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Sometimes it’s hard to start an important conversation, one that might alter your organization forever. Handled awkwardly and with little forethought, a discussion meant to inspire ideas, motivate action, and re-envision outcomes can turn out pretty lame. That’s often how I feel about any rah-rah sessions and books related to “change” or, worse, “big change.”

Recently, Susan Sarfati, CEO & president of the Center for Association Leadership, and I spoke at different times with Alan Webber, better known as the high-energy co-founder of the very hip business magazine Fast Company. Almost every page of every issue of Fast Company is about change, but it’s cool change, if you know what I mean—like how to get your boss to let you use video games to train your co-workers.

Anyway, cool change—and how to talk about it--seemed a natural topic when I got an opportunity to chat with Alan myself, so I asked him how association leaders can begin effective discussions of one of the biggest and coolest business changes of the past 20 years: the use of strategic social responsibility to create business opportunities while benefiting society and the planet.

“People at all levels of an organization should ask themselves two questions,” Alan replied.

“(1) What keeps me awake at night? What is the gnawing problem or issue that I feel we are not addressing and that, deep in my heart of hearts, I am not happy that we are not speaking to the issue?

“(2) What gets me excited--pumped up--about getting up and going to work in the morning?

“If you can be honest about the answers to those two questions, you begin a conversation both about the deficiencies and strengths of the organization, and that’s where [this journey] has to start,” Alan stated. “What should we be doing that we are not doing that we all know is true? And what are we doing that we should amplify because it’s our greatest opportunity to make a difference?

“Those are open-ended questions; they are not multiple choice,” he continued. “And the more people who speak honestly about those questions, the more you begin to hone a sense of direction for the future, and it taps the energies and aspirations of people in the organization.

“If you can identify a very small set of opportunities—say, three to five answers to those questions--then you can get into more tactical questions: What do we know? What are we good at? How can we do things differently from how they are being done today? Who should we be talking to for more information? What are the simple steps we can take so that what we learn, what we commit to, can be turned into real action and … built into a feedback loop, so that we can see our actions impact the area we have chosen to work on? How do we structure conversations with the outside world to get and provide input? Do we start institutionalizing brown-bag lunches with people inside and out? Can we create the equivalent of a talk show inside our organization, and then how do we get that talk show broadcast over a Web site or put in print so that more people get into the conversation? How do we convert to action?"

Alan called this discussion process a way of “structuring yourself to be a thoughtful, creative, innovative and knowledge-hungry operation as you go into a new area. Tackle it like a wonderful opportunity for research and development.”

Stay tuned for the March 2008 Associations Now, which will contain part of Susan’s and my conversations with Alan on trends and corporate lessons from the social responsibility arena, as well as potential cool changes generated by our Global Summit on Social Responsibility, being convened April 30-May 2 by ASAE & The Center.