Using organization development and poetry for changing and saving lives.
My guest this week is Manish Srivastava, who shares his journey from the director of learning and development for Unilever into working globally with such issues as child malnutrition with UNICEF in Ethiopia and Human Capital efforts and engaging the youth around sustainable change in Cambodia. He has been a consultant with the Presencing Institute at MIT University for a number of years. He shares his stories around Awareness Based Systems Change and how unintended consequences impact broader system components. He describes his work around using poetry, theater, and mindfulness to help leaders and organizations to become more self-aware – not just systems thinking but also systems feelings. During this pandemic with physical isolation, he is helping people to reframe their reality around possibilities, empathy, and recognizing the helplessness of the current situation which provides the potential to find our deeper connections, from sitting with our brokenness, and experiencing these realities together.