Aiki Business Group
Mission: Bring aikido principles and embodiment practices into the business world
Vision: Establish a network of experienced, successful practitioners to advise and enable others interested in bringing Aikido into the business world
Strategic Goals • Establish a catalog of practitioners and their links from around the world • Establish a social network / interactive WIKI on the AE website • Plan and conduct a conference for experienced and new practitioners • Develop an online How-To Manual that provides:
o Guidelines on how to successfully engage with businesses o Case studies of successful service projects to business o A process guide that explains how to market, price, sell, contract for, implement and evaluate consulting, coaching and training services o A process guide that describes example seminars, lists potential training exercises, example sequences and their facilitation o Recorded interviews, articles and book excerpts from pioneers o A video archive of seminars provided by experienced practitioners o An annotated bibliography of training centers, seminars, books, articles and videos in the field The History of the Work The applications of Aikido principles to the world of business cover a wide spectrum. The work ranges from business leaders who have trained in the art and then discovered natural connections to the way they do business, to Aikido teachers who have developed presentation, consulting and training businesses that contract with individual professionals, organization leaders, corporations and non profits to help them improve their performance.
The Basic Approach Historically, the primary approach of both the consultants and trainers has been to demonstrate Aikido and its core principles as a context and then provide, slow motion, non falling exercises drawn directly from mat practice to establish an experiential, embodied understanding of those principles and a physical simulation of their application to business life. Pioneers in advising business in these ways are Koichi Tohei who focused on applications to daily life, Terry Dobson and Tom Crum who focused on conflict resolution and George Leonard who focused on human potential. Tom continues to lead the field as a speaker, consultant and trainer.
Varied Applications Since the early seventies these and other practitioners have expanded the business applications to focus on individual performance improvement including leadership development, sales mastery, interpersonal communications, emotional intelligence, stress management, creativity and intuition, and team development. Further applications have evolved with more systemic focus on organization development including culture design, mission and vision definition, values clarity, strategic planning and market navigation, operations management, cross department collaboration, stakeholder management and multi-company partnership relations.
Leadership Development Some of the most striking progress in taking Aikido into business has been made in the field of leadership development in the USA. Richard Strozzi, based on his work consulting both corporate executives and the military, established Strozzi Institute, now on the leading edge of leadership development. Chris Thorsen and Richard Moon spent 15 years as leadership development advisors to key executive teams that built out the wireless industry, giving them the unprecedented opportunity to work with intact business teams for a dozen years in a row. In 2007, Tom Crum was ranked among the top 25 thought leaders in personal development and among the top 80 in leadership development by Leadership Excellence.
The Nature of the Work: Aikido is a natural metaphor for servant leadership. To approach the business community successfully requires just this attitude of humble service. Although practitioners of the art can assume that Aikido principles and even its practices will add value to a business environment, we cannot assume that this will be understood by any given business leader or the people in his or her organization. Translating the principles and practices of the art, let alone their applications and value to business can be difficult.
Business First Rather than trying to convince others that Aikido is important to them, we need to practice blending by listening to their view of their business needs. Once we deepen our understanding of their challenges, we’re in a position to offer how our methods might be of service as a way of fulfilling their desired outcomes. We’re there primarily to help their business progress, not to demonstrate how powerful our Aikido is.
Three Offers There are three proven ways of offering the art as a business tool. We can directly offer presentations and trainings billed as Aikido or Aikido based; we can engage as generic organization consultants, trainers or coaches and only bring Aikido forward explicitly as the need arises; or, as either service providers to, or members of an organization, we can utilize its principles and practices implicitly without direct reference to the art – say to practice self mastery or to aid in collaboration. Language Challenge Once the art is explicitly presented, however, we face the challenge of translating the terms in which we’ve learned the art into language that can be easily understood by laymen. For example, Irimi can become engagement or intervention, Tenkan can become listening, or Randori can be a way of looking at handling multiple pressures during the business day. The rule of thumb is again to start with their way of speaking and seeing and looking for the analogs in the art.
A Caution Lastly, a word to the wise. Unlike a formal dojo, even if we are assured that participants are involved voluntarily, they may have felt pressured to take part by their superiors. Further, engaging others in physical simulation exercises, we run the risk that people may be deeply disturbed by the process. They may be completely out of touch with their body, the exercise may trigger a deeply conditioned reaction, or they may have experienced trauma that has been stored in the musculature and experience an unexpected, frightening release. Once facing a practice with a partner, they may not be comfortable being touched, but not feel that it’s ok to say so.
As practitioners we hold a deep responsibility not only for participants’ physical safety, but their emotional safety as well. We are accountable to be constantly sensitive to the individual and group dynamics that are occurring during an engagement. People must be reminded that they are at personal choice regarding any exercise and that they will be completely supported if they choose to observe rather than take part directly.