The thought manifests as the word;

The word manifests as the deed;

The deed develops into habit;

And the habit hardens into character;

So watch the thought and its ways with care;

And let it spring from love

Born out of concern for all beings.

As the shadow follows the body,

As we think, so we become.

n From the Dhammapada (the sayings of the Buddha)

Philosophy


		The Dragonfly Institute was founded by Beverly Kimble in 2002. It has sprouted from her life experiences, first, 27 years experience working in high-tech telecommunications and software businesses, and her more recent 7-year work as an organizational development specialist in learning and coaching. She also works as and adjunct professor at George Mason University and from 1999 through 2002 she was the Program Director for George Mason University’s Coaching and Organizational Learning Program, a joint offering with Newfield Network Inc., experts in training and certifying coaches. The Institute has evolved as the result of a perceived epistemological crisis that exists in the world today (the study of the origin, nature, methods and limits of knowledge). People are looking for ways to do better with less and to find meaning in their work asking the question “What was I sent here to do?” Many believe that they want to do work that will support and sustain life in our universe. This yearning supports the need for learning places that empower the learner in special ways. It lives in the questions: Our research has uncovered the following: When learners have the freedom to pursue his/her learning, they are more likely to take the responsibility for to make it happen. The learning is more easily absorbed and applied when the learner has a healthy support system of teachers, peers and others. Motivation reaches its peak when the habitat is “right” and trust is high. We believe that organizations that understand learning as a capability and embed it into their business strategy are ones that will flourish and grow in the next decade. Using learning as a business strategy for organizations is to develop new ways of knowing and being. Arie de Geus, the former Group Planning Coordinator who worked at Royal Dutch Shell for 38 years, when they were the #1 oil company, explains the power of learning: “Over the long term, the only sustainable competitive advantage may be an organization’s ability to learn faster than its competition. No outside force can take the momentum of that advantage away from you. An insight or invention, whether it is a new way of marketing, a new product, or a new process, is really a learning process. At Shell, we saw we did not have to be too secretive – provided we were not standing still. If we continued to learn and generate new ideas and incorporated them into our work, then by the time anyone had copied us we would be that much further along.” Learning can enable an organization in magical ways when treated holistically. Collaborative processes need to be designed around learning -- not only around what the organization is learning but also around how people contribute to the learning. Learning, on the surface at least seems to be a given. People are learning things all the time. However, the tendency is to focus on knowledge directly relevant to new product technology and delivery without time out for reflection and use of feedback loops. Learning just for the sake of learning will not improve your bottom line. Instead learning needs to be embedded in processes, projects, and experiences. Many organizations have real structures that limit learning. The sense of urgency, and traveling at speeds of light creates a bias for action. And that, in turn, prevents organizations from taking time to learn. To learn we need time to reflect. Often we tend to use the knowledge we already have because there is not time to produce anything new. In a healthy learning environment you ask people to go further than just producing action that creates results, you take the time to ask questions about your assumptions before you took action, you ask what other interpretations of the data there might be, and you use a purposeful feedback loop after every major decision or project delivery. Organizational learning is about adopting learning as a part of your organization’s way of doing business. We believe that the skill to learn faster than those in other organizations in order to be a recognized leader in their respective industry is an achievable goal and that people, through learning, create a sustainable advantage. Our institute brings together a consortium of individuals, building partnerships with others to be in service to our participants, aiding them to evolve their organization to become more productive and meaningful places to work. We emphasize the importance of ethics and morality and construe learning as moral practice addressing such questions as: Who am/are I/we? What are individual and collective objectives worthy of pursuit? What do we want to become? How do we collectively engage with one another in order to achieve our objectives? How do I/we live a good life within the organization? What do I/we need to learn to contribute to the health and well being of the Earth? Our work emphasizes the importance of organizational and individual learning as it contributes to the creation of caring organizations, organizations in which participants are valued as ends in themselves and which are organized to identify and meet the needs of those participants. Doing so sets the tone and a solid foundation for employees as they work toward customer satisfaction and the production of needed and life-sustaining goods and services. Our courses are designed to facilitate organizational learning principles and practices, and we use a combination of academic style, requiring students to share and participate with reading and writing assignments and experiential and action learning techniques that enhance the learning process. Other methods include the use of film, literature, poetry, body work, music and art to enrich discovery and growth. We believe that people are only whole when they can bring their emotions, their minds, and their bodies to the workplace and use them for purposes of enrichment and making the world a better place. Our workshops therefore, grow the use of our emotions, our bodies and our conversations. Sustained learning occurs over time and through personal experience. Learning that changes the way we see things is powerful and encourages culture change. Through this type of learning experience, organizations can evolve naturally through self-determined motivation. We think that the next increment in productivity will come from more and better leaning, rather than working employees longer and harder. As we shift away from a command and control model of organization toward self-directed communities of workers, it is essential to help people evolve capabilities that will ensure success in these environments and to evolve safe environments in which learning will thrive and grow.

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