inhabiting
the unknown

Authority, Leadership and Learning at the Edge

3 – 6 SEPTEMBER 2026
ONLINE

Many of us find ourselves working in territory our familiar maps no longer describe. Polarisation intensifies across every scale: globally through wars and conflicts, within nations where political divisions deepen, in organisations where teams fracture along competing visions, and in personal spheres where conversations about politics, freedom and control, climate, or technology strain relationships. Technologies accelerate beyond our capacity to absorb them—from AI and robotics that promise transformation to deep fakes and social media that make it harder to discern what is real. The speed of societal change means each generation has grown up with fundamentally different perspectives, creating fractures between people now trying to work together.

In our organisations and in our personal lives, these forces are experienced as immediate disruptions—restructures that reshape roles overnight, remote work that shifts how authority operates, and competing demands that pull us in different directions. We find ourselves between stages: no longer where we were, not yet where we might be going, and still required to work, lead, decide, and collaborate. Can we work from uncertainty rather than fight it? Where do we find our authority when structures keep shifting? How do we lead when we cannot predict what comes next? How do we stay engaged with complexity without reaching for false certainty simply to feel stable?

Wilfred Bion wrote that groups often avoid the work they have gathered to do, not because of resistance or lack of motivation, but because the work itself creates anxiety. The edge of learning lies in that uncomfortable place between knowing and not knowing, between holding on and letting go—a threshold that may be difficult, but where real learning can happen.

Why do decisions get made that nobody actually agreed to? Why is culture so hard to change even when everyone says they want to? Why are some voices heard more than others?

This Group Relations Conference puts participants in direct contact with these and other questions through lived experience. Participants and staff form a temporary organisation in which they study what happens among them: how authority is taken up or avoided, how roles are assumed, and how patterns of inclusion and exclusion emerge.

The conference takes place online over four days, with the virtual setting itself becoming available for study as part of the work.

Alongside the conference, two additional learning components extend the learning: a pre-conference introducing the conceptual foundations of Group Relations, and a post-conference designed to consolidate learning and deepen practice.

We invite you to join us in this exploration.

We look forward to working with you,

Marco Valerio, Director
Leila Djemal, Associate Director

About the Conference

Group Relations Conferences do not follow a traditional conference format. There are no presentations, panels, or keynote addresses. Instead, participants and staff, from a wide range of professions, backgrounds, and cultures, together form a temporary learning organisation. The topics and issues that arise are studied as they unfold in real time. The participants’ lived experience becomes the material for learning.

Organisations operate not only according to their stated purposes, but under the influence of group and systemic processes that are both visible and hidden, rational and irrational. These processes shape behaviour and decision-making in ways that are often poorly understood, even by those most affected by them. A Group Relations Conference creates a temporary organisation specifically to study these processes through direct experience.

The learning is modelled after the working conferences developed at the Tavistock Institute of Human Relations, London. The conference provides frameworks for making sense of experience, but the content arises from what actually happens between people, from the choices made, the roles taken up and the dynamics that develop.

The conference offers learning on two levels. Participants can develop a deeper understanding of how groups function. For example, how authority gets taken up or avoided, how boundaries get negotiated or challenged, how groups develop a life of their own, and how individuals can find themselves drawn into roles they did not consciously choose.

At the same time, participants can observe their own tendencies and behaviours in real time, becoming more aware of how they take up leadership or followership, how they respond to authority, what roles they gravitate towards or resist.

The conference provides opportunities to study these dynamics as they play out in shifting and uncertain conditions; to encounter both the visible and less visible processes that operate in groups of different sizes and structures, and to discover the unspoken feelings and assumptions that are routinely set aside in everyday working life under the pressure to fulfill formal working tasks. It also creates a space to work directly with competition, collaboration, conflict and connectedness.

As a temporary organisation, the conference functions as a microcosm of the wider world. The dynamics that arise often mirror patterns from participants’ organisations, teams, communities, and personal lives. The conference offers an opportunity to examine what emerges and consider its implications beyond the conference itself.

The conference is based on experiential learning. Participants are invited to learn by doing – by being part of groups, examining what happens in them, and reflecting on these experiences.

Learning emerges through experiencing and reflecting on what happens around us and within us: longing and competition, belonging and exclusion, confusion and clarity. Some of this belongs to what is happening in the room; some carries the weight of personal and collective history. The conference provides space to examine both dimensions, allowing them to be explored and thought about rather than set aside too quickly in an effort to get on with the formal task.

In this conference, the online medium itself becomes part of the learning. What happens to authority when people are present but not physically together? How do groups form across distance? What dynamics surface online that would not appear in-person? Most organisational work now takes place partly or wholly in virtual environments, making these live questions for anyone working, leading or consulting in contemporary organisations.

This conference is for anyone who wants to understand more about how groups function, and to develop greater capacity to lead, contribute, and navigate within them.

Participants come from a wide range of fields: leaders, managers, entrepreneurs, consultants, HR professionals, coaches, facilitators, clinicians, educators, researchers, activists, public sector and non-profit professionals, students, and many others.

The experiential nature of Group Relations Conferences makes them suited to anyone, regardless of their level of experience. Curiosity and a genuine desire to learn are the only requirements.

If you have attended a Group Relations Conference before, returning offers opportunities to deepen your systemic understanding and experiment with new ways of engaging or taking up your role. Each conference is different, shaped by who is present and what emerges between them.

A LEARNING PATHWAY

Pre and Post Conference Learning

The four-day conference sits within a broader learning pathway. Two additional components are available: a pre-conference component offering an introduction to the conceptual foundations of group relations work, and a post-conference component consolidating the learning and exploring small study group dynamics and consultation in greater

Together, the three components complement one another and can be taken either as an integrated pathway or individually, as stand-alone offerings. Whether you are new to this work or an experienced practitioner, and whether you are seeking conceptual grounding or practical consolidation, the programme offers multiple entry points and forms of learning. depth.

Pre-Conference:
Conceptual Component

22-23 August 2026
Two meetings of 4.5 hours each. Held online.

Times (22-23 August 2026):
Sydney/Melbourne: 5:00pm – 9:30pm AEST
Singapore: 3:00pm – 7:30pm SGT
Israel: 10:00am – 2:30pm IDT
Central European Time: 9:00am – 1:30pm CEST

This component introduces some of the conceptual foundations on which group relations work is based: systems psychodynamic thinking and its application to key concepts such as authority, role and group dynamics. It also includes an introduction to some of the key components of a group relations conference. Whether you are new to this work or have prior experience, it provides an opportunity to engage with these ideas, and offers a framework to assist in making sense of what you will encounter.

For whom: Open to all participants. Particularly valuable for those who are new to group relations work or who wish to refresh and deepen their understanding of some of its foundations.

The Conference

3-6 September 2026
Four days, Thursday through Sunday. Approximately 6 hours, each day. Held online.

Times (3-6 September 2026):
Sydney/Melbourne: 4:00pm – 10:30pm AEST
Singapore: 2:00pm – 8:30pm SGT
Israel: 9:00am – 3:30pm IDT
Central European Time: 8:00am – 2:30pm CEST

A detailed timetable will be available at the beginning of the conference.

Four days of working in groups, studying what emerges in real time, with opportunities to deepen understanding of how group and system dynamics shape behaviour in others and in ourselves, and to develop the capacity to work with complexity and uncertainty as they arise.

For whom: Anyone interested in learning about leadership, authority, and group dynamics through direct experience. No prior Group Relations experience required.

As the program of the conference constitutes an integrated whole and its events are inter-related, participation in all sessions is highly recommended.

Post-Conference:
Reflection and Practice

10-11 October 2026
Two meetings of 4.5 hours each. Held online.

Times (10-11 October 2026):
Sydney/Melbourne: 5:00pm – 9:30pm AEDT
Singapore: 2:00pm – 6:30pm SGT
Israel: 9:00am – 1:30pm IDT
Central European Time: 8:00am – 12:30pm CEST

This component consolidates learning from the conference and explores small study group dynamics and consultation in greater depth. It offers opportunities to discuss experiences and reflections arising from the conference, and to deepen and practise working with a Group Relations perspective.. Its specific shape will be determined after the conference, in part based on what participants bring from their experience and what we believe will be most helpful in taking the learning forward.

For whom: Open to all conference participants. Particularly valuable for those interested in deepening their understanding of small group dynamics and, for those with more experience, in developing and practising their consulting skills, including for possible future staff roles.

Staff

Conference staff include experienced Group Relations practitioners from the Asia-Pacific Region and beyond.