Episode 1 (season 3): Fanny Matheusen talks about implementing Deep Democracy methodologies

Yes, and also the hummus that you like in the sense that we have chosen a word that symbolizes for us part of what we do, namely. Hummus is an international dish that everyone knows, but that everyone also makes in their own way. And we think that the unique mix that people can create together can result in a lot of wisdom. Lots of beauty, lots of goodies.

Yes, that reminds me of Blenders. Our brand name. That was once set up from the same idea. Yes, nice. And please explain, what do you or does HUMMUS do?

I have actually been fascinated by groups for thirty years and have always been fascinated by the role of difference in that story of groups. And a few years ago I came across the Deep Democracy method and that was really a revelation for me. I thought ah yes, the things I have actually been doing and experimenting for years, that has a name. And then I also discovered that this was actually very little known in Belgium. So I felt a bit of my pioneering calling. I sometimes have that problem, that I become a bit of a pioneer in things that emerge and then I quickly started to provide training in this in Belgium. And then I was able to take my best students along with me, which is always a luxury. And then we actually founded a collective together, HUMMUS, from which we provide those training courses. But also, and I think this is very important, also providing process guidance in organizations. So we also want to stand with our feet in the mud. Feel the work. And from there we always bring new inspiring insights into the world. Yeah, that's kind of what we do. And my role in this is mainly yes, I founded it, I am the manager, but I also try to keep the creative spirit warm and further develop the method.

Deep Democracy was a discovery for you a few years ago. I'm sure that is still an unknown concept for many listeners, so you should explain it first, if possible.

Yes, I'm glad I got that chance. Any opportunity to develop Deep Democracy is a great one. For me, Deep Democracy is actually, at its base it means that in many contexts, at work, in organizations and in society, there is a dominant discourse. A discourse that we maintain with a number of people that it concerns all people. But actually that very often does not apply to all people. There are many different perspectives in society and Deep Democracy actually wants to pay attention to those different voices and actually believes that if we listened a little more to those minority voices, or to those other voices I would actually rather call them because sometimes they are not at all in the minority, that we can achieve much more collective wisdom that we actually need in society at this time. Because that society is undergoing a rapid transition. We see a lot of movement in this at the moment and we actually think that we need all the votes. And how do we do that together? And Deep Democracy offers some tools for that. Really very manageable instruments, for example instruments about making decisions in a different way, dealing with tension and conflict in a different way. But for me it has also become a kind of attitude to life. Or such a way of looking at people and at the world and from there also practicing myself and the people we train in a number of, yes, we sometimes call them meta skills or something, or almost basic attitudes from which you deal with people in a more compassionate way, use your intuition more sometimes, also trust that there is also a lot of wisdom in people in organizations and in teams. And go from there. Not always from an expert role. So that’s a completely different way of facilitating and guiding groups. Yes, for me it was a discovery in that sense, because I was already doing a number of things, very often I was seen as a bit of a special facilitator, oh, she does some strange things and then suddenly I thought yes but I actually do this. So I've found a bit of language for the things I was already experimenting with on my own.

And yes, that is interesting for you and perhaps also for credibility. That also helps others. If you can attach a good name and a clear methodology to it and work around it in a structured manner.

Yes, and what it has brought me is also, and I find that very interesting about Deep Democracy, it has actually given me an opening to a whole international community of people who do this. So democracy as a method is present in forty countries around the world, which is quite a lot, and also in countries where it is quite exciting. For example, I have colleagues in Lebanon with whom we have been in contact recently. Also colleagues in Turkey, colleagues in the US and Canada who are now also very shocked by what is happening there. So that is also fascinating because it also makes the field a bit broader than if you only look from those Belgian glasses.

So you provide training, you supervise processes. How should I imagine that? If a company or organization asks for guidance on Deep Democracy in their organization? What will you do then or how will you approach that?

That can be very different. So the registrations are often like this in three areas. We have quite a few questions about conflict. When there is tension and conflict and people cannot find a solution themselves. There are also some questions about how we can work together better. We call that co-creation, more co-creation, participatory issues. These are sometimes at an organizational level, but also at a social level. For example, the entire decolonization movement, which was very active a few years ago, now it seems to be fading away again, but was nevertheless very active, also required social conversations where these different perspectives could be discussed. And then a final registration is often also around inclusion, which you also work a lot on. And yes, that can be very different. Sometimes there is a need for more knowledge or skills in this area and then we will actually invest more in training. But then we very often encounter organizational patterns. Sometimes the reason is different, sometimes something may have happened, for example an incident or something that happened in the organization or happened a few times. And what the organizations think, oh, but we really need to talk about that together. We always start with a coordination meeting with our customer, in which we explore together a bit about what our offer could be. But what do you really need and what have you already done about it? Where are there cool areas and where is the resilience to work on these? And where will we have to challenge ourselves a little bit or, in a somewhat confrontational way, get to work ourselves? And those processes can be very different. Sometimes we may simply work with a small group and coach a small group, for example, or set up conflict mediation. But we often also work with large groups of people. We really like having people with different perspectives in the room. For example, I have actually been able to do some beautiful things with, for example, eighty people in the room who looked at a certain theme together from very different interests and perspectives, worked on it together for a whole day and then at the end of the day you see such beautiful things arise when everyone can be listened to. And that is what we take care of above all.

Yes, because how do you do that? How can the listener get started with this tomorrow or today in his or her organization? Yes, the idea is to let the voice of the minority speak clearly in order to tap into that collective wisdom. But yeah, okay, interesting. Yes, we should definitely do that. And how do you do that in a feasible way?

Yes, without, of course, giving a nine-day training course here. But I think, for me, there are a number of basic attitudes or so that we can work around. I think the first is to be very aware of our own way of speaking and listening. Some of us speak little and we will invite them to speak more. Some of us speak a lot, which often has to do with our position in the organization, our formal position. I am also in a leadership role myself. Yes, you will naturally speak more, because that is also expected of you. But that may also have to do with the multiple identity from which we speak. Higher educated people also speak up more easily. We know that in men's and women's teams, men often take much longer to speak at a meeting than women, for example, or men also pass the floor to each other. So. These are things that we will pay attention to in our way of facilitating. So that is actually very nice work to have an eye for how do I, I call it with a big word, but how do power dynamics actually express themselves in the way we dialogue. That's something we're going to pay attention to.

Because recognition means moving towards the person or away from the person if you disagree.

So it's a very dynamic way of dialogue. Meanwhile, we know that it is actually a very old form, we were just talking about the African continent and this form of speaking is very similar to some of the old customs of speaking there. But in the meantime we know from neuroscience, which I find so interesting, that we can now combine those things. That when we literally move with our body in our brain, our neural pathways are also stimulated. So actually there is also a lot of intuitive wisdom in doing that in a moving way. That we do that standing up.

Also explains why it is sometimes much more interesting to have a conversation between two people while walking than at the table.

Certainly. I think in covid times things have emerged such as walking coaching and so on and I hear many coaches who no longer let go of that because they really feel that the added value of walking indeed also plays a role.

But it is also an interesting method in the group to make the differences more visible and discuss them. And that's one of your favorites, you just said.

Yes. Of course, it also comes from my own life experience that they have the feeling of having a different voice and then being given the space to do something with it. I think that has been part of my calling throughout my career, to do something with it in very different ways. I have already done that in my commitment to the youth movement because I have worked with children with disabilities in the youth movement for whom there was actually no place in the youth movement. So that started very early to keep an eye on that. And what drives me today, I think, I sometimes also call myself a transition pedagogue, is that I think that today, because that society needs so much, we actually need all the wisdom to turn the tide, I sometimes think, it is such a shame that we only listen to certain voices or to a number of leaders who think they speak from everyone's right. But that's not. That is of course not correct.

Yes, and when you see today what is happening in the world and in our own Flemish country or everywhere, you get the feeling that the dominant majority is only becoming even more important and the minority is even more oppressed or suppressed or how should I say it.

It's certainly worrying. Last night, my children are in their twenties, and the conversation was only about the decrees that had been signed and what is happening there. It's very worrying.

Very nice. In the meantime, I might also say that there is also a sidekick at the table here, my colleague Eva Maréchal.

Yes, I wanted to pick up on the book you wrote about professional action in a polyphonic society. I think one of your big inspirations in this is also Edwin Hoffman. And how have you incorporated his thinking into your practices?

Yes, Edwin is indeed a very inspiring man and we invite him every year to the HUMMUS house to share his wisdom. Where he has moved a stone for me is that he has actually made it clear in a very inviting way, I think, because he is a very amiable person, that our way of providing training on everything that has to do with diversity and inclusion or intercultural competence, yes, that was very often trained in many studies about other cultures, about people who were different. And Edwin Hoffman has shown to me that it is actually much more about simply communicating decently with each other, based mainly on the knowledge of your own frame of reference. And that's a message he gave years ago, when I heard it for the very first time, I actually found it very inspiring. I had also studied at that interaction academy, where he actually got his start. And I found it very inspiring that he connected those worlds and that he actually makes a plea to communicate in a way in which we really invite ourselves to go into that openness in and and thinking, to actually broaden our horizons, but from the knowledge of our own multiple identity. And he developed the TOPOI model. That is also a very handy model and I also taught students at the time and that was one of the models that I also taught them and that I think helped them enormously in the field, because it is a very practice-oriented model that is very manageable.

Yes, because that and and thinking, what should we mean by that when it comes to multiple identity and dialogue with each other?

Yes, it is also the last character of my PEACE model, that and and thinking. For me, that's about the fact that we actually walk a fine line very often when we really think about inclusion. And we can even question that concept today. But in any case, if we want to use the concept of polyphony more, if we want to build more polyphonic teams and organizations, we should always pay attention to two facets. On the one hand, we are all there as people, as employees, as team members. There is something that binds and connects us on the level of equals. But there is always a difference. And how do we do that with that difference? And there are organizations that focus too much on 'we are all equal and so we don't have to do anything special, because everyone just has to try very hard'. Then you get a bit of the meritocratic approach. But there are also organizations that have sometimes become too involved in the exception policy and therefore make all kinds of separate arrangements for everyone. And then, in fact, a culture often arises in which there is a kind of repression, including among minorities. And what the and and thinking advocates is where do we find the balance between the two? Where can we do justice to 'okay, we are all human here' and where can we do justice to 'but we are all really different' without losing sight of it. So it is actually a plea that goes much further than, one is color blindness, but the other, I would almost dare to call it, is also a kind of exoticism or something from which a lot of stereotypes and prejudices arise and which sometimes also pits groups against each other in the workplace. And we actually don't want that and you, with your own practice, will probably know that it is sometimes a difficult balance and that the slider is not always in the middle. Sometimes we have to go there a little bit more and sometimes we have to ...

Fanny, you just referred to awareness of your own personal frame of reference. That is very important, but it is much easier said than done. Because yes, looking ourselves in the mirror and determining what is our frame of reference is about the most difficult thing, it is like a fish swimming in the water and not being aware of the water. How do you approach that? How can you help people to hold up that mirror?

Yes, that is of course also a very comprehensive question. I think that it also happens in bits and pieces that people learn to see that. But we do use some inspiring working methods to work on that. For example, I also work with a very large card set that contains a number of those facets. And then we first do the exercise of, oh yes, if you think about a colleague that you are having a hard time with, what facets would he have? And they soon go to one card actually where the problem is located. And then of course I turn it around completely, making it very clear that if you were to be addressed from that one card, would that be your complete self? And which parts of yours actually still play a role? So that bit about multiple identity, intersectionality, intersexuality, that is super important to me. I'll just use a few words now, we can go on and on. Combined with the fact that I often work with people around: What were your own experiences with being different? I think that even many people who belong to the so-called dominant group in society have had experiences of being different, thinking about something different, feeling different. And I think that's also a very interesting ground. What happened if I was the other voice? What happened to me then?

Joris Luyendijk, who was in London and realized that there were seven check marks, but he was missing a check mark or something?

Yes. And I think it's great that he writes that book about that. Or a colleague of mine, Meike Vroom, who has now written a book 'I am not a racist, but ...'. Which actually also indicates a bit from her being a white woman, how she often unconsciously makes statements that could be discriminatory. But daring to admit that to ourselves and actually holding that mirror up to ourselves, creating awareness about that, I believe in that much more than many people who say, yes, but yes, I am a good person. You know. And that's easy, because then we actually push it all away. But it's actually by sitting in our own experience. For example, an exercise that I often do when we work on conflict is, think back to your childhood and what messages did you receive there about difference? How many of us have we heard or read in children's books? Don't argue. That's a shame, isn't it? I don't believe there are good partner relationships where we don't argue. Sometimes that is quite necessary. But because it is a taboo, we have also become very afraid of it. We let this lie for too long in workplaces. And then of course more serious conflicts or sometimes polarization come into play. So I often go back with people to find out where are some of the roots and we explore that through exercises.

But how nice is it to apply this method in a school, because it undoubtedly also has an impact on how teachers deal with their students, where democracy may also be a great, how should I put it, playground to work on.

Yes, yes, yes. And that's actually a different book, which I didn't bring with me now. I have also written 'You can learn to rebel' for people who work with children and young people. Because one of my other passions is that I think the younger we learn this, the more we can actually work on that transition in society, because our young people are the leaders of tomorrow. So if they can get to know that, that is super important. And so we now have a number of examples where schools have indeed been inspired, where we have sometimes worked first with the management, then with the teachers. But it is true that teachers have also been inspired to do things in the classroom. And I am also very proud of the fact that we are currently, but it is still ongoing, in a European project called Carp - there is also a website for people who want to take a look at it - where we are actually doing further development of these tools because we noticed that when we introduce those tools to young people today, very often their mental resilience does not allow them to really fully experience those tools. And so I started working with an organization in the UK that works on mental resilience in young people in many vulnerable areas in East London. And we also put our knowledge together and we actually started developing new tools that can be used in the classroom. And we are now fully rolling this out in twelve schools in four different countries. Yes, that is a very nice job to be able to do. And yes, I was there at one of the first applications in a school with great social vulnerability in London. And the stories that emerge from those young people. Yes, I am really amazed at how much power there is actually in those stories. And how much courage and hope they also show. Even though life is a big challenge and a big struggle for them every day. That part is also there and it really comes to the fore through the way we work with them.

Because Fanny, what is the transition that you would like to achieve with the young people? Is it that they find their own voice and dare to speak out? How should I see that in such a classroom context? The fact of polyphony, Deep Democracy and yes, what you just talked about.

Yes, I think for me, I just said that leadership is actually a very important theme and I think that many young people are affected by the current education system, and now I am going to generalize, because that is not the case in all schools and I know that many people are working on a different path. But many of our young people actually lose their leadership in education, are left behind, and sometimes learn to obey things that do not feel authentic to them. And our tools actually invite you to relive your own leadership from within. That's one piece. And the other part is if we can achieve that in a group, then you will see the polyphony in that group emerge more. They also learn to deal with differences between each other. Something we will really need, also in work contexts. But they also discover not only the polyphony between each other in the class group, but also the polyphony within themselves. And that is also a very beautiful thing, many young people have also acquired a very limited idea of ​​themselves from their upbringing or from their education or from the opportunities they have or have not sometimes had. And suddenly they also discover other facets of themselves, which also creates openings for possibilities that they also see to be able to walk their path a little more fully. So yes, I think it is very powerful if we can do that towards young people, their own leadership, but also their own polyphony.

David Van Reybrouck, a body of thought.

Yes, he started that. But you actually see that popping up in many countries today, in many different forms. And then I think I also realize that politicians are also citizens and we have lost that a bit. A lot is also projected onto them because they are only politicians, which creates a very stereotypical image. But actually they are also citizens who assume a certain responsibility. And how can we better coach them in their work and so on. There is actually very little attention paid to it. I've been really shocked when I've talked to some people in political professions about how little support they get, how little training they get, for example. That could also make a very big difference and therefore other conversation rituals could arise. Also in a municipal council, for example, or in those committees or in parliament. I think that could really benefit us a lot. Regardless of elections and such. So we can also think very critically about that. But simply if we were to speak and listen in a different way within the existing system. I think very different things could then arise. Yes, so Deep Democracy also invites that. And a second meaning of deep, so there really is that idea of ​​a different democracy. But a second meaning of deep is in line with this for me and that is that this will not only be done in a rational way. That if we speak to each other differently, emotions should also play a role. And that is also something we see in politics today, that emotions should not actually play a role in decisions that are made. Emotions, but also body sensations, deeper wisdom, wisdom from other cultures. Yes, there is so much that remains below the waterline and I think that if we were to create more openness about that, it could make a very big difference.

Yes, yes, absolutely. I want to express great appreciation, because you just said that was important, and it was very sincere. Thank you for this conversation. We have hopefully inspired a lot of people.

Thank you for the invitation and also much appreciation for your work that I have been able to get to know in this way.

Yes, thank you. Thank you Fanny.