More than a few years ago I was facilitating a small one-day workshop for a client on what it takes to work well as a team. The classroom was set up in rows, and there were about ten participants. We kicked it off with introductions, a few questions, and then jumped into the materials. I’m usually pretty good at quickly establishing rapport with those in the room and helping them engage in a collaborative learning experience. This day however, nothing seemed to be clicking. The energy in the room was low and people were obviously anything but engaged.
One of the participants, a young man with a warm smile and what felt like a big heart raised his hand. “This is a class about teams, right? What if instead of sitting in rows we moved our chairs into a circle?”
We did, and it worked. It was practically magic how quickly the energy in the room began to shift as everyone worked together to rearrange the room so that it became a shared space. Rather than focusing straight ahead at the front of the room, we all looked together towards the center, everyone there able to make eye contact with everyone else. Since then I’ve never facilitated a class on anything to do with teams in any configuration other than a circle.
Since then, that young man with the warm smile and the big heart has gone on to bigger and better things. Today Cody Goldberg is the Executive Director of Harper’s Playground, a foundation committed to “Building a more inclusive world, one playground at a time…driven by a vision of a world in which no one is left out.”
Harper’s Playground designs and builds playgrounds that work for everybody. Playgrounds that are inclusive and inviting, and springing up far and wide because Harper’s Playground generously shares their information on what is needed, what works, and why it works with anyone who asks. A few years ago Cody and I met for coffee and reminisced about that classroom where we met one another for the first time, and moved the chairs in the room into a circle so that no one was left out. Cody shared that circles are a part of every one of their playgrounds. Why? Because a circle makes room for everyone.
I spent some time today at Luuwit View Park in Portland. It was obvious that Cody and the Harper’s Playground vision had been incorporated into the design, as circles were a part of almost every aspect of the park. Our current times feel like we are living as if we still believe the world is flat, unable to see beyond our own horizons we forget that we have long known that it is round. Like a circle.
And a circle?
A circle makes room for everyone.
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