Clean in Montana: Systemic Modeling
Details
Would you like to get better at working with others?
If you want to build stronger teams by creating safety, belonging, and freedom, these three days of an intermediate program will hone your Clean Language skills.
How to know you’re a fit for Clean in Montana
You lead, manage, or collaborate with others, you’re involved with strategy, or you facilitate, coach, or consult. You want the skills to uncover, work with, and change the complex, unseen narratives that govern how we communicate. You’ll learn to:
-
Build trusting, resilient teams
-
Hold people accountable in a respectful way
-
Encourage creation and testing of new ideas
-
Create a culture where it’s safe to make mistakes
-
Be open to others’ intentions
- Have productive conversations with people with whom you disagree
What to expect
Too often, workshops are all presentations, no practice. Not here. The work you do in Bozeman will give you small, easy-to-implement tools to improve understanding and reduce miscommunication. Caitlin will teach you to help groups be deliberate about their growth and collaboration. You’ll leave with frameworks, experience, and a community of practice.
Agenda
Systemic Modeling brings Clean Language into groups.
It’s a structured, collaborative process where people learn to listen deeply, notice patterns, and make meaning together.
You might think of it as a band learning to hear itself — each instrument distinct, yet part of a shared composition that emerges anew every time they play.
The result: Teams that can think clearly, speak honestly, and stay human with one another, even through challenge and complexity.
There’s no fixed agenda. The Rolling Program is shaped by who’s in the room and what they’re ready to learn. Together, we’ll work with Caitlin Walker’s core tools and models including the Clean Setup, Clean Feedback and the Clean Change Cycle.
Each session is emergent and practical, applying these frameworks in real time to the contexts you bring, whether that’s leadership, coaching, management or facilitation. Caitlin, Emily and Erin will meet participants where they’re at, guiding you to notice your own patterns, be more precise, and strengthen your capacity to work cleanly in complex systems — all while we model the same practices live, ourselves.
About Caitlin Walker and systemic modeling
Caitlin Walker, PhD, author of From Contempt to Curiosity, has led innovative projects in settings ranging from at-risk students to corporations, law enforcement, and universities. Growing up in Ghana, California, and the UK made her curious how we develop cultural rules and internal systems. Through her work, which builds on the original Clean Questions created by David Grove, Caitlin aims to help people learn about themselves and others through a methodology she developed called “systemic modeling.” Caitlin has used this method in small groups and large-scale cultural change. Her bespoke programs address diversity, conflict, leadership, mergers and organizational learning. Hear Caitlin talk about Clean Language and systemic modeling on her TED Talk or the Drama-Free Culture podcast.
About the organizers: Emily and Erin
Emily Stifler Wolfe is a facilitator and coach who helps leaders and teams leverage their impact. Through her podcast, Food, Montana, she explores the intersection of local and regional food systems with other levers of change and power such as finance, climate, governance, and conservation. As a former journalist and mountain rescuer, she is all about clear communication and teamwork.
Erin Randall is a veteran systems coach working with universities, pharmaceutical companies, fintechs, mining companies, and more. She listens for what is emerging in people and systems, helping to make change bearable, sustainable, and even enjoyable. But mostly, she is all about happy people doing great work. You can find her at Ad Meliora Coaching.
Why We're in Montana
Bozeman is a small city in southwest Montana, about 90 minutes north of Yellowstone National Park. A popular destination, Bozeman has a hip, historic downtown and easy access to outdoor adventure. The snowmelt that flows from the surrounding 11,000-foot peaks become the mighty Missouri River, the longest in the country. Other Montana waters flow to the Pacific and the Hudson Bay. Likewise, the ideas we develop together at Clean in Montana will flow elsewhere. Montana is a headwaters state — for water and ideas, both. What we do over these three days matters.