October 15th photos up!

We've posted photos and a narrative from our October 15th Cultivating Common Ground event on our website: http://www.seedscrc.org/past-events.php

Wicked & Effective Influence

Nettie Pardue, Training & Facilitation Program Manager at the SEEDS Community Resolution Center

I attended Effective Influence in 2008. A few weeks ago, I found myself musing about Effective Influence as I entered the Land of Oz, in a packed Orpheum theater in San Francisco. I was going to spend an evening revisiting one of my favorite childhood movies from a different angle. From what I knew about this production going in, it was supposed to provide me with the Wicked Witch's perspective.

But why on earth would I want to understand the wicked witch? What would she have to teach me? Margaret Hamilton, the original wicked witch will always be the epitome of mean, nasty and scary to me. Child-me was always terrified of the Wicked Witch and wondered how someone could be that mean or that evil. So as I filed in with teenage girls dressed as if for prom, couples on dates, folks with silver hair or no hair a myriad of shapes, sizes and colors packed that auditorium but I was thinking about the Witches.

Most people know about Glenda the Good Witch. For the record, the wicked witch had a name too: Elphaba. Somehow it seemed significant that, though I'd watched the Wizard of Oz countless times, I didn't know her name. The adult mediator in me was startled to realize that I knew this Elphaba person only from her role as Wicked Witch; I knew nothing about who she was, what drove her, what she needed, what we might have in common. Did she have children? Get excited about accounting law? Vote the way that I would vote? Excel at persuading the flying monkeys not to make a mess of the FAA's traffic routes?

Thinking about this, I realized that, while I did know something about the personal side of Dorothy and her friends, I knew no more about the human side of Glenda than I did about the human side of Elphaba. When she appears in the film, she does so in a heavily produced, larger-than-life bubble... but, is she married? (Yes.) What does her husband do? (A derivatives trader.) Could I hire him? (No.) What schmear does she like best on her bagels if I am bringing them to a team meeting? Does she keep pugs or labradoodles? Maybe Glenda has an aging parent waiting impatiently offstage for the spectacle to end so that they could watch Larry King... or made her late and so prevented her from magicking Dorothy's house to a safe landing before it killed Elphaba's sister? After all, Glenda arrives just a little too late. Might she not have put the ruby red slippers onto her own feet if she wasn't aiming to get Dorothy in trouble? Was she secretly annoyed by how Dorothy presented herself as powerless, and gave her the slippers to make a point?

You'd only know if someone asked.

Wicked showcases the idea of understanding the other and not jumping to conclusions about each other's backgrounds, stories or histories. By remaining curious and asking, we can do this. Wicked also suggests how lack of understanding and making false assumptions can lead to hurt feelings and unforeseen consequences. If Elphaba had really listened to her sister instead of trying only to protect the people around her from her follies, might her sister not have been so embittered?

>> When people behave inexplicably or meanly or contrary to your wishes, get curious. Go with the part of you that is saying, Huh? and ask them what's up, instead of acquiescing to the part that thinks it has the other already figured out.

>> Connections make for productive teams and colleagues who open doors for you, sometimes especially because you bring a uniquely different point of view. People remember authentic moments of connection as well or better than moments of disconnection.

>> Disputes in which only the answer matters (i.e. who wins or loses) often corrode relationships: no one likes to feel as if, each time a dispute comes up, you want them to lose. Remember that the person and how they feel actually matters, too.

Sitting in that theater among teenage girls dressed as if for prom, couples on dates, folks with silver hair or no hair, people in a myriad of shapes, sizes and colors, I decided that the green-faced Elphaba should be my reminder to always consider the other person's story. She can remind me to consider what I think that I know, and how, and from what source. Elphaba will maintain my curiosity, cause me to ask questions... and seek empathy, not when I agree but especially when I don't. I'm not perfect, but that good witch Glenda, she had her flaws, too. I am no so certain that she deserves that title Good Witch anymore.

But she could just be Glenda.