ICF 2008 Conference Round Up

Just back from 5 days in Montreal for the ICF 2008 Conference and it was a blast! It was wonderful as always to connect with old friends and new colleagues.

This year’s emerging themes of coaching, sustainability and social action was very much about closing the circle for me. It was a privilege to be back in Montreal (which was my home for 4 years in the late 1980s) and to also connect to and hear from thought leaders who have so shaped my own professional work – especially before becoming a coach, and my own roots as an environmentalist and development worker with the UN.

Some of the highlights of the conference for me this year were:

Vandana Shiva’s keynote which covered topics such as right living, ecology, her work around the Global Seed Project.. Having first heard Vasantha speak back in 1993 when I was a grad student, it was very powerful to hear from her 15 years later. I realize now just how influential some of her earlier writing was on my career as an environmentalist and project manager. Vandana called coaching an important part of the "detoxification" movement.

John King’s presentation on his book Tribal Leadership(http://www.triballeadership.net/) . I hope to be able to feature John’s work in future blog posts at the BizToolkit blog, piggybacking on to a future radio interview with Widom Year’s host – Coach Deena Kolbert, CPCC. His work is an extremely powerful model of leadership and teams.

The fantastic work of Tom Hurley and Craig Neal at the Conversation Circles. I thoroughly enjoyed the dialogue on Friday around Coaching 2.0 – What’s Next. Tom and Craig's session reconnected me with my roots in process facilitation. I look forward to continuing to resharpen my saw and am planning to look further how I can bring the World Cafe format to more of my clients.

Peter Senge’s keynote on systems and sustainability. His new book the Necessary Revolution integrates environmental principles and underscores the focus of the environment – an interconnection of economic, political, social, cultural and ecological principles. Senge’s keynote took me right back to my days as a Grad Student at FES.

Another huge theme from this year's conference was the need for coaches to move beyond a 1-1 model and to incorporate more team, group and organizational work. It seems as though moving into it's forth year that group coaching skills and Group Coaching Essentials will continue to be in high demand next year.

I have no doubt that everything I absorbed will still need a few weeks to sift in, so keep posted as new ideas continue to spring forth!

What did you take away from the conference? What was your favorite? As always please feel free to comment below.

I look forward to keeping the dialogue flowing.

Warm wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton, PCC, CPCC
Group Coaching Essentials
Potentials Realized
Phone: (416) 996-TEAM