World Café

One of the recurring processes that has been used across this research is the World Café (2016). The World Café is a method that has been repeatedly used by the World YWCA to facilitate conversations between meeting participants, since at least 2004, often with the intent of working toward shared

understandings of challenging questions. The method itself is a recognised tool in conducting action research (Steier et al., 2015), as well as having been used by thousands of commercial and community organisations across the world as a participatory consultative mechanism (Tan, 2005). There are seven basic principles to running a World Café, although as with many action-oriented

research tools these principles are intended to guide rather than prescribe, and the practice should respond to the context (Steier et al., 2015). These principles as outlined by Steier et al. (2015) are:

1. Set the context

2. Create hospitable space 3. Explore questions that matter 4. Encourage everyone’s contribution

5. Cross-pollinate and connect diverse perspectives

6. Listen together for patterns, insights and deeper questions 7. Harvest and share collective discoveries.

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There are three World Café discussions drawn upon in this work, two were part of leadership development activities, and the third was part of presenting the work back to the YWCA.

Within this project, the World Café discussions followed a similar structure: 1. small groups were formed and given a question to discuss.

2. after the allotted time, people were asked to leave their initial group and form a new group, ideally with an entirely new group of people.

3. there was then time for each to share a summary of what their last group discussed. Participants were advised that they should present this as a collective view, rather than identifying individuals.

4. after the allotted time for report backs, a new question was introduced to the group and a new, but related, conversation begins.

Steps 2 – 4 are then repeated until the desired process is completed.

Members of the core group have used the same questions for a World Café on three occasions. Those questions being:

1. What does intergenerational-shared leadership mean to you? 2. Do you believe that intergenerational-shared leadership is really

important? If so, why? If not, why not?

3. What are your personal concerns when working with people who are older or younger than you?

4. What examples and suggestions can you share of intergenerational-

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On two occasions, in Yangon and Stuttgart all four questions were asked, on the third occasion, at World Council, only the first two questions were discussed.

The first two World Café discussions were broadly conducted in the same way and respond to the principles outlined for World Café discussions. They were one of the first exercises of both training activities as it was thought that these discussions both gave participants a chance to settle into the topic and the facilitators a good sense of from where the group was starting. The facilitator introduced the session, and people were encouraged to take their places at tables of four to six people. Tables were covered in flipchart paper, and coloured pens or pencils were available for people to draw, take notes, or just doodle as part of the process.

Between each round of questions participants were invited to change tables, and time was provided to share what had been discussed at their table in the previous round, before a new question was introduced. This process facilitates cross-pollination and sharing of perspectives and creates opportunities for participants to spot patterns. As an early exercise in the training, the intention of the facilitators was that this initial conversation would inform work for the rest of the meeting and help to generate insights that would help progress practice. Each table conversation was recorded, transcribed and analysed, and the flipchart paper collected and retained as part of the analysis process.

The first World Café discussion included in this research was held as part of the

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Yangon in June 2014. The second World Café discussion was held at the

European Intergenerational-Shared Leadership Dialogue held in Stuttgart

October 2014, and the third in a workshop held at the 28th _{World Council of the}

World YWCA in Bangkok in October 2015. Each group was mixed by generation and national origin. Participants in the Yangon discussion were mostly resident in Asia; however, the group also includes a number of participants from the Pacific, including the Solomon Islands, Australia, and New Zealand.

Participants in the Stuttgart discussion were all usually resident in Europe, although not necessarily of European origin. Participants in the workshop at World Council were self-selected from the membership of the World YWCA. 90 women were involved in these discussions, 35 in Stuttgart, 25 in Yangon, and 30 at World Council.

Although the researcher was present for all discussions, their role in each session varied. In Yangon another member of the core group facilitated the session, and the researcher participated. In Stuttgart another member of the

core group facilitated the session, and researcher observed, and at World

Council the researcher facilitated the session, but did not participate. As people move across tables as part of the process, it is difficult to follow individuals across the recordings. Due to the difficulty of identifying individual voices on the recording, in the quotes provides from the World Café

discussions individual speakers are not identified by use of pseudonyms, as individual speakers could not be reliably followed across multiple rounds of conversation. Rather, where isolated quotes are given speakers are identified by

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which World Café discussion the quote is from e.g. Stuttgart 1, Yangon 3, by generation, and as speaker 5 or 10 etc depending on which number speaker they were on the recording. This means that where a conversation, or part thereof is included, speakers can be followed across that single exchange.

In order to preserve anonymity few additional biographical details can be shared, most countries sent only small delegations to any meeting, so the pair identification of country represented, and generation could well identify a speaker to those present at the meeting. Thus, quotes are identified as having come from the Stuttgart, Yangon, or World Council World Cafés and whether the speaker is a young/er or old/er woman. The researcher has made the identification as a young/er or old/er woman, sometimes because the voice is recognised and whether the speaker is a young/er or old/er woman is known, sometimes because the words used indicate whether the speaker identifies as a

young/er or old/er woman. It is possible speakers are misidentified in terms of

age. While the World YWCA definition of a young woman is 30 years of age and under (2015a), this definition is not applied by all national associations, so a woman who identifies as a young/er woman in terms of her national association may not meet the criteria to be a young/er woman set by the World YWCA. Audio recordings were transcribed into NVivo, summaries of small meetings and a range of documents were also entered into NVivo, and an iterative

process of coding to identify first order concepts, then identifying and grouping into second order themes, followed by looking for conceptual abstractions (Gioia et al., 2013, Kempster and Parry, 2011). This process eventually lead to the

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emergence of four structures of intergenerational-shared leadership, and in keeping with the principles of action-oriented research (Bradbury-Huang, 2010, Huxham, 2003) these conceptual abstractions were presented back to the participants in the project to test whether they were “practically adequate” (Sayer, 2010, p69). To distinguish these structures intentionally descriptive labels have been adopted: uni-directional; bi-directional; balanced; and fluid. These will be discussed in detail in the next chapter. Three key mechanisms

were also identified, which can operate to support or hinder the practice of

intergenerational-shared leadership – a reliance on age-based stereotypes, a

commitment to sharing leadership intergenerationally (note the phrase

intergenerational-shared leadership is not used here, as some versions of

intergenerational-shared leadership identified through this research resist the

practice of sharing leadership intergenerationally) and being willing to follow as

well as lead.