The Force-Field Diagram is premised on the assumption that people and events behave (or fail to behave) as they do because of the balance of pressures and motivations upon them. The idea is that by mapping these out, we can then identify those forces which are both easiest to address, and which will have the biggest impact on the balance. The idea is originally attributed to Kurt Lewin.
For instance, if we wanted to explore people’s adoption of a particular standard in their work, we would map out the forces that encourage and support people in that standard down the left hand side, and the forces that discourage and obstruct down the right. We might then use red dots to explore those which would have the biggest impact if changed (e.g. reducing the barriers or increasing the motivators) and green to explore the ease with which we can bring these things about; and then select those which have both red and green dots.
Force-Field Diagrams are very useful ways of getting everybody engaged in thinking through issues around behaviours, or even potential issues around a preferred solution.
The Force-Field template can be used as part of a plenary activity (with the facilitator capturing ideas from the group and writing them up), or as a syndicate activity (with one group looking at positive forces and another looking at negative ones), or as a distributed activity (with people typing in their own ideas to the template via sticky notes).
Once the forces have been included, the group can then prioritise them on the basis of impact and ease – once again as a directly facilitated activity, or by inviting them to work individually or in small groups to allocate dots (using the highlighter pen tool) for impact and ease.
The following links provide more information on the tool
Clicking the instant template below will open up as a live interactive tool in your browser. Simply copy its URL from the address bar on the page that opens and share it through your meeting chat with your team. They will instantly be able to participate with you by: adding their thoughts via sticky notes; seeing all that’s going on, and moving things around. For more on instant templates, click here.
Track your progress to ensure the efficacy of this strategy.