useful story-based techniques, especially for cultural diagnosis
- learn how to enrich data-gathering techniques by incorporating elements of story
- understand how and why story and similar indirect techniques are effective for cultural diagnosis and intervention.
This workshop is for: Consultants, facilitators, HR professionals, people in leadership roles — virtually anyone who wishes to add to their use of story and narrative techniques in their repertoire.
About Bob Dick:
Bob Dick is an independent scholar, an occasional academic, and a consultant in community and organisational change. He has been a practitioner and an academic for most of the past 45 years, enjoys both enormously, and continues to work in both fields. In both he uses concepts and processes from action research, action learning, action science, narrative, and community and organisation development to help people (including himself), organisations and communities to improve their work, learning and life.
You may have attended his workshops or engaged him as a facilitator or consultant or facilitator. If so, you’ll know that he often uses story in his work. He also builds story-based techniques into many of the diagnostic and change processes that he uses.
He resides in Brisbane’s leafy western suburbs with the love of his life, Camilla.
Whats new and exciting about the conference this year?
If you’ve been to any of the past two conferences then you might be wondering what’s different… And if you haven’t been to any of the past conferences – this might help give you an idea about the conference too…
Here are 10 things that are different (and exciting) for this years conference:
1. This website is the first difference… We’ve decided to expand beyond the Interactive PDF Brochure and provide easier ways of entering into the conference…including social-media links… Thanks to my pal and mentor Viv McWaters for this very sensible suggestion… 
2. The second big difference are our Pre-conference workshops. Yes, the conference has now become a 3 day conference, and even better – we begin it with some amazing people leading 4 different workshops for Day 1. Our pre-conference workshop leaders are travelling internationally and nationally to be part of the conference…
3. This year we are opening the conference on the evening of Day 1. After the Pre-Conference Workshops. And we’re also bringing in some local talent with comedian Rod Quantock being a major part of the conference opening program. For more on the program check out the brochure here. This means that Day 2 is all about getting straight into the action!
4. A cocktail reception awaits at the conference Opening.
5. A sit down dinner at the beautiful Studley Park Boathouse on the evening of Day 2.
6. By popular demand we have Mary and Steve Caterers back this year!
7. This year’s conference is not just about the methods… It’s also about the business…How to get the work… With a pre-conference workshop focussing on how you can have a flourishing consulting practice…as well as workshops throughout exploring “Success and Struggle” – this is a unique opportunity to open up those conversations you’ve been waiting for…
8. Seeking ways of helping to open, broaden and expand the opportunities for rich conversation, we have scheduled Day 3 to leverage the power of Open Space Technology to provide the opportunities for those ‘must-have’ conversations…
9. We have been even more generous with our Super-Duper Early bird this year!
10. The conference doesn’t fall on my Birthday… 