Hey, how are you doing? I thought to share with you that I am going to the Human System Dynamics (HSD) Gathering in Guelph on May 29th and 30th . Are you going to come too? On the off chance that my attendance might not be sufficient attraction for you to join, I thought I would share some of the thinking behind my decision to attend this meeting of fabulous people!
First of all, I should tell you that I’m a coach, based in the UK, and working with clients across all sectors, mainly public and charity. I work with people who want coaching for professional reasons as well as those who are interested in exploring more personal matters. More often than not both of these are areas of exploration tend to come up in most coaching conversations.
First contact
I came across the Human System Dynamics (HSD) several years ago and was intrigued with what they stand for as well as feeling a sense of connection with the people in the HSD community from the very outset.
I was struck in the early meetings I attended in the HSD community of how diverse the community was. It was truly global, multicultural, and populated by people with wildly different and exciting motivations, interests and ways of thinking. There was a strong sense of being welcomed into the community as the unique individual I am and, although I can’t speak for other people, my sense was that other people felt the same.
Over time this experience has grown and been reinforced in all the interactions I have had. I have felt welcomed in those moments when I have put myself in the spotlight to share my thinking and equally welcome to take a position more at the edge of the community, seeking points of connection with other ways of being and approaches to exploring complexity.
Integrating HSD into my work
As a coach I have undertaken many hundreds of hours of Continuing Professional Development (CPD). Despite learning from all of these experiences I have always sought frameworks for thinking which allow me to engage with both a scientific, evidenced based approach and thinking and feeling in a more metaphysical, emergent way.
In much of what I have done in the past there has been a sense of exclusivity between these two, whereas with HSD I have found that they comfortably coexist. I recognise many of the frameworks HSD uses to explore complex adaptive systems as practises which I already use as a coach. The language may be different, yet the intention is the same. Unlike many of the coaching models I have been trained in, I find HSD frameworks for thinking are infinitely adaptable to the needs of my clients should I choose to use them during our coaching conversations. There is no sense of constraint in using HSD frameworks in the service of my client partnerships, they allow both my client and me to explore what is emerging between and within us.
Diversity as strength
Another dimension of diversity that truly appeals in ‘HSD land’ is the variety of practise based backgrounds that the community come from. There are coaches, OD professionals, HR professionals, counsellors, activists, scientists and spiritualists and many more besides. There are people active in politics, in different forms of faith, social justice, environmental activism, learning and education, governance and law. A characteristic which unifies all these very different people is an interest in trying to move the groups, communities and nations (all forms of complex adaptive systems) in which we all live in a direction we would recognise as ‘better’ than it currently is.
HSDG 2025 – the place to be
It’s an enriching, exciting, supportive and challenging community of practitioners and I am really looking forward to meeting more of them in person at the HSD Gathering in Guelph. I suspect that I will spend time at the fringes of the group during the meeting gathering and sharing my learning through observation and conversation. I also hope to be able to share some of my experiences with the community from a position within the spotlight of their attention!
Whether you favour observing from the fringe or spending some time in the spotlight I strongly recommend you come to this meeting. You can be assured of a great group of people, rich in their dimensions of difference, with similarity in their interest of working with complexity. They are unified through their desire to connect in support and challenge each other’s thinking and feeling. Be there!