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The lecture is based on a case study of the Grubb Institute's work over fourteen years with a voluntary community organisation in the middle of Ireland, which set out to ‘create enterprise and employment opportunities, and measures leading to these, in consultation with the community and statutory agencies’.
The lecture presents the dynamics involved in working with the inter-connectedness of people and communities in moving from dependence to autonomy. The work focuses on the principle of ‘ordinary plenty’ in each participant, and how to understand what is present already in the community and to make the links which enable significant collaborations to release resources to create new possibilities. The lecture draws parallels between this development process and the artistic creative process exemplified by the sculptor Andy Goldsworthy. The application of group relations, psychodynamics, and systemic thinking is brought alive in the day-to-day work of two projects with young people. The experience and dynamics of accompaniment are explored in several ways: accompanying the organisation in its ‘yearning’; the difference between technical and adaptive change; finding the right distance between the consultant and client participants; feeling the connectedness in oneself with the community and the participants; and the meaning of leadership in the accompaniment process.