Author Archives: Sandy Heierbacher

Text, Talk, Act: Results and How to Continue

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Last week, on Dec. 5, thousands of people across the country joined Creating Community Solutions in a “Text, Talk, and Act,” a nationwide discussion on mental health via text. Participants met in groups of 4-5 to talk about the importance of mental health, their personal experiences, and what they could do to make a difference.

The initiative was designed to engage high school and college students in particular, using technology that is ubiquitous in their lives. Over 600 phones (and approx. 2,400 people) joined in to “Text, Talk, and Act” last Thursday.

NCDD is one of the organizing groups for Creating Community Solutions, and we contributed to this innovative project in several ways — including designing the infographic used to publicize the event!

Here’s a photo collage that one of our participant groups (the team @JCFNmemphis) submitted to us…

JCFN-MemphisThe discussion questions were designed to provide a safe space for candid dialogue on mental health, one of the most critical and misunderstood public issues we face. During the conversation, groups were asked to respond to polling questions related to mental health. Results from the live polling questions were tabulated almost instantly, so people could see how participants across the country responded.

Many of the participants reported that mental health is very important in their lives: 59% of respondents said that they thought about mental health every day and 69% said that it was extremely important to them.

During the conversation, participants discussed what schools and communities are doing well to support mental health. “Having understanding psychologists and social workers in the school systems really helps the students feel comfortable talking about their problems,” one participant answered. Other responses included support groups, open discussions, and early intervention. Some participants noted that we need more attention and programs to address mental health challenges: “In our community, no one is really trying anything. We think more legislators who are personally involved in actively caring for those with mental health issues need to be open advocates.”

The process also provided an opportunity for participants to discuss actions they can take to strengthen mental health on their campuses and in their communities. Some of the action ideas included starting nonprofits, raising awareness, and continuing the conversation on mental health in their school or community. Participants also noted that individual, everyday actions can make a difference as well: “Allow my actions to show I am someone who you can talk to when people need to.”

View more results from the polling questions and additional actions you can take at: www.creatingcommunitysolutions.org/texttalkact

We are also on Storify! Review the event here: http://bit.ly/TextTalkActStory

If you weren’t able to participate last week, you can now – we’ve left the texting platform open. Taking part is easy: just gather a few friends, colleagues, or fellow students, and text START to 89800 any time you like.

Help make this bigger and better by referring a friend, posting or tweeting about #texttalkact, and using the texting platform to suggest ways for us to improve the experience.

Thanks to everyone who participated last week, and keep texting, talking, and acting!

Look yourself up on NCDD’s new Google map and directory

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NCDD’s new Google map and searchable online directory are both live and up-to-date with all our members deets! Now is a great time to search for yourself on the map and in the directory and make sure the info we have for you is updated and complete.

Member_Map_Art

(Not on the map or in the directory? Sounds like it’s time to officially join NCDD!)

The map and directory are both pretty standard and intuitive, but here are some step-by-step instructions for those not used to this technology or not sure what to look for…

On the map:

The Google map is at www.ncdd.org/map (we make things easy for you!). Use your scroll wheel or the map navigation tools to scroll in on your region in the U.S. — or if you’re based elsewhere on the planet, scroll out first to find your country.

We have 1900 members currently, so many icons are hidden by other icons until you scroll in closer.

Notice the nice legend Andy created that lives right below the map. As you can see from the legend, we recognize our supporting members with larger icons. Supporting members based in government get the golden building icons. Higher ed based members get the green school icons. And consultants and facilitators get the blue drop icons. Supporting members who aren’t marked in our database as being consultants/facilitators or based in government or higher ed are represented with the white drop icons. Non-dues members are represented by dots of similar colors.

Note that if you’ve asked us not to share your street address, Google has used your city, state and zip code to map you — so your icon may not be in the exact right location and you may need to click around to find it.

Click on the icons to view a pop-up with info about the member represented by the icon. Once you find yourself, check to see:

  1. If your info is up to date
  2. If you have empty fields that can be filled
  3. If your dues are due or lapsed
  4. If you have been assigned the correct icon
  5. If your bio has been cut off awkwardly (only 500 characters are shown)

If it’s time for you to renew (or if you’re a non-dues Member who’d like to have a bigger icon), use the renew/upgrade form at www.ncdd.org/renew. If you have additions or corrections to make to your map entry, you can let us know on the form — or email them directly to Joy at joy@ncdd.org.

If you’ve noticed that your bio cuts off at an awkward place, feel free to submit a shorter bio of 500 characters or less to Joy so she can replace what’s displayed on the map.

In the directory:

The online members directory is up at www.ncdd.org/directory but you can also find it right under the map! It’s super easy to search — just use the drop-down menu to select the field you want to search in (name, organization, state, country, etc.), type in your text, and click the search box (or just hit return). If you see yourself in the results, click on your name to view your full listing.

The info here should be the same as in your map entry, but please check for these three things:

  1. If your info is up to date
  2. If you have empty fields that can be filled
  3. If your dues are due or lapsed

Again, send any changes to our office manager, Joy Garman, at joy@ncdd.org. And please renew your membership if your dues have lapsed.

Why these tools?

For those interested, we’re using Google Maps and Fusion Tables for the map, and a WordPress plugin called Participants Database for the directory. These two tools are replacing our old Member Network, which was run on a Facebook-like social network called Social Engine that never worked very well for our purposes.

We wanted a way for our members to easily find each other when they knew each other’s name or organization. We also wanted an easy way for people to see who’s in their area — maybe because they’re looking for a facilitator or consultant to work with closeby, or perhaps because they want to find colleagues near them. We weren’t able to find an affordable tool that provided both a map and a robust search function, so for now we’re covering our bases with these two tools.

We hope you like them!

Jean Johnson: On the Debt, Citizens Want Action, Not Perfection

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My friend and colleague Jean Johnson had a great article published on the Huffington Post last month that I recommend NCDDers take a look at.

NIF-logoThe article, titled “On the Debt, Citizens Want Action, Not Perfection,” outlines three key observations from last year’s National Issues Forums on our country’s long-term budget and debt problems. NIF is a nonpartisan network of educational and community organizations that regularly convene people to exchange views on major issues. Throughout 2011 and 2012, the group brought typical citizens together in 24 states and the District of Columbia to deliberate on options for tackling the debt.

The article begins with a telling quote from one of the forum participants in Mississippi: “Right now, our representatives have loyalty to self first; loyalty to party second; and loyalty to country third. They need to reverse it.”

Jean, a Senior Fellow at Public Agenda, has long been associated with NIF, and she observed some of the debt forums and reviewed videos and transcripts of others. In 2-hour conversations, participants weighed ideas ranging from cutting federal spending and raising taxes to passing a balanced budget amendment to focusing on economic growth as the best way out.

Jean explains in the article:

Not surprisingly, people didn’t become budget experts in just one evening, nor did they agree chapter and verse on an explicit package of solutions. Even so, the vast majority of those attending approached this discussion with a sense of pragmatism and flexibility that often seems scarce in Washington.

Take a moment to read this important article at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jean-johnson/on-the-debt-citizens-want_b_4218921.html.

Save the Date! NCDD 2014 is set for Oct 17-19 in DC Area

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It’s time to save the date for the 2014 National Conference on Dialogue & Deliberation! We’re excited to announce that our next national conference will take place in the DC area October 17-19, 2014.

Check out the little “save the date” video I created this morning…

Thank you to all 92 of you who provided input on our final venue contenders. You helped us decide on the Hyatt Regency in Reston, Virginia for next year’s conference location. Though Reston is a little ways from DC (20 miles), people are excited about the warm and spacious venue, the incredible room rates ($124/night plus tax!), the free shuttle from Dulles airport, the cool location, and the metro stop that’s opening soon in Reston.

We think the pluses far outweigh the minuses, and appreciate all of you helping us think through this important decision. Photos of the Reston Hyatt are up on the Facebook page here if you’d like to check them out.

We’ve also just created a Facebook “event” for the conference, which will be a great place for you to stay updated on the latest details on the conference as things develop. Visit www.tinyurl.com/ks4dr8g to indicate that you’re “going” or “maybe” going in order to stay updated.

2013 Year-in-Review Confab Call – What would you want to hear about?

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I’ve been thinking that the next NCDD confab call could be a “year-in-review” type call, with several different people from the network providing updates and insights on their work throughout the past year.  We’d do this in January since we all have enough going on this month!

Confab bubble imageThis has been an incredible year for the dialogue and deliberation community, with groundbreaking projects and initiatives popping up all over the place.  I have my own ideas for who we might ask to weigh in about their projects and progress during a Year-In-Review call, but I’m curious to hear what NCDD members would be interested in hearing about.

Please take a second and share your thoughts via the comments here.  What projects, initiatives, or organizations might you want to hear from? What would you like to see included on a call focused on 2013 goings-on in the dialogue and deliberation community?

(By the way, we do have a Tech Tuesday event this month on the 17th, and over 100 people are already signed up to hear from Dave Biggs of MetroQuest about his organization’s view on and approach to tech-enabled public participation. Don’t forget to register if you’re interested!)

Register for December’s Tech Tuesday event on MetroQuest

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Tech_Tuesday_BadgeI’m excited to tell you about this month’s Tech Tuesday event, which will be hosted by Dave Biggs, Co-Founder of MetroQuest, on Tuesday, December 17th, from 1-2pm Eastern (10-11am Pacific).

MetroQuest is a new organizational member of NCDD, so some of you may not yet be aware of their work. Dave was a keynote speaker at the recent IAP2-USA conference in Salt Lake, and MetroQuest public involvement software is recommended as a best practice by the APA, TRB, FWHA and other agencies.

Dave will be talking to us about what he has learned about best practices for online engagement, and will give us a demonstration of the MetroQuest software by walking us through several recent case studies. Register today to reserve your spot on this FREE Tech Tuesday webinar!

MetroQuest software enables the public to learn about your project and provide meaningful feedback using a variety of fun and visual screens. It’s easy to mix and match screens to accomplish the engagement goals for each phase of the project from identifying and ranking priorities, to rating scenarios or strategies, to adding comments on maps and much more. To ensure the broadest participation, MetroQuest can be accessed on the web or mobile devises, at touchscreen kiosks and in engaging town-hall style workshops.

MQ

MetroQuest is:

  • the most mature community outreach software available with over 16 years of award-winning projects and continuous refinement;
  • used successfully by leading consulting and public involvement firms including HNTB, Jacobs, URS, ICF, AECOM, Kimley-Horn, Kittelson, Michael Baker, Golder, CH2M Hill, WRT, Nelson Nygaard, Design Workshop, Consensus Inc, MIG, and many more;
  • used by hundreds of agencies in the largest urban areas (Atlanta, Chicago, LA, San Fran, Denver, DC) to the smallest towns and villages.

Theresa Gunn, Past President of IAP2-USA has said “MetroQuest is the first online tool I’ve seen that incorporates all of the different elements of a public engagement process into one program and does it well.”

If you’d like to join us on the 17th, sign up today at https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/6501680890695446017.

Tech Tuesday is a new initiative from NCDD focused on online technology. Many in our field are curious about how they can use online tools to support their engagement work, and many tool creators are excited to talk to this community about their innovations. These one-hour events, designed and run by the tool creators themselves, are meant to help practitioners get a better sense of the online engagement landscape and how they can take advantage of the myriad opportunities available to them.

Join me today in supporting the Participatory Budgeting Project

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PBP-logoAs a member the Participatory Budgeting Project’s advisory board, I wanted to invite you to join me today, on Giving Tuesday, in supporting a group that is doing amazing work bringing Participatory Budgeting (PB) to the U.S. PB is a process that empowers people to decide how tax dollars are spent in their communities. People come together to brainstorm ideas for how to improve their community, work with experts to turn these ideas into concrete proposals, and then vote to decide which proposals get funded. This revolutionary process has been used all over the world to decide how to spend over a billion dollars.

The Participatory Budgeting Project (PBP) makes this happen across North America, and I’m proud to serve on their Advisory Board. Since 2010, PBP has worked with partners in places like New York, Chicago, and California to engage 30,000 people in deciding on how to spend nearly $30 million in their communities. They’ve got a great video if you want to learn more. Or you can read about those who are experiencing the excitement of PB, such as Jenny Aguiar, one of the youth participants in the citywide process in Vallejo, CA: 

“I came in for the free pizza … but I stayed because I saw an opportunity to make a change. Before this, I had little to no experience in working with my community, but I had always been interested….

There was a stronger sense of unity that has emerged from PB. Personally, it just opened my eyes to what it was like to actually do something that means something to people… I now know I have the ability to help not just this community, but many more.”

Real Power. Stronger Communities. Better Decisions. These are the results of participatory budgeting, but PBP needs your help to continue this work. Over 20 cities have recently approached them to set up participatory budgeting. There’s a big opportunity to take this movement to the next level and really transform government. Can you make a donation to them today?

By giving today, December 3rd, you can help make your contribution count even more. PBP’s Board and major donors have pledged to match all donations today up to $7,000, meaning that every dollar you give is doubled – give $10 and they receive $20, give $25 and they receive $50, or give $250 and they receive $500.

And when you give you’ll have the opportunity to truly get another taste of participatory budgeting – you’ll receive an email invitation to vote in the group’s own internal PB process, to help them decide how to spend the donations they receive in 2013.

So please, give generously today if you can!

15% Discount for NCDD Members on Harwood Lab

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Mike Wood of the Harwood Institute shared on the listserv today that they still have a few spaces left in their national Public Innovators Lab, happening December 10-12 in Alexandria, VA (at United Way Worldwide’s Mary Gates Learning Center). Every NCDD member gets a 15% rebate on the price. You can register here and when you input your organization’s name, just add “-NCDD” after the name and you’ll get the 15% percent rebate on whatever credit card you use to pay the fee.

HarwoodLogoThis is a 3-day learning session where we take you through all of the essential Harwood tools and frameworks that are designed to help you develop a deep understanding of your community through conversations and then use that public knowledge to shape your strategies and change the way you operate inside and out. We cover topics such as:

  • Understanding your community’s “stage of community life” and the implications for how you structure your community change agenda.
  • Assessing your “public capital” – there are nine factors of public capital – the essential ingredients of community. Learn how you develop strategies that actually create public capital at the same time (what we call finding the sweet spot).
  • The 3 A’s of Public Life – Authority, Authenticity and Accountability – assess yourself and your organization against the 3 A’s and learn about how to cultivate these characteristics
  • Turning Outward and “The Turn Quiz” – what it means to be turned outward in your work and how you can easily engage with your staff and teams on whether you have a outward or inwardly focused culture.

Learn more at http://conferences.unitedway.org/harwood.

Invite others to join NCDD before Thanksgiving for 50% off

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As part of our 2013 member drive, we want to encourage our existing members to invite others to join NCDD as a Supporting Member for just $25. Word-of-mouth from those of you who know NCDD is absolutely the best way to expand our reach and get more people involved — and hopefully this gives you some incentive to encourage others to become members of this great network of ours.

Table-group-600px-outlinedJust send people to www.ncdd.org/drive-join50 to complete the membership application.  The first question on the form is “Who invited you to join NCDD during the 2013 member drive,” so we can recognize those who bring in new members!

The form allows people to join at 50% off the regular (already very reasonable) membership rates. People can join as a Supporting Member for only $25 (instead of $50) or a Sustaining Member for $62.50 (instead of $125).

You may want to send out a few emails to people you think should be involved in NCDD, or maybe you’d want to post an invitation on Facebook or send an alert out to a listserv you’re active in. Here’s some suggested text you can use as you see fit…

I’d like to invite you to join a great network I’m involved in — the National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation. You can join for just $25 (50% off the regular dues for Supporting Members) if you complete the membership app at www.ncdd.org/drive-join50 before Thanksgiving.

NCDD (the National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation) is an active network of about 2,000 organizations and professionals in the public engagement and group process realms. We all work — in one way or another — to bring people together across divides to discuss, decide, and act together on today’s toughest challenges.

NCDD essentially serves as a gathering place, a resource center, a news source, and a facilitative leader for an active community of practice centered around the practices of dialogue and deliberation. Their online resource center is unmatched, with nearly 3,000 resources, and more than 32,000 people are subscribed to their monthly email updates. Their community is rich, responsive, and informed — their listservs, national conferences, and member “confab calls” demonstrate that.

NCDD is constantly creating opportunities for innovators in this growing field to connect with each other, learn from each other, and stay updated on what’s happening in the field. They also encourage collaboration through activities like their Catalyst Awards, and are always partnering with other leaders to help our field make a greater impact.

As a member, you’ll be among the first to hear about what’s happening in this important field. You’ll be featured on the NCDD member map and in the member directory, and you’ll be able to post to the NCDD blog, listservs and social media about your work. You’ll have access to all kinds of discounts on programs that boost your skills in engagement. And you’ll become part of a wonderfully rich, supportive, and dynamic network of people and organizations who are working to bring sanity and civility back to the way we solve public problems.

You can learn more about membership at www.ncdd.org/join, or just complete the form today at www.ncdd.org/drive-join50 to join for the $25 rate I’m extending you.

Audio from November’s Confab Call on Rockefeller’s GATHER

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Confab bubble imageYesterday’s confab call (Nov 20th) on the Rockefeller Foundation’s new publication on convening was a great one! About 80 people participated, and our speakers and facilitator did a fabulous job.

If you missed it, you can listen to the audio archive here, and be sure to check out the dynamic Hackpad doc where many participants were taking notes, asking and answering questions, and introducing themselves.

Our confab speakers yesterday were instrumental in the Rockefeller publication GATHER: The Art & Science of Effective Convening:

  • Rob Garris, Managing Director at Rockefeller Foundation. Rob oversees their Bellagio conference center, and oversaw the creation of GATHER
  • Noah Rimland Flower, Monitor Institute. Noah is one of GATHER’s two co-authors and led the content creation

GATHER is a free hands-on guidebook for all convening designers and social change leaders who want to tap into a group’s collective intelligence and make substantial progress on a shared challenge. (Download or purchase it at www.monitorinstitute.com/what-we-think/gather.)

The gorgeous publication provides simple frameworks for the questions that are often ignored: whether convening is the right tool to use to advance a strategic agenda, and how a convening can be used to achieve a specific purpose. It helps you understand how to customize the design to fit that purpose, laying out a clear series of steps for what is a naturally chaotic workflow. It then offers principles to use for each of the many tactical choices involved. GATHER and its accompanying workshop materials are designed for you to use in your own work, with a team, and with larger groups both inside and outside an organization.

On yesterday’s confab, we discussed:

  • How convening is increasingly being used as a strategic tool for foundations
  • Mis-steps many convening designers make, and how to avoid them
  • Examples of how convening can be used for societal problem-solving
  • How the presence of funders can influence a convening
  • How do you know when you’re addressing the right problem and involving the right people
  • How to determine the best size (number of participants) for your convening
  • And much more!

And here are links to some great resources that were brought up on yesterday’s call…

  • Monitor Institute’s new publication Harnessing Collaborative Technologies, on the emerging tech tools that can be used to help funders work together
  • In addition to the gorgeous 43-page report, a super-useful interactive tool has been developed by GrantCraft at http://collaboration.grantcraft.org to help people identify tools to facilitate collaboration.
  • From the Kids’ Table to the Adults’ Table: Taking Relationships Seriously in a World of Networks, by John Esterle (Whitman Institute), Malka Kopell and Palma Strand.
  • New report by Special D Events prepared for the Kellogg Foundation, Convenings 2.0: Connecting adult learning, communication strategies and event logistics to build stronger relationships

To stay updated on NCDD’s future confab calls and all of our activities, be sure to join NCDD! Note that all confab audio recordings (and archives of the collaborative docs created during them) can be found in the NCDD Confab Archives tag.