I love this post by Pamela Slim ‘The Accordion Principle‘ because it resonates with my facilitating and consulting practice, and brings a systematic approach to a practice I often use.
The idea is to have a cycle between taking the high-level view on the challenge or problem to solve, and to focus on some detailed work. It is to make a systematic ‘health-check’ of what we are focusing on by looking at the big picture regularly. “The key is not to avoid looking at the big picture, it is to consistently move between the big picture and the small picture. I have termed this practice The Accordion Principle.“
In Pamela’s view it gets even further: “The new client will say something like “I don’t even know where to start. There are so many things going on right now, and they are all kind of swimming in my head.”. “Just start anywhere,” I say.” The point here, is that we need to start somewhere, and we need to start small. And then when we take the big-picture view, we’ll figure out how things have changed and how to progress with the rest.
Are you ready to apply the ‘accordion principle’ more systematically to your endeavors? Work on the details, then go wide to check the full picture, then go detailed again, and repeat… until you get there!
