“Let’s not reinvent the wheel.” You’ve all heard that one, haven’t you? Here’s my story about how this most unfortunate aphorism impacts public deliberations.

Long, long ago, and in what sometimes seems like a galaxy far, far away, but is actually just down the road, two communities shared a border. One was larger and one was smaller, but their landscapes and economies were far more alike than different.

One of these communities responded to the impacts of growth by instituting a neighborhood-based planning approach and spent most of three years developing a comprehensive plan and complementary land-use regulations (both its first). The process involved dozens of people on appointed neighborhood advisory committees and more than 100 public meetings. It also featured proactive efforts to ensure good coverage by the local weekly newspapers and hundreds of conversations with individual citizens. In the end, the new plan and regulations were adopted without much controversy.

Officials in the neighboring community, which had also begun to grow, watched these events and said, “Let’s not reinvent the wheel.” This was before there was a computer on every desk, so a copy of the neighboring community’s new regulations was obtained and laboriously re-typed. To give credit where it is due, adjustments were made and they did remember to change the name in all of the appropriate places. Then they set the formal hearings required by law. (more…)

A BIG breakthrough for all group process folks…

For almost 5 years I’ve been involved with envisioning and creating a “pattern language” for group process.  (A pattern language is a set of design factors to guide people in creating things that are wholesome and life-giving – vibrant communities, effective curricula, engaging software… and great conversations.)  That process has now come to fruition.

In 2008 Peggy Holman and I did an all day workshop on “A Pattern Language for Conversations that Matter” to introduce the idea of pattern languages to professionals in the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation (NCDD).  That winter, Tree Bressen invited me to a multi-day gathering at her home to actually construct a pattern language on group process.  That session began what proved to be a profoundly complex and challenging task facilitated by Tree and her tiny core team of volunteers – all pieced together on a gigantic wiki and Google docs and dozens of meetings.

I participated in a few more of their multi-day work sessions over the years, but about a dozen other volunteers did far more work than I did.  Last year I wrote a blog post on the project for NCDD - http://ncdd.org/4535 - and a couple of weeks ago wrote a personal blog post - http://post.ly/534Wr - on the transformational potential of pattern languages of all kinds – and why I consider them profoundly important.

But the big news now is that the pattern language so many of us labored for so many hours to produce has now been released as a gorgeous card deck. (more…)

Lisa Heft invites NCDDers to attend the 2012 “Open Space on Open Space” — a full-length Open Space conference taking place March 14 through 16 in San Francisco. This conference is best if you have a basis of knowledge and experience about Open Space (rather than something like it) – because the thoughts, questions, topics and experiences we will share will be based on this assumption.

Join colleagues who use and / or have learned Open Space for this full-length Open Space conference. It is not a training – Lisa will not be teaching anything — this is for attendees to question, explore and share together about Open Space and related topics. (more…)

Ever wonder how Citizens Juries are different from Deliberative Polling?  When you should use World Cafe, Open Space, or Charrettes?  Or perhaps you have a good handle on dialogue and deliberation processes, but you need to introduce these options to a planning board or public official without overwhelming them too much?

Well, if you’re not already familiar with NCDD’s popular Engagement Streams framework, you’re in luck.  Our creative director, Andy Fluke, just produced a gorgeous document outlining the Engagement Streams, and you are welcome to reproduce and distribute it as much as you’d like!

First developed in 2005, NCDD’s Engagement Streams Framework helps people navigate the range of dialogue and deliberation approaches available to them, and make design choices that best fit their circumstances and resources.

The framework presents two charts:

1. The first chart, Engagement Streams, categorizes dialogue and deliberation approaches into four streams based on one’s primary intention or purpose (Exploration, Conflict Transformation, Decision Making, and Collaborative Action), and shows which of the most well-known methods have proven themselves especially effective in each streams.
2. The second chart, Process Distinctions, goes into more detail about 22 dialogue and deliberation methods, and includes information such as group size, meeting type and how participants are selected.

The full 8-page Engagement Streams Framework (.pdf) should be printed in color on 8.5 x 11 paper. Download the doc at www.ncdd.org/files/NCDD2010_Engagement_Streams.pdf.  And for more info and other versions of the streams (including an Excel version of the charts), visit the Engagement Streams resource page anytime at www.ncdd.org/streams.

I hope our readers will forgive a personal note, but I wanted to send my thanks out to Barbara Chappell, principal consultant at Simply Speaking Seanachai, an Australian consultancy “dedicated to improving relationships between, people, communities and decision makers”. In a recent message to her mailing list, she said some really nice things about NCDD’s director and my beautiful wife, Sandy Heierbacher. I rarely post anything personal here, just so you know, and it’s so great to hear someone echo publicly what I’ve known all along…

Sandy is an amazing woman who seems to spend every waking moment finding out new information about how we can improve the way we engage people in decision making and she shares it so willingly through the NCDD website. If you have not already been on to the website take some time to visit and linger long enough to find some of the gems of information that are on offer. Apart from the website content, Sandy organises webinars with great speakers and holds on-line seminars and learning events. She weaves a web of interconnections across the US and other continents and connects a lot of people who are like minded about engaging with communities.

And, by the way, yes, the every waking moment part is very true!  Thank you, Barbara, and Happy Valentine’s Day, Sandy!  

Don’t forget to register for next week’s NCDD Confab Call with Tina Nabatchi and Cynthia Farrar!  The Confab will take place next Thursday, February 23rd from 1:00 to 2:30 Eastern (10-11:30 Pacific). An impressive group of over 20 leaders in our field have already signed up for the call.

Tina Nabatchi is an assistant professor of public administration at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. Cynthia Farrar is CEO and Executive Producer at Purple States LLC.

NCDD’s “Confab calls” are opportunities for members of the NCDD community to connect with each other, hear about exciting projects in our field, and explore our field’s most pressing challenges.

Register for February’s Confab call today, at www.ncdd.org/community/confabreg-feb2012, to receive the call-in details.

Next Thursday’s call will focus on some of the things Tina and Cynthia learned while working on their 2011 report “Bridging the Gap between Public Officials and the Public.”  Among other things, the report explores what state and federal public officials know and think about public deliberation — and yielded some provocative results! (Download the full report here or see a 3-page summary on the NCDD site here.)

And please note that we’ll be trying something new during the last 15 minutes of this Confab… calling on NCDD members who have announcements of interest to their colleagues.  Let us know on the registration form what you might want to share, so we can determine who to call on at the end of the call.  Announcements about upcoming events, job or funding opportunities, facilitation gigs, new and interesting programs… it’s all good!

Join us in New York City this March 30th and 31st for the International Conference on Participatory Budgeting in the US and Canada. NCDD is a proud co-sponsor of this event, and we hope to see you there.  Let me (Sandy) know if you plan to attend, so we can be sure to meet up!  Registration is a sliding scale between just $10 and $50 — but register soon because space is limited.  Learn more at www.pbconference.wordpress.com.

Here’s the full announcement…

International Conference:  Participatory Budgeting in the US and Canada 

March 30-31, 2012, New York City

Join us in New York City to learn about a new type of democracy! After spreading around the world for over 20 years, “Participatory Budgeting” is making waves in the United States and Canada. It is giving people the power to make real decisions over the budgets that affect their lives–and it may soon be coming to a city near you! (more…)

In principle, when parties cannot agree on an issue the next peaceful step is for them to decide how they are going to decide the issue. For instance, “We can’t agree on the floor plan for the new building, so we’re going to spend time on this at our next meeting, hear both sides, and vote. Is that okay with everyone?” If everyone can agree on how the thorny issue will be decided, that’s progress toward agreement. When we send something to a committee or say something like, “Let’s ask Louise and let her decide,” we are making a decision about how to decide.

When diplomats or politicians spend time on meeting arrangements, seating plans, and the details of meeting agendas — the conditions under which the parties agree to meet — they are really deciding how they will decide. They are building agreement.

Practical Tip: When it seems like you are stuck and cannot decide something, at least decide how you will decide. Name a next step that moves you in the direction of eventual agreement. Make a plan for a future discussion and vote, send it to a small group or committee with a specific charge, or name a third party decider.

This post was submitted by our good friends and long-time NCDD members Len and Libby Traubman…

Elie Wiesel said, and we experience: “People become the stories they hear and the stories they tell.”

We are part of a 19-year-old Jewish-Palestinian Living Room Dialogue preparing for its 238th meeting here on the San Francisco Peninsula. To offer to NCDD participants and others the stories of human successes and best-practices that work in everyday life, we continually update two Web pages for you and citizens worldwide.

(1) At http://traubman.igc.org/messages.htm are preserved over 600 messages containing several thousand success stories of Palestinian-Jewish and some interfaith relationship building. These pages are rich in human experience and social science that documents the flowering public peace process of Dialogue and Deliberation on Earth.

(2) At http://traubman.igc.org/dg-prog.htm are vividly described and illustrated several hundred effective local and international public outreach endeavors of our local handful of Muslims, Christians, and Jews.

In addition, we are here to personally answer questions and be continually be available for edducators, facilitators, and all citizens seeking to help diverse women and men engage well and communicate with excellence. Some foundational principles of this public peace process of change are experessed in graphics and text at http://traubman.igc.org/changechartsall.pdf.

Here’s an exciting press release I just received from NCDD member Avis Ridley-Thomas. As you can see on her member page, Avis is now retired from her position in the L.A. City Attorney’s Office, and currently serves as Co-Director for the Institute for Nonviolence in Los Angeles.

Damaging impact of economic recession on L.A. communities to be explored during ‘From Wreckage and Ruin… The Road to Rebirth’, a citywide dialogue on Wednesday, February 29

L.A. Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa, L.A. City Council President Herb Wesson, and L.A. City Attorney Carmen Trutanich lend support to The California Endowment-sponsored conversation on th affect of joblessness, home foreclosures, debt and poverty on our health and that of our communities.

Los Angeles, CA – On Leap Day, Wednesday, February 29, L.A. area leaders from politics, business, labor, education, philanthropy, government and religion will come together at sites across the city to convene with community residents and neighborhood leaders for a timely discussion and an important two-hour dialogue on the impact of the Great Recession on the health of men, women and families throughout the city and the overall health of their communities.

Days of Dialogue will host “From Wreckage and Ruin… The Road to Rebirth: A Day of Dialogue on the Economic Crisis and Community Health. This special one-day, citywide dialogue event is sponsored by The California Endowment, United Way, California Community Foundation, Brotherhood Crusade, Attucks Asset Management, Cedars-Sinai Health System, AFL-CIO and a host of businesses and community-based nonprofit organizations. (more…)