Sharing Secrets: Learning to Exchange

You are involved in an organization, a business, or a community that is struggling to survive. This is the reality of our current experience. How can we move from languishing toward flourishing? The answer may be simpler than you think.

Giving Away the Secret

Mariano Rivera, the Yankee’s legendary pitcher, did one thing better than anyone else on the planet. He threw one pitch, a cut-fastball, over and over again, with mind-boggling success. Statisticians estimate that he threw this pitch over 85% of the time.

Rivera’s one pitch would have been very hittable if it were not the for the fact that it suddenly turned so sharply to the left side of the plate. He pitched in 1,115 games compiling a MLB record 652 game saves. In the playoffs, Rivera was nearly untouchable, posting a 0.7 earned run average (less than one run for every nine innings).

Dumbfounded, everyone asked, “How does he do it?” Broadcasters spoke of Rivera’s one pitch as the game’s best kept secret. But it was no secret. 

The problem for major league batters was hitting it. And even though this pitch was his money ball, he openly taught other MLB pitchers how to throw it. In 2008, Rivera taught his pitch to Roy Halladay helping him to win the Cy Young award, throw one of only 23 perfect games in MLB history, and become one of Rivera’s own teammates’ most feared opposing pitchers.

Sharing and Exploring 

In the past, product and service marketing may have found success in trade secrets and intellectual property. Today, organizations that are flourishing are learning by sharing and exploring ideas in partnership with others.

Our social communities and organizations are facing unprecedented challenges. Many businesses are doubling-down on the back-room formulas that made them different. Health organizations, schools, and faith communities are tempted to be inward-looking as they compete for employees, constituents, and contributions. It is as if we are concerned that the opposition will steal our pitch signs.

Healthy growth in communities and organizations require relationships that are committed to the flourishing of the world. Relationships in which we can teach and learn together. 

I don’t have a consulting equivalent to Rivera’s pitch that I can teach to an organization. Know that if a consultant offers such a pitch, it is only a sales pitch. 

Discovering New Possibilities

In a first conversation with the leadership of a congregation I asked, “What do you hope to see happen?” Some of their replies were “To renew our vision,” “To bring people together,” and “To clarify our purpose.” One leader asked, “Can you deliver these results?” He wanted me to give them the solution.

“What you want is beyond off-the-shelf fixes. Here’s what I can do,” I said. Then, I explained that as a consultant I would listen to them, partner with them to help reach their objectives, and together we will discover new possibilities.

I formed an Agreement with that church. Through our collaborative partnership they stopped focusing on finding solutions to their problems and began discovering new possibilities. They clarified their purpose, renewed their vision, and the congregation began to rally together.

Becoming an organization that is flourishing and promotes flourishing will require a pivot from a slavish attention to return on investment toward shared learning and exchange. 

Pivot toward shared learning and exchange:

• Build an organizational passion for the world to flourish

• Focus on possibilities instead of solutions

• Openly share your success and failures

• Seek out partners who are interested in exchanging ideas and learning with your organization

If you would like a conversation about shared learning and exchange, I invite you to contact me at steves@designgroupintl.com or call me at 574-536-1461.

Walking alongside,

Steve Slagel
Design Group International
Senior Consultant

Process Consulting competencies identified and implemented through
the Society for Process Consulting.