Heard, Seen, Respected (HSR)
Heard, Seen, Respected (HSR) is a collaborative story building exercise for relationship mapping: it helps participants build useful connections and understand how people, roles, or ideas relate.
How to run it
- Introduce the purpose of HSR: to practice listening without trying to fix anything or make any judgments. 3 min.
- One at a time, each person has 7 minutes to share a story about NOT being heard, seen, or respected. 15 min.
- Partners share with one another the experiences of listening and storytelling: “What did it feel like to tell my story; what did it feel like to listen to your story?” 5 min.
- In a foursome, participants share reflections using 1-2-4, asking, “What patterns are revealed in the stories? What importance do you assign to the pattern?” 5 min.
- As a whole group, participants reflect on the questions, “How could HSR be used to address challenges revealed by the patterns? What other Liberating Structures could be used?” 5 min.
- Reveal how common it is for people to experience not being heard, seen, or respected
- Reveal how common it is for people to behave in a way that makes other people feel they are not being heard, seen, or respected
- Improve listening, tuning, and empathy among group members
- Introduce the purpose of HSR : to practice listening without trying to fix anything or make any judgments. 3 min.
- Are you ready to build team trust and empathy by listening to each others’ stories? There’s plenty of space for positivity in this unique meeting template.
Run this exercise live
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What participants need now
Materials:
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Prompts to use +
One at a time, each person has 7 minutes to share a story about NOT being heard, seen, or respected. 15 min.
Partners share with one another the experiences of listening and storytelling: “What did it feel like to tell my story; what did it feel like to listen to your story?” 5 min.
In a foursome, participants share reflections using 1-2-4, asking, “What patterns are revealed in the stories? What importance do you assign to the pattern?” 5 min.
As a whole group, participants reflect on the questions, “How could HSR be used to address challenges revealed by the patterns? What other Liberating Structures could be used?” 5 min.
Are you ready to build team trust and empathy by listening to each others’ stories? There’s plenty of space for positivity in this unique meeting template.
Run this with your AI assistant +
Works with Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, or your own local model: paste this prompt and your AI will co-facilitate this exercise with you.
Adapt this exercise for my exact room. Exercise: Heard, Seen, Respected (HSR). Readiness: Publishable Draft. Core moves: One at a time, each person has 7 minutes to share a story about NOT being heard, seen, or respected. 15 min.; Partners share with one another the experiences of listening and storytelling: “What did it feel like to tell my story; what did it feel like to listen to your story?” 5 min.; In a foursome, participants share reflections using 1-2-4, asking, “What patterns are revealed in the stories? What importance do you assign to the pattern?” 5 min.; As a whole group, participants reflect on the questions, “How could HSR be used to address challenges revealed by the patterns? What other Liberating Structures could be used?” 5 min.. Return a concise facilitator script with timing, wording, safety notes, and remote/in-person adjustments.
Origin unverified
- Where we observed it: The strongest current observations come from Liberating Structures; aggregators are listed as additional observations, not origin proof. (4 sources observed, including Liberating Structures, Parabol, EasyRetro, SessionLab.)
- What that means: we track where an exercise has been observed in public sources. We do not claim to know who created it, or how popular it is.
- No efficacy claims: appearing in this library is not a claim that the exercise is proven effective. Facilitator judgment and context decide whether it works for a given room.
- Corrections: if you have evidence of an earlier or more accurate source, read our methodology and trust boundary and tell us.