I forgive those who
don’t mind telling Stories
■ The “I forgive…” method to elicit Stories
Written by
I forgive my English for not being the one I thought it was…
■ Complexity and honesty
W hen asked to unpack Stories,
people don’t hesitate much.
Most often, they agree to deliver.
Well, they tell they want to
contribute. But eventually, do they
produce ?
It depends on some key factors.
What’s the context ?
What’s the subject ? How is it
taken on inside the organization ?
When working with a group, what
kind of team is it ? What’s the
team’s history ? What’s the social
network operating here ?
These are only sample questions,
we could find more. And by
focusing on these second level
kind of questions, we hypothesize
the organization is already open to
listen to and work on Stories (first
level question).
These questions seem to be
simple ones and they may be,
really, except there are tensions or
conflicts either related to the
question at stake or regarding
relationships within the group.
Even if a privacy statement is
issued, true, honest and
consequently valuable, meaningful
Stories are difficult to obtain.
Similar trends concern individuals
working with Stories.
It may turn complex for people
involved in a workshop to express
themselves frankly, despite their
obvious good will.
Confronted to questions,
participants tend to answer with
Stories they presume the facilitator
or the organization wants to listen
to. They could also act
unconsciously, to avoid being seen
as the prosecutor kind of guy,
Stephane Dangel
http://storytelling.over-blog.fr
or the one who keeps being
negative, underlining problems,
aso.
Whatever device we use as
Stories prompts, we encounter the
same situation. Part of the task is
to ensure such biases will be
erased or at least effect-limited.
Each method designed to work
with Stories include such
purposes.
I suggest a specific method, which
focuses on the problem and tries
to get the most out of it. What we
see as an obstacle may become a
rich source of knowledge.
■ “I forgive…” Really ?
F rankly speaking, as human
beings, when we
somebody “I forgive you”, how
tell
many times are we merely or
partly lying ?
Human beings have always had
problems with that particular
behaviour, because it doesn’t
belong to their genuine nature.
Even in the traditional jewish
religion, the Yom Kippour feast,
which we could interpret as “The
Great Forgiving Day”, as far as I’ve
understood, has little to do with
forgiving others. God is asked to
forgive own, individual faults, there
is no relationship dimension.
■ Using the subtleties of
the “I forgive…” behaviour
W e can use the ambivalence
of the “I forgive…” behaviour
to elicit Stories.
For example, when I say “I forgive
the guy who gave me three
successive opposite opinions
about the same unchanged
project”, what’s really happening ?
Eventually, I don’t forgive him. I
only pretend to. I only describe
something happening in the frame
of a given, precise organizational
environment. In a few words, I’m
telling a Story.
Using a few words I open the
doors to some underlying sense
making realities.
Would I have told the same Story
without beginning with “I
forgive…”. I doubt.
The “I forgive…” beginning
loosens the stress associated with
blaming somebody as I did. It’s a
trigger. Or if I had said “I forgive
the trainee for knowing
everything”, “I forgive my
neighbour, who keeps miaowing
while listening to Whitney
Houston’s songs”, “I forgive my
mother-in-law for establishing a
huge list of artifacts she will take
back when her daughter and me
separate”, aso.
global Story eliciting session. The
difference will lie in the amount of
time required to find patterns and
make sense of the unearthed
items.
Well, sense making may not be
the most appropriate word:
sometimes, the goal will only
consist in having a more precise
view of a complex situation.
But for those who would want to
know more about KJ diagrams, the
following document provides the
basics:
http://opim.wharton.upenn.edu/~ulr
ich/documents/ulrich-
KJdiagrams.pdf

The few words associated with “I

forgive…” sentences are key: they
allow us to proceed with face-to-
face workshops as well as some
distant ones, through SMS or Additional applications
Twitter-like device.

With the “I forgive…” beginning, I Basically, participants really won’t

dare to express those sentences
directly in front of the targeted
persons.
There’s somewhere a humorous
dimension, which allows this dual
meaning (I forgive but I accuse of
something in the same time) to be
expressed overtly.
There is no fakery over here:
author as well as targets of the
Story easily understand what’s
going on.
The little amount of words has
some other advantages : they
allow us to study easily the Story
from different points of view, to
enrich understandings, make
sense and find patterns through
social construction.
have much trouble expressing
themselves: asking for events
beginning with “I forgive…” will be
sufficient to trigger the process.
Several rounds will be necessary
as first sentences will generate
additional ones.
Wheter they are real life events or
fictional ones depends on what
you’re aiming at: do you want to to
learn what occurs inside the
organization, what’s going on, or
do you want to know what people
fear, what they are anxious about.
T he “I forgive…” trick will be
useful to develop closer links
between somewhat rival units
within the organization: they could
elicit “I forgive…” sentences about
each other, then make an
exchange to learn with a certain
level of humour what their rivals
focus on about them.
Another area of application will
obviously be CRM, either targeting
customers or customer service.

■ The How to use the “I Narrative therapy could also find

forgive…” device
As ice-breaker
E ach participant of the Story
eliciting workshop should write
some “I forgive…” sentences
about one or, better, several other
attendees.
Each participant is then invited to
guess where he is the target and
who’s the author.
It may quickly expand to a true
brainstorming-like session if
sentences are relevant to the
matter of the workshop and some
snowball effect starts.
Some standard facilitation will be
required then.
To elicit Stories and make sense
T he device operates wheter it is
used to treat a precise
question or in the frame of a more
here an additional operating tool at
various stages.
Once this raw material is gathered,
it’s time to work on it.
I favour methods Cynthia Kurtz
described inside her extraordinary
And what about a book made of “I
forgive…” sentences, sent to
relevant targets instead of the old-
free e-book, “Working with fashioned Christmas and New
Stories”, which you will find at: Year wish cards ? ■
http://www.workingwithstories.org/
I thought of summing it up, but it’s
already written in such an easy-to-
use manner it wasn’t worth. So
much valuable content for free: it’s
incredible!
Her “Emergent constructs” process
is especially appropriate.
Well, now I forgive you may
Others methods can produce: the
now traditional (some would say a not cope with the “I
bit old-fashioned) KJ diagrams forgive…” method…
process is adapted. The method is But let’s experience it before
well known, so I don’t think it’s
worth an explanation.
you decide and give me
some feedback.