Sue Nelson Cleveland

(Original Publication January 2010) Have you heard about it? In August 2009 Mayor Jackson hosted the first Sustainable Cleveland 2019 Summit : Building an Economic Engine to Empower a Green City on a Blue Lake which was an Appreciative Inquiry summit to create a 10-year strategic plan for the City and region. Over 700 people from all walks of life converged in Public Auditorium to co-develop the plan. The cool thing about this is that instead of writing a strategic plan, participants came up with 22 projects that collectively would be the plan and then developed prototypes – right there! – and began the work. My group, The Public Compact working group, was charged with writing a vision and pledge that individuals could sign that would help stimulate engagement with economic and community development throughout the region. (There’s also an Engage 1.6M group that is charged with reaching out to everyone. We’re helping to provide content for that outreach.)...

Do you ever wake up in the early morning with a random thought that answers a question you’ve had?  I’m talking about the kind of answer that isn’t the product of a logical thought process, but is the result of a kind of leap. One morning, I woke up with this phrase in my head, “generative vs. determinative thinking.” In my half-awake fog, I wrote it down, wondered what in the world this phrase was pertaining to, and fell back asleep. Once I was actually awake, I still had no clue what it was about.  So off to Google I went. Here’s the first entry from the search for generative vs. determinative thinking: Ontological and Epistemological Terrains Revisited  “…To grant thought generative and determinative functional properties is ...”Boy! Did that not clear anything up! The next source was a lot more interesting:  Why Nonprofits Have a Board Problem ( http://hbswk.hbs.edu/archive/4735.html ).  This short interview and book r...

(Original Blog Posted mid-January 2010) Last Friday (January 8th) Brad Whitehead and Tom Waltermire headlined the noon City Club Forum ( http://www.cityclub.org/ ) on the Economic Outlook for the Next Decade.  Together Brad ( www.futurefundneo.org ) and Tom ( http://www.clevelandplusbusiness.com/About-Team-NEO.aspx ) gave us a few surprise factoids: the Cleveland area is the center for medical imaging in the U.S. manufacturing output in Northeast Ohio is the highest it's ever been. Productivity per worker is improving.  Also, replacement hiring is coming as workers reach retirement age. Cleveland is one of only three cities to win federal funding to pilot region-wide collaboration.  (The others are Seattle and Minneapolis.) They made a really important point for us to keep front of mind: The things that will happen over the next ten years have their beginnings today.  The things that are or were big here started small, were successful here and became...

(This is taken from a letter to Dean Tracy Lind, Trinity Cathedral, Cleveland OH, September 30, 2008, Posted to my Blog  Spring 2010) I used to give lectures and workshops on Wisdom in the Workplace. I came up with a working definition of wisdom comprised of truth, inclusion and compassion. We spent a lot of time on truth. That “The truth is always an option” was eye-opening to many who thought they were victims or were so used to playing the game. My opinion is that we have to know we have that choice, even if we decide not to take it. I’m sure there are times when choosing to not speak up has its merits. Lying, I think, is in a different category.  But when a person knows he is choosing expediency over honesty, or is choosing self-preservation over speaking, he or she is not a victim. Moreover, they know they are contributing to the maintenance of conditions they oppose. For many, this leads to changing actions. They leave toxi...

Last week I was asked by a small non-profit for a proposed budget to facilitate a two day, off site, overnight staff retreat.  The retreat, they hoped, would have two components: team building exercises with a staff of nine to eleven (five of whom were hired this summer), and facilitation of implementation planning of their Board's new strategic plan.  They wanted to form several working groups, which with only 10 people, meant that we would have to stagger the working group meetings so that people weren't trying to be in two places at once. This organization would make their decision on whether or not to hire me based on price.  First of all, I really appreciated not being asked to develop a full proposal when the issue was going to be price.  I provided this team three options for more or less time, and therefore in-depth work, across two days so that I could vary the price for them.  Even so, it can be really surprisin...

(Original Post   Date circa August 2010) (You should know I spent all of 1/2 hour looking this up; so don't take my word for anything.) A lot of folks who went to Catholic School before the Second Vatican Council learned their religious principles from "The Baltimore Catechism." ( http://www.catholicity.com/baltimore-catechism/ )  The version that was in use as late as the 50's and 60's was the 1941 Revised Edition. According to Wikipedia the American bishops, starting in 1829, wanted an updated catechism to help instruct the faithful in America. They thought it should be based on the "Christian Doctrine as explained in Cardinal Bellarmine's Catechism (1597)." Now, in 1597 the world was not the friendliest place, what with all the pillaging, infant mortality, brutal conflict resolution methods and harsh vagaries of the weather ( http://www.answers.com/topic/1597 ).  Here's one way of describing those times: Basic theme: Be what you are ...

As you know, Copernicus paved the way for the scientific revolution by convincingly showing that the Earth is not the center of the universe.  This challenged the prevailing authority structures, understanding of God and the purpose of humans, and supported the development of scientific process.  Lewis Mumford wrote that there have only been four or five such total societal transformations in the course of human history.  Willis Harman in Global Mind Change makes the argument (arrogant as it may be) that we could very well be in the midst of such a far-reaching global change in our time, "when society goes through a more fundamental kind of change involving all its institutions and even more basic aspects of its culture." Harman goes on to say that "every society ever known rests on some set of largely tacit basic assumptions about who we are, what kind of universe we are in and what is ultimately important to us ." [Italics his] In our times, our understanding ...

I have no idea where I got this little booklet. There's no publication date in it, but it's   probably almost 15 years old.  I keep it on the coffee table in my living room a) because it makes me look soooo environmentally conscious and b) because I have to keep working hard on understanding Mr. Kiuchi's message. Tachi Kiuchi was Chairman and CEO of Mitsubishi Electric America when he received letters from elementary school children asking him to help save the rainforests.  Next thing you know, he's conducting primary research in Malaysia.  Here is what he learned. Well, the first lesson actually came from his father, long before his sojourn into the forest: "Do what you want. Follow your purpose.  But don't die."  Kiuchi writes, Lesson One : Stay alert. Watch where you're going . Lesson Two : I learned that saving the rainforests - in fact, saving the environment -- is more than an environmental necessity.  It is a business opportu...

The following article was written last May.  My thinking has evolved since then, which you'll see in future posts. -s Resilience as a concept for a desirable future is out of vogue, and here's why.  We, quite rightly, are careful about the words we choose to define our goals because they focus our actions to achieve them.  One of the words in vogue these days is "resilience."   Here is a description of resilience from a report, Resilience and Sustainable Development: Building Adaptive Capacity in a World of Transformations. Resilience, for social-ecological systems, is related to (a) the magnitude of shock that the system can absorb and remain within a given state, (b) the degree to which the system is capable of self-organization, and (c) the degree to which the system can build capacity for learning and adaptation. It's worth noting that resilience is not needed for adaptation to a steady state. The wh...

(Original Post Date: Early April 2010) A few weeks ago, my coach Louise Kaelin ( http://www.touchpointcoaching.com/ ) asked me to consider being open to the idea that I have "earned a full share of the harvest."  Louise uses a process of crafting statements that help her clients sort out what's true and not true for them and this was the statement we were working on when I needed to slow down and explore what it meant. Like most of my fellow humans, I have lots of limiting beliefs so I developed a creative, intuitive process to bypass them.  Remember when we used to make collages to help us visualize our dreams?  Well, being an internet aficionada I don't have lots of magazines around to cut up anymore; but I could copy pictures from the web. I Googled images for phrases like, full measure of the harvest receiving one's full share earning your share workers in the vineyard and more.  When a photo appealed to me, I copied it into a Word doc....

Bridging the Divide (Original Blog Post March 2010) Have you heard the song about the bridge?  You know - the Innerbelt bridge. The bridge connecting the east and west sides of our city that ODOT is going to rebuild because the one that's there is getting pretty weak. There's a difference of opinion between the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) and a lot of Greater Clevelanders about who should have a say in what the bridge is for and which design should be chosen. Last August, I asked Jolene Molitoris, ODOT's Director, "Philosophically, what is the role for self-determination in public policy planning?"  ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcG_r6ByQ2M&feature=related ) While Ms. Molitoris answered with her commitment to partnerships and her welcoming of citizen input, she came down on the side of consensus decision making without weighing the concept of self-determination, or giving any weight to local opinions.  (In a...

Dear Readers, Are you interested in finding ways to make Northeast OH a thriving region?   Are you interested in how to take ideas and move them into action? Are you interested in finding solutions to problems that work for everyone and the earth we live on?   Are you creating wealth and want to let us all know how you are doing it or what help you need? This is the purpose of my blog - to promote ideas in support of a thriving Greater Cleveland region.   To further this aim, let’s use this blog as a way to stay in touch with others who have the same interests.     Our topics will likely range from inclusion, to highlights of the Sustainable Cleveland 2019 Summit to boondoggles of entrepreneurship and more thought-filled pieces about inclusion, generosity of spirit and the like.   Overall, this topic is too grand to keep to myself.   I hope you’ll think with me so that at least, as Descartes said, we’ll know we exist. ( http://en.wikipe...