Programmes and workshops:

• Working with Shame in Organisations
  2 day Workshop, London, 19/20 October 2024 and 14/15 May 2025 (details below)
  
  
• Core Concepts - Gestalt in OD
  2 days Workshop, London, 28/29 September 2024 and 5/6. April 2025;
  2 days online, 1/2nd December 2024 (details below)
  
  
• In Practice - Gestalt oriented organisational development
  3 x 2 day Workshop, online, 12/13th March 2025, 9/10th April 2025 and 7th/ 8th May 2025 (details below)
  
  
• Gestalt in OD Masterclass (experienced practitioners only)
  10 Days spread over the year; specific dates to be agreed with participants as of Sep 2025
  Gestalt Centre London
  4500 £
  
  
• Gestalt Supervision Group for Coaches and OD Consultants
  Ongoing Gestalt group, meets twice per year in Berlin and Brighton, UK
  
  
• Gestalt in OD - Intervening for Change
  6 forthnightly seminars held in London
  
  
• Awareness, dialogue, process. Gestalt in Action.
  A Workshop with Gary Yontef, Ph.D.
  tbd, Berlin (details below)

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ONGOING GESTALT PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT AND SUPERVISION GROUP FOR CONSULTANTS AND COACHES

OD Consultants and Coaches often feel left alone and isolated after they have finished their training or when they have long worked on their own. Then there is a need for a stable and trusted community that provides a safe place to work on personal issues and offers support when working with difficult cases and clients.

To address this need, we started an ongoing Gestalt Group and building a learning community with the aim to meet regularly 2 times per year alternating between Germany (Berlin) and the UK. The group has met once so far and we have 2 more places available for those who are interested to join the group.

Requirements:    

• Good understanding of Gestalt and min 1 year experience in using the Gestalt approach
• Willingness to fully participate in a group of peers and to take responsibility for oneself
• Ability to support others and shared responsibility for group processes
• Commitment to confidentiality
• Membership is ongoing, i.e. there must be a strong willingness to come to most retreats
• Ability to cover costs of the retreats
• Being able to understand and express yourself in English

Language:     English

Venue:          Berlin, International Gestalt Centre, Wielandstr. 14a, 12159 Berlin
Brighton, Phoenix Therapy Centre

Dates:           4-6 Oct 2024 (Brighton) and 28-30 March 2025 (Berlin)

Cost:             765 £

Contact:        cschuierer@t-online.de    Tel: +49-151-25334332 or +44-75 49 69 94 73

Facilitators:   Christina Schuierer and Tony Fraser

TONY FRASER was chairman of Mayvin Ltd, an organisation consultancy specialising in OD and has held senior leadership positions in large corporations in Human Resources, Strategic Planning and Business Development. This business track is complemented by psychotherapy training to enable him to work with people on emotional and relationship as well as business issues.
Tony is the author of books and articles on interpersonal skills and management development including the Management of Interpersonal Skills Training and Gestalt in Management.

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Working with Shame in Organisations

Shame is not only the most intensely painful feeling and experience of being wrong, not enough and not belonging, but also the least talked about, as people affected are often unaware, confused with guilt or simply trying to hide. This is the case in the private sphere and even more so in public and organisational life.

In organisations, shame often underlies narcissistic leadership patterns and is a widely used “tool” to exert power, keep people small and at their place. It is related to perfectionism, (work-)addiction, procrastination and isolation – amongst others. It affects our wellbeing at the workplace and is a major inhibitor to honesty, creativity, learning, innovation and change.

In this workshop, we will examine typical shame processes, learn how shame is established and triggered and raise awareness on reactions and avoidance behaviours from a field perspective. We will look at how shame plays out in different groups and organisations, how it can be detected and what we can do to avoid that shame contaminates the field and our relationships.

The workshop is intended for Consultants, Facilitators, Coaches/Counsellors and Psychotherapists who work with people in organisations or deal with shame in the workplace and who want to develop their insight, knowledge and skills in recognising, attending to and handling shame, vulnerability and guilt in an organisational context.

Language: English

Venue:       Gestalt Centre London

Dates:        19/20 October 2024 and 14/15 May 2025

Cost:          595 £

Facilitators Christina Schuierer and Richard Spence

Richard Spence has worked globally since 2008 as an Executive and Team Coach with corporate giants and fast-growing start-ups in sectors ranging from Engineering and Advertising to Government. He is a coaching supervisor, teaches systemic Constellation work and is a Gestalt psychotherapist in private practice. Previously, Richard had a long creative career as a BAFTA-winning film and television director in the UK and USA

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Core Concepts - Gestalt oriented organisational development

Working with Gestalt is challenging and exciting. This programme provides a practical introduction to the foundations of Gestalt and how they can be applied to organisations.

It is intended for 3  distinct groups of participants: 

• OD  or development professionals working on individual or organisational change  who are looking for additional tools and approaches
• OD Consultants, Facilitators and Coaches who want to extend their insight, knowledge and skill
• Managers working in organisations looking for fresh insights into why people (including yourself) behave the way they  do.

 The Core Curriculum for the programme includes:

-          Introduction to Organisational Development
-          Core Gestalt Concepts and their application in organisations
-          Awareness and the Use of Self
-          The Diagnostic Phase
-          Designing interventions
-          Raising Awareness
-          Recognising and managing resistance
-          The Gestalt Approach to Change

The programme is highly participative and experiential. Learning takes place through short conceptual inputs with activities and exercises used to ground the material in experience and to support skills development

Language:    English

Venue:        Gestalt Centre London, 15-23 St Pancras Way, London NW1 OPT 

Dates:         28/29 September 2024 and 5/6. April 2025, 10:00 - 17:00
2 days online, 1/2nd December 2024

Cost:           595 £

Facilitators: Christina Schuierer and Richard Spence

Richard Spence has worked globally since 2008 as an Executive and Team Coach with corporate giants and fast-growing start-ups in sectors ranging from Engineering and Advertising to Government. He is a coaching supervisor, teaches systemic Constellation work and is a Gestalt psychotherapist in private practice. Previously, Richard had a long creative career as a BAFTA-winning film and television director in the UK and USA

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In Practice - Gestalt oriented organisational development

Gestalt brings a unique perspective to organisational issues. The focus on detailed observation and here and now awareness, its rigorous separation of data and interpretation, its emphasis on exploration and experiment and its innovative methodologies for addressing rigid patterns and blocked processes all combine to create a powerful array of tools for anyone seeking to make sense of organisations. Gestalt works well in combiantion with analytic and other models to create new opportunities for change and the development of systems and individuals.

What you will learn: 

• Understanding of and the ability to apply the main Gestalt concepts relevant to OD
• Substantial exploration and review of individual practice (e.g. personal strength and limitations, development of insight and awareness)
• Professional consulting skills (e.g. contracting, diagnostics, designing interventions, working with others)
• Practical application through case review.

 Who should attend:

• Your work involves organisational development, human resources or learning and development. You have some experience of Gestalt and are looking for new tools and approaches to use in your practice.
• You will have attended the Gestalt in OD Core Concepts workshop or equivalent or have a basic understanding of Gestalt.
• You work in an organisation context and want fresh insights into why people (including yourself!!) behave the way they do.

Workshop methods:

• „Here and now“ experiential activities
• Personal work in small and large group settings
• “Real play” case consultations
• Short inputs, group discussion and practice on concepts and tools
• Some structured data gathering to acquire feedback between modules

The programme is highly participative and experiential. Learning takes place through short conceptual inputs with activities and exercises used to ground the material in experience and to support skills development

Language:    English

Venue:          online for Gestalt Centre London, 15-23 St Pancras Way, London NW1 OPT

Dates:          12/13th March 2025, 9/10th April 2025 and 7th/ 8th May 2025

Cost:             2450 £

Facilitators: Christina Schuierer and Richard Spence

Richard Spence has worked globally since 2008 as an Executive and Team Coach with corporate giants and fast-growing start-ups in sectors ranging from Engineering and Advertising to Government. He is a coaching supervisor, teaches systemic Constellation work and is a Gestalt psychotherapist in private practice. Previously, Richard had a long creative career as a BAFTA-winning film and television director in the UK and USA

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Awareness, dialogue, process. Gestalt in action.
Workshop with Gary Yontef, Ph.D.

(in cooperation with the Pacific Gestalt Institute, Los Angeles)

Dates:   tbd

Venue:  Berlin, Gestalt Centre, Wielandstr.

Cost:     930 € including board and lodging

Good knowledge of the Gestalt Approach as well as good English knowledge required.

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Gestalt in OD - Intervening for Change
6 Fortnightly Seminars held in London

The seminars and workshops provide both a theoretical background and experiental groupwork to understand what gestalt-oriented OD is and how it can be applied.

If you:

• are working in an organisation and want to learn the foundations of organisational development
• have some experience of organisational development, but want to learn more about effective interventions
• are a gestalt based counsellor or therapist who wants to enter the field of organisational consulting or coaching
• are an experienced OD consultant or coach, but want to know about the gestalt aspect of OD work in particular

you should secure your place in one or all of these learning events now.

Please note that the programme design means there is likely to be a rich range of experience both in OD work and understanding of the gestalt approach.

The 6 theory and concept focused seminars can be booked separately at very short notice (if places are available) – or together with the experiential workshops, as a whole series.

Established for over 30 years, the Gestalt Centre London is a leading training centre for gestalt psychotherapists and counsellors and the application of gestalt theory and methods for human resource professionals.

Situated in the heart of the City of London, the meeting and training facilities provide an excellent environment for this programme.

Short seminars will be held every second Wednesday in the early evening that will offer an insight into theories and concepts of gestalt-oriented OD. They will be complemented by some short, structured experiential work and training. After a 30 minute break, each seminar will be followed by a workshop for an hour and a half.

The workshops, facilitated by the faculty, provide an opportunity to experience how key concepts work in practice through active participation in a 'here and now' learning group. Each session will focus on the themes from the earlier seminar and will bring to life the challenges of working in real time. The workshop will provide the opportunity for the development of personal insights as well as exploring organisational events through experiment, discovery and participation.

While you can book the seminars separately, the workshops can only be taken if you also have attended the seminar. The number of participants is restricted to 20 for seminars and 12 for the workshops.

Themes of the 6 learning events:

1. Awareness and use of self in the consulting process
An introduction to organisational development
The cornerstones of the gestalt approach:relationship, contact and awareness
Use of self: emotional and intellectual presence
Field Theory and the Cycle of Experience

2. The diagnostic phase in the OD process
Field Theory and Action research: parts and wholes
What is happening – but…..what is not? 
Gaining access - who is the client?

3. Designing effective interventions
What is an intervention?
What next from there - what levels of system?
How to unblock energy
Improving capabilities and skills or creating opportunities?
Experiments vs. Exercises

4. Raising awareness
Domains of awareness
Noticing what is avoided and what is suppressed
Defensive routines and discounting 
How to raise our own awareness and develop others’ capacities

5. Recognising and managing resistance
Why creating a safe environment is key
How to notice resistance
Exploring fixed ways of relating
Appreciating different energy and valuing conflict
How do you allow different perspectives?

6. Change and the wider context
Paradoxical theory of change
Change emerges from reciprocal relating
Taking ownership and responsibility
How can this be sustained?

Faculty:

Tony Fraser: is a highly experienced Organisation Consultant and Executive Coach who has worked in the private, public and ‘third sector’ with every level from front line managers to Board Directors. Tony has designed and led organisation change programmes and leadership and team development programmes for some of the world’s most successful organisations. He has used the Gestalt Approach successfully over the last 30 years and continues regularly to renew and update his practice. Tony is co-author of ‘Gestalt for Managers’ and ‘The Management of Interpersonal Skills Training’.Founder and former MD of Executive Development International with 35 years of experience in organisational consulting and working with the private sector and large corporations worldwide

Christina Schuierer: is an OD consultant and trainer with 20 years experience of working with public and private organisations worldwide. She has helped development organisations and teams to become more successful in designing and implementing projects on economic development, environmental protection and organisational sustainability and has worked in more than 50 countries in Europe, Africa and Asia. She is managing a small consulting company based in Berlin, teaches on the faculty of International universities and institutes and is responsible for staff care at the German headquarters of Médecins Sans Frontières. Christina applies the Gestalt Approach to consulting, training, coaching and therapy.

For more information please contact:
Tony Fraser tel: 07715 165182 or email: tonyf@execdevint.com
Christina Schuierer email: christina@organisational-development.org

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