I was invited by Nicholas Fraser of the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to have two NCDD representatives attend a one-hour discussion in DC this Friday with White House officials and 6 or 7 additional stakeholder groups.  The invitation described the meeting as an opportunity for White House officials “to hear your thoughts on a proposed US National Plan per the Open Government Partnership.” OGP is a new global, multilateral initiative that aims to secure concrete commitments from governments to promote transparency, […] (continue)

Please take note of this important message from NCDD’s Board of Directors, launching our Summer Fund Drive and outlining some new directions NCDD is taking.  – Sandy Dear NCDD Supporter, Since 2002, the National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation has served as a hub, a resource clearinghouse, and a facilitative leader for our dialogue and deliberation community.  Together we have been the catalyst for extraordinary connection and progress across our field. NCDD is at a critical juncture, however, as foundation support has declined in recent […] (continue)

Several months ago, there was a call for more discussion about diversity, race, and inclusion in our field. Using the NCDD discussion list, I put out a call for people who would be interested in pursuing this topic further, and we had a good number of people sign up. Three small groups, each with six NCDD members, will meet one day per week via phone over the next three weeks (7-8pm EDT July 13, 20, 27). I wanted to give readers of the blog one […] (continue)

I wanted to announce some exciting changes the NCDD Board recently decided on for our membership structure.  I think these are sound decisions that retain NCDD’s principles of inclusion and accessibility while ensuring that dues can help NCDD be more fiscally sustainable. Here’s an outline of the changes: 1.  We’re moving away from identifying people as “dues-paying members” and “non-dues-paying members.”  If you aren’t paying dues (which are optional, after all), we’ll simply call you a “Member” of NCDD (imagine that!).  However, if you do […] (continue)

Update: Thanks to everyone able to join us today, with a special thank you to Susanna for sharing details about her project! Links to both the audio from the call, and the cooperative Google doc worked on during the call, can be found below. It was a really great call and we were happy that so many people could join us. Look for news about our next Confab Call soon. Blog post with more details on today’s Confab with NCDD member Susanna Haas Lyons: www.ncdd.org/5200 […] (continue)

I just came across the listing for this paper in the NCDD Resource Center and was reminded of how interesting this work by John May really is.  The article was published in an issue of Public Money and Management back in 2007, and it has some notable implications for those of you working to engage people in in-depth dialogue and deliberation efforts — both online and face-to-face. The article was written primarily for practitioners and commissioners of public participation and community engagement.  It introduces the […] (continue)

Hi, everyone! I wanted to get some feedback from NCDDers and site visitors about the new main page of the Resource Center, and the navigation options in the sidebar. The NCDD Resource Center, at www.ncdd.org/rc, connects visitors with over 2,500 resources:  dialogue guides, evaluation tools, videos, books, articles, case studies, organizations, graphic recorders, handouts, charts, and more. We’ve been doing a lot of work in recent months to make the Resource Center as user-friendly as possible. Run on WordPress software, the Resource Center features the […] (continue)

Update: Thanks goes out to all the 40 participants that joined us for today’s call, with a special thanks to Susanna for sharing details of her program. You can find out more about the call here, including the working document we assembled during the call and the confab’s audio. — Join us on Wednesday, June 29th from 2:00 to 3:00 EST for an NCDD Confab call with Susanna Haas Lyons.  Susanna will be sharing some of her learnings and observations from an interesting Facebook app-based […] (continue)

I’ll be serving as one of two guest speakers on conference call on dialogue and deliberation next Thursday, June 23rd, from 4-5pm Eastern. This is one of a new series of conference calls being organized by Community Matters (an initiative inspired by the Orton Family Foundation), and I’m honored to be participating. The folks at Community Matters and Orton welcome NCDDers on the call, so I’m extending their invitation to you.  I hope to hear some NCDD folks on the call! Here’s a brief description […] (continue)

Those of you who are job hunting or looking for consulting opportunities in facilitation and public engagement may want to subscribe to NCDD’s “Making-a-Living listserv.” I’m going to start using our Making-a-Living listserv to share job openings with subscribers, and I’ll encourage subscribers to share job openings they hear about as well.  In the past, I’ve tried to post important job openings on the NCDD blog, and I’ll continue to do my best with that.  But using the list this way will help me share […] (continue)