Cohere+ - Exploring coherence in communities of change agents using Sensemaker® - What "outliers" reveal from a system

As part of the EU-Erasmus+ project Cohere+, supported by the associate partner Cynefin Company, a Sensemaker® capture** has been designed  to be able to tap into the hidden assumptions, underlying patterns, and unarticulated needs around the topic of coherence of a number of communities and movements of change agents, among participants of Inner Development Goals- Summit 2023, participants of the Holomovement meeting in 2024 and other groups and networks. 

A number of findings have already been published as part of the chapter 24 "Deepcasting the IDGs- Exploring the cross-dimensional quality of coherence" in the book IDG: Stories of Collective Leadership in Action, Volume 2: From "We" to "Systems Change" (De Gruyter Brill).

This blog article focuses on the so-called "outliers", which are those responses and stories that are seem outside the majority of responses and patterns (indicated as triads and dyads below) and which are often revealing a great and often overlooked amount of information.

The following text is a transcript of a live sensemaking session between Bettina Geiken and Anne Caspari

There are 9 very negative stories out of around 110. The rest are mixed, positive, or very positive. So this is an outlier group—which makes it particularly interesting. It’s a mixed group, geographically and professionally (citizens, consultants, NGOs, entrepreneurs), with a diversity of age and more female than male voices.

The tensions they describe are mostly internal—conflicts within the self or between the self and the wider collective. If we look at the triads and dyads (where patterns emerge beyond individual stories), a few things stand out:

• There is no strong trend toward growing awareness of the self in relation to others.
• People were less concerned about “having the right people” and more about having the right structures, facilitation, and process.

One key polarity appears in section 2.1: “My main concern is to stay true to myself and my truth” versus “to be part of a generative community.” These are often felt as opposing needs—many people seem to give up parts of the self in order to belong to the community.

Negotiating healthy self-boundaries in a strong community space often creates tension. Not everyone can manage this balance. In intentional communities especially, individuals sometimes sacrifice aspects of selfhood to remain included.

In this dataset, many stories align with the struggle to stay true to oneself while navigating community belonging. This can reflect either:

• an internal challenge with navigating that space, or
• a community that is itself overwhelming or misaligned.

Three stories pointed to a task-oriented process, but most were more relationship-oriented.

Section 2.3 shows that tensions were mostly ignored or suppressed. In 6 out of 8 stories, tensions weren’t addressed, indicating discomfort either with specific people or with the process.

For instance, one story from Belgium highlights the tension between “making sense” and “moving to action.” Another speaks of criticism of IDGs that led to only polite conversation—missing the heat or intensity the storyteller needed.

There’s also a strong theme of personal safety. One person wrote of choosing separation while longing for connection. The process didn’t offer enough safety for them to feel included, despite external signals of belonging.

Another story described difficulty in processing anger and the weight of today’s world—capturing feelings of hopelessness and how hard it is to digest such emotions.

Many negative stories involve themes like:

• feeling lost
• lack of clarity on next steps
• desire for aligned action, but no follow-through

Some people describe magical moments of emergence or presence, but then say: “the next steps were never clear” or “nothing happened after.”

There is also a gap between the desire to contribute to something bigger and the reality of taking action. Several stories reflect ambivalence:

• “I want to serve the collective”
• “I want to be nurtured”
  But few stories land on “I take action” or “I get things done.”

This may point to a need for support in building aligned agency—especially between gatherings or outside structured group moments.

The emotional vocabulary around falling out of coherence is richer than that around coherence itself. People seem more able to describe disconnection than deep presence or flow, which are rarer experiences and harder to articulate.

Overall, stories rarely identify task-oriented goals. This suggests that in coherent or emerging spaces, relationships and safety are prioritized—possibly at the expense of action. That might be why we see fewer stories about agency and execution.

This is precisely what the project aims to address: how to help changemakers move from connected intention to aligned action.

What are recurrent themes in the stories that were evaluated as "negative"?

There is no single column explicitly labelled as a "negative evaluation" flag. However, we can infer negative experiences from one or more of the following:

• The story title or experience text contains words indicating struggle or failure (e.g. triggered, tension, lost).
• The multiple-choice question “2.3 Tension in the process were mainly…” includes “Ignored or suppressed”.
• The response “I feel lost and can’t wait for the next meeting” in “2.4 Regarding your story…”.

I'll now filter for entries where:

1. The story contains words like triggered, frustrated, confused, etc., or
2. The respondent said tensions were “ignored or suppressed”, or
3. They felt “lost” between meetings.

Then I’ll extract common themes from those.

The stories marked as “negative” show these recurring themes:

1. Personal triggers and emotional discomfort – Often from interpersonal interactions or group dynamics.
2. Tensions not addressed – Especially when people suppress conflict or difficult feelings.
3. Disconnection from agency – Feelings of being lost, confused, or passive between gatherings.
4. Unmet expectations in facilitation – A mismatch between hopes for coherence and what actually happens.

5. Reflections on ego and coherence – The tension between personal patterns and collective flow.

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**Sensemaker® collects real-life stories, experiences, anecdotes, narrative of participants and then asks them to take a step back and evaluate their own stories, allowing for direct individual sensemaking of the lived experience. As the aggregated data from all entries highlight collective patterns these are used for collective sensemaking.