Transformative dialogue from the no-name initiative, now in Korean
My first nni Dialogue
It was around 2023. I still remember, vividly, the day I first sat in an nni Dialogue. I was there as the interpreter, not as a full participant, moving words between two languages.
And yet something flowing through that room reached me, intact, through the filter of interpretation. The energy, the feeling, a current moving between people. These things had physical weight. They filled the space. When someone brought something out from inside themselves, and when it landed in another person, the air in the room actually changed. The partcipants were deeply moved and motivated, even some tears. It was one of the most powerful things I've ever experienced.
Even while interpreting, I kept thinking: this is something Korean society desperately needs. That feeling never left me, and it eventually led to what I'm doing now.
What nni Dialogue is, and where it came from
nni stands for "no-name initiative." The name itself says a lot about what this work is reaching toward.
The person who created nni is Jonelle Naude, a Co-Active FORL leader from South Africa. On her LinkedIn she introduces herself as such: “I lead the non-profit organisation nni (no-name initiative). Our dominant focus is igniting and spreading transformative dialogue and pro-active citizenry through deep dialogue facilitation, training citizens to become empowered facilitators, and hosting and supporting public dialogues on all things related to inequality and power relations including race, ethnicity, gender, power and economics.” Alongside this, she works as a Master Certified Coach (MCC) and consultant on systemic change and leadership. Like every Co-Active leader I've met, she's just a genuinely wonderful, purpose-driven, phenomenal human being.
The ground that nni grew out of matters. South Africa carries the history of apartheid, and those wounds have not fully closed. In a society where the question of how to work through division and conflict between people is alive every day, this conversational methodology took shape.
The topics nni Dialogues invite are socially meaningful ones. But the dialogue is not a debate. It is not a place to win or lose, not a place to push your argument through. It is the opposite: a practice of setting your identity and ego aside for a moment (hence,"no-name"), fully occupying the voice of the perspective you are giving form to, and letting it speak all the way through.
You go beyond the content and feel the energy beneath the words. You communicate the essence of what that energy wants to say. It is a methodology that helps people listen to each other intently and understand each other deeply. That is what nni Dialogue is.
My mission: making nni Dialogue accessible in Korean
Launching nni Dialogue in Korean is my leadership quest, which is something each graduate is asked to set for themselves at the end of the Co-Active Leadership Program. The two programs are not connected to each other, but I felt the spirit of both programs coincided in many ways. This launch is a chance to actually live, in my own life, the things I learned in the program. It is a chance to take my leadherhsip ideals and put it into concrete action. Getting to this point took a lot of courage and a lot of support, I ain’t gonna lie. After all, picturing something in your head and putting it in front of people are completely different things.
But you might ask why bother doing this in Korean when free dialogues in English are already offered fairly often? Watching Korea and the rest of the world over the past four or five years, I keep thinking that people seem to have forgotten what it is to understand each other as human beings. I do not believe the will to understand each other has disappeared altogether. The desire is still alive, and warm, generous moments still show up across Korean society and daily life. Korea is, without question, a warm and affectionate culture. That is part of why Korean democracy is still functioning so powerfully.
But the divisions inside this group are getting deeper. Yes, social media contributes heavily to the division, and being physically in the same place while living inside different algorithmic worlds is, of course, a global phenomenon. It’s just that Korea, having modernized and digitalized so quickly in its contemporary history, seems to be experiencing the siloing and isolation faster and deeper too.
There is also the fact that Korea is a materialist-collectivist society where being a "normal," properly functioning person carries unusual weight. How you appear to others, and therefore how you should look to be acceptable (this has been, honestly, the most toxic thing for a very long time in the Korean culture, especially for women), which school you graduated from on the social ladder, which company you joined, what title you carry, how much money you appear to be making. The pressure to squeeze yourself into a narrow box of what is considered "normal" is enormous, and we develop the habit of judging ourselves and others by whether we fit inside it.
On top of that, the tendency to split the natural and social world into binaries: hard right or left, men or women, right or wrong, success or failure, etc. The habit of assuming first and learning the truths later, if at all. We also often react from the space of anxiety from the start when we face ambiguity and uncertainty. These kinds of malignant patterns are stacking up, and they are eating away at social cohesion and at the connections between one person and another.W
And one more thing I want to name: Korea is also a country that has lived through a series of painful historical and generational trauma. A long colonial history, the pain of Korea War and the subsequent division, compressed economic growth spurts & various crises, and the wounds accumulated through all of it accumulate in layers inside all of us. I see the intense focus on achievement and competence in this culture as, in some ways, a trauma response. The sense that if you do not keep proving yourself you are not safe, the anxiety that even pausing for a minute means falling behind is deeply embedded in the national psyche. This achievement-obsessed way of living might produce something in the short term and offer people a place for usefulness and respite from the difficult work of healing, but it does not help it do the actual work of healing, as we are perpetually living in impatience, anxiety and fear.
All of these social, historical, and cultural layers pull us away from the will to connect with each other. And so our sense of how to reduce the social fractures, the collisions, and the individual isolation that follow is getting dimmer.
But as I said earlier, I do not believe Koreans lack the will to connect. We simply have not had the chance to experience or learn what a specific effort at deeper understanding actually looks like and feels like. From my own experience: once I had had that experience, I knew, both vaguely and very powerfully, that I could not return to who I had been before. Before the experience, it was a cognitive territory I did not even know existed. From that point on I committed to attending as many of these dialogues as I could. And now that I have completed the certification to facilitate, I want to offer safe spaces for the similar experience for the Korean-speaking community. That is my mission.
The first Korean-language Dialogue, June 23
So on June 23, I am hosting the first nni Dialogue in Korean. It will be held on Zoom, and the theme is "change."
As far as I know, this will likely be the first nni Dialogue run entirely in Korean from start to finish, with no interpretation in between. It carries weight for me, too, but I am honestly curious to see how the energy of nni Dialogue moves when it is wearing Korean clothes, in that particular time and space.
I described the session this way:
Change is the only constant in life. The world is shifting quickly, and quiet shifts are happening inside us too. In this conversation we will explore together what change asks of us and what it gives us, and how, in the middle of all of it, we can stay with what is most ourselves.
It is not a session for arriving at a big conclusion or going home with a set answer. It is more about bringing out the things you do not usually voice (about the changes inside you, around you, in society), and noticing how they shake and settle as they meet other voices.
I would invite any Korean-speaker who is drawn to this. Where this small beginning leads is something I want to watch unfold, together.
And I promise, I will also hold some English-speaking dialogues as well.
Check out nni
Click here to register for Change on 6/23
#nniDialogue
#nni다이얼로그
#SystemicDialogue
#ResonantProductivity
#CreativeLeadership
#Mindesign
Joonyoung Kim is an executive leadership coach and founder of Mindesign. She works with leaders on resonant productivity and creative leadership, the kind that sustains rather than depletes. Based in Korea, working with people everywhere.
Liked this essay? Get the next one in your inbox.
Subscribe to Joon's newsletter →
Transformative dialogue from the no-name initiative, now in Korean
My first nni Dialogue
It was around 2023. I still remember, vividly, the day I first sat in an nni Dialogue. I was there as the interpreter, not as a full participant, moving words between two languages.
And yet something flowing through that room reached me, intact, through the filter of interpretation. The energy, the feeling, a current moving between people. These things had physical weight. They filled the space. When someone brought something out from inside themselves, and when it landed in another person, the air in the room actually changed. The partcipants were deeply moved and motivated, even some tears. It was one of the most powerful things I've ever experienced.
Even while interpreting, I kept thinking: this is something Korean society desperately needs. That feeling never left me, and it eventually led to what I'm doing now.
What nni Dialogue is, and where it came from
nni stands for "no-name initiative." The name itself says a lot about what this work is reaching toward.
The person who created nni is Jonelle Naude, a Co-Active FORL leader from South Africa. On her LinkedIn she introduces herself as such: “I lead the non-profit organisation nni (no-name initiative). Our dominant focus is igniting and spreading transformative dialogue and pro-active citizenry through deep dialogue facilitation, training citizens to become empowered facilitators, and hosting and supporting public dialogues on all things related to inequality and power relations including race, ethnicity, gender, power and economics.” Alongside this, she works as a Master Certified Coach (MCC) and consultant on systemic change and leadership. Like every Co-Active leader I've met, she's just a genuinely wonderful, purpose-driven, phenomenal human being.
The ground that nni grew out of matters. South Africa carries the history of apartheid, and those wounds have not fully closed. In a society where the question of how to work through division and conflict between people is alive every day, this conversational methodology took shape.
The topics nni Dialogues invite are socially meaningful ones. But the dialogue is not a debate. It is not a place to win or lose, not a place to push your argument through. It is the opposite: a practice of setting your identity and ego aside for a moment (hence,"no-name"), fully occupying the voice of the perspective you are giving form to, and letting it speak all the way through.
You go beyond the content and feel the energy beneath the words. You communicate the essence of what that energy wants to say. It is a methodology that helps people listen to each other intently and understand each other deeply. That is what nni Dialogue is.
My mission: making nni Dialogue accessible in Korean
Launching nni Dialogue in Korean is my leadership quest, which is something each graduate is asked to set for themselves at the end of the Co-Active Leadership Program. The two programs are not connected to each other, but I felt the spirit of both programs coincided in many ways. This launch is a chance to actually live, in my own life, the things I learned in the program. It is a chance to take my leadherhsip ideals and put it into concrete action. Getting to this point took a lot of courage and a lot of support, I ain’t gonna lie. After all, picturing something in your head and putting it in front of people are completely different things.
But you might ask why bother doing this in Korean when free dialogues in English are already offered fairly often? Watching Korea and the rest of the world over the past four or five years, I keep thinking that people seem to have forgotten what it is to understand each other as human beings. I do not believe the will to understand each other has disappeared altogether. The desire is still alive, and warm, generous moments still show up across Korean society and daily life. Korea is, without question, a warm and affectionate culture. That is part of why Korean democracy is still functioning so powerfully.
But the divisions inside this group are getting deeper. Yes, social media contributes heavily to the division, and being physically in the same place while living inside different algorithmic worlds is, of course, a global phenomenon. It’s just that Korea, having modernized and digitalized so quickly in its contemporary history, seems to be experiencing the siloing and isolation faster and deeper too.
There is also the fact that Korea is a materialist-collectivist society where being a "normal," properly functioning person carries unusual weight. How you appear to others, and therefore how you should look to be acceptable (this has been, honestly, the most toxic thing for a very long time in the Korean culture, especially for women), which school you graduated from on the social ladder, which company you joined, what title you carry, how much money you appear to be making. The pressure to squeeze yourself into a narrow box of what is considered "normal" is enormous, and we develop the habit of judging ourselves and others by whether we fit inside it.
On top of that, the tendency to split the natural and social world into binaries: hard right or left, men or women, right or wrong, success or failure, etc. The habit of assuming first and learning the truths later, if at all. We also often react from the space of anxiety from the start when we face ambiguity and uncertainty. These kinds of malignant patterns are stacking up, and they are eating away at social cohesion and at the connections between one person and another.W
And one more thing I want to name: Korea is also a country that has lived through a series of painful historical and generational trauma. A long colonial history, the pain of Korea War and the subsequent division, compressed economic growth spurts & various crises, and the wounds accumulated through all of it accumulate in layers inside all of us. I see the intense focus on achievement and competence in this culture as, in some ways, a trauma response. The sense that if you do not keep proving yourself you are not safe, the anxiety that even pausing for a minute means falling behind is deeply embedded in the national psyche. This achievement-obsessed way of living might produce something in the short term and offer people a place for usefulness and respite from the difficult work of healing, but it does not help it do the actual work of healing, as we are perpetually living in impatience, anxiety and fear.
All of these social, historical, and cultural layers pull us away from the will to connect with each other. And so our sense of how to reduce the social fractures, the collisions, and the individual isolation that follow is getting dimmer.
But as I said earlier, I do not believe Koreans lack the will to connect. We simply have not had the chance to experience or learn what a specific effort at deeper understanding actually looks like and feels like. From my own experience: once I had had that experience, I knew, both vaguely and very powerfully, that I could not return to who I had been before. Before the experience, it was a cognitive territory I did not even know existed. From that point on I committed to attending as many of these dialogues as I could. And now that I have completed the certification to facilitate, I want to offer safe spaces for the similar experience for the Korean-speaking community. That is my mission.
The first Korean-language Dialogue, June 23
So on June 23, I am hosting the first nni Dialogue in Korean. It will be held on Zoom, and the theme is "change."
As far as I know, this will likely be the first nni Dialogue run entirely in Korean from start to finish, with no interpretation in between. It carries weight for me, too, but I am honestly curious to see how the energy of nni Dialogue moves when it is wearing Korean clothes, in that particular time and space.
I described the session this way:
It is not a session for arriving at a big conclusion or going home with a set answer. It is more about bringing out the things you do not usually voice (about the changes inside you, around you, in society), and noticing how they shake and settle as they meet other voices.
I would invite any Korean-speaker who is drawn to this. Where this small beginning leads is something I want to watch unfold, together.
And I promise, I will also hold some English-speaking dialogues as well.
Check out nni
Click here to register for Change on 6/23
#nniDialogue
#nni다이얼로그
#SystemicDialogue
#ResonantProductivity
#CreativeLeadership
#Mindesign
Joonyoung Kim is an executive leadership coach and founder of Mindesign. She works with leaders on resonant productivity and creative leadership, the kind that sustains rather than depletes. Based in Korea, working with people everywhere.
Liked this essay? Get the next one in your inbox.
Subscribe to Joon's newsletter →