THE SOLUTIONS FOCUS

The SIMPLE Way to Positive Change

Paul Z Jackson and Mark McKergow

When you need to discover what works at work, The Solutions Focus offers a powerful yet subtle way to positive change. It takes you beyond outmoded ideas, replacing over-complicated theories and methods with a dynamic, intensely practical approach that provides the positive outcomes organizations crave, along with fresh learning every time.

The authors show you how to identify what is working in your team or organization and amplify it to make useful changes; to focus on what is possible rather than what is intractable and how to be solution focused, not solution forced. While the method and scope are wide-ranging and comprehensive, the basic principles are simple:

• identify what works and do more of it
• stop doing what doesn't work and do something different.

The trouble with traditional approaches to people problems is that they assume a straightforward relationship between cause and effect, between a problem and its solution. Now there is a revolutionary yet practical alternative - the solution-focused approach which sidesteps the search for the causes of the trouble and heads straight for the solution, showing you how to envisage your desired future and move swiftly towards it.

The Solutions Focus details a unique SIMPLE way of working that allows bespoke solutions to be invented each time, according to what actually fits the organization:

• Solutions not Problems
• Inbetween: the Action is in the Interaction
• Make Use of What's There - Not What Isn't
• Possibilities: Past, Present and Future
• Language: Simply Said
• Every Case is Different

Radically pragmatic and proven in many fields, this 'theory of no theory' goes to the heart of what works for people, teams and organizations. Packed with field-tested tools, exercises and case examples, The Solutions Focus will interest everyone interested in practical, innovative workplace solutions - and in doing more with less.

Paul Z. Jackson is an independent training consultant with a wide variety of clients in both the public and private sectors. He has variously been a print journalist, senior producer at the BBC and university lecturer. He is also the author of Impro Learning. Mark McKergow has a PhD in physics and is now a consultant specialising in accelerated learning, management development and business strategy.