Business + Mission
Where the Streets Have No Names
Off the Map guides business and missional leaders through spaces where folks come to encounter and understand each other without being obliged to agree. For the better part of four decades, we’ve traveled unfamiliar territories — separately, and now together — exploring uncharted spaces for communication, persuasion, change agency, and leadership. We’ve been lost now and again … had to backtrack here and there … walked around in circles on occasion … all the while hoping Tolkien was right when he made Gandalf say: “All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost.”
In 2017 we began work on a project to help folks communicate with people they find disagreeable. We weren’t the tiniest bit interested in the aspirational angle on that … none of us needs to be told we should try harder to communicate with people who aren’t trying to communicate at all. What captured our imagination and focused our efforts was helping people cross the difference divide — repeatedly and on purpose — if they want to. We’re convinced that anyone with a hunger for rescuing and strengthening human connections — about identifying and working for the common good, at a minimum — can set the table for others who want that too.
See more of our work at 3Practices.com and HumaneResources.me.
JIM HENDERSON
Jim Henderson’s innovative work in crossing the difference divide has been reported by The Wall Street Journal, and USA Today, and featured on This American Life with Ira Glass. Jim is a serial entrepreneur, a producer of films and live events, an organizational leadership coach, and the author of eight books. He makes his home in Seattle, Washington.
JIM HANCOCK
Jim Hancock has a long history of designing content and delivering experience-based learning for organizations and institutions working on all sorts of interesting things. He’s authored and co-authored a dozen books and well north of 300 short films (and a couple of pretty long ones). He lives and works in Seattle, Washington.
ANDREW HIMES
Andrew Himes has been working to support collective impact and social change for over five decades as grassroots organizer, author and editor, film producer, host of multiple collective initiatives, and technology innovator. He is author of The Sword of the Lord: The Roots of Fundamentalism in an American Family. He lives in Seattle, Washington and serves as Director of Collective Impact for the Carbon Leadership Forum.
Three Practices:
I’ll be unusually interested in others
I’ll stay in the room with difference
I’ll stop comparing my best with your worst.
Late one night in a Central-California hotel, a traveling salesman invited us to join him for a beer.
“Where you from?” he asked.
“Pacific northwest,” we said.
“So … Democrats, then,” he replied. Satisfied he’d gathered, in a single question, all the evidence he needed to size us up as ideological opponents, he changed the subject to sports.
This is the spirit of the age, nicely summed up by The Onion headline:
“STEREOTYPES ARE A REAL TIME-SAVER.”
Of course they are. Because, honestly, who has the time, let alone the need for real conversations when simpleminded stereotypes will do?
Who indeed….
The 3Practices emerged as a feat of reverse-engineering. Over decades, we observed, and eventually described and named the habits of people who cross the difference divide — repeatedly and on purpose. Not only do these people have time for real conversations, they’ve decided they don’t have time anymore for conversations that aren’t real.
In 2017, we started leading 3Practice Circles, first in Seattle, then across the country, in order to prove that it’s possible to have substantive, civil conversations with ideological opponents.
We lead Open 3Practice Circles where anyone is welcome, we lead Hosted 3Practice Circles where folks can introduce the 3Practices to people in their spheres of influence, and we lead Private 3Practice Circles for businesses, civic groups, religious organizations, schools, and universities.
We train others to lead 3Practice Circles, too, because we can’t be everywhere … nor do we need to be. When people see what goes on in a 3Practice Circle, some of them think, I could learn to do that. Yes, they could … and can … and do.
3Practice Zoom Circles
A space to pursue clarity + understanding with people who have good reasons to disagree
Upcoming 3Practice Zoom Circles + other events
Experience a 3Practice Zoom Circle: Waking Up White in America
Are there unearned privileges that come with waking up white in America?
Three Practices:
I’ll be unusually interested in others
I’ll stay in the room with difference
I’ll stop comparing my best with your worst.
3Practices for Crossing the Difference Divide — in paperback and digital/tableteditions — is for people who are sad, angry, and apprehensive about important relationships being sucked into the vortex of the difference divide. It’s a book for people who aren’t ready to accept this as our new normal — where we have no choice but to write off relationships that mean a great deal to us.
This book shows how you can:
1. Create a safe space for learning the 3Practices.
2. Teach a simple skill people can take home and apply immediately.