Announcing Next Stage Facilitation Intensives in Montreal and Boulder

Posted on July 25, 2014 by NCDD Community

We are happy to share the announcement below from NCDD Sustaining Member Rebecca Colwell of Ten Directions. Rebecca’s announcement came via our great Submit-to-Blog Form. Do you have news you want to share with the NCDD network? Just click here to submit your news post for the NCDD Blog!

Integral Facilitator® Next Stage Facilitation™ Intensives are 3-day workshops introducing the core competencies of an Integral approach to facilitation designed to enhance your capacity to generate greater coherence and increased collaboration and dialogue in the groups you work with.

In this three-day workshop, you’ll learn:

How to maintain presence in the face of challenging situations.
How to work effectively with group energetics and emotional states.
How to effectively build connection and working with tension to deepen coherence and intimacy.
How to engage tension, power dynamics and conflict in a group.
How to increase the positive impact you have on others.
How to bring an integral approach to your work.

As a Next Stage participant, you’ll learn directly from master facilitator, mediator and former Director of Dispute Resolution for the Utah State Judiciary, Diane Musho Hamilton.

Your participation will include a deep dive into your personal presence as a facilitator, including how bring an Integral approach to your work with groups, and opportunities to practice new approaches that will stretch your development as a skilled facilitator. Masterful facilitators with depth and presence are more responsive to the subtleties of group dynamics and can create more rewarding and effective dialogue and collaboration.

Next Stage Facilitation Intensives will be taking place September 8 – 10 in Montreal, Quebec, and October 6 – 8 in Boulder, Colorado.

Praise from workshop participants:

“The workshop has shifted my perception of issues such as power, and allowed me to understand where my choices lie. I feel confident to run with those issues now as opposed to fighting against them and using up all my energy.” – Marissa Moore, Senior Finance Executive

“This has been my best experience ever in a 3 day training. Diane is an amazing facilitator! I’m currently figuring out how to get myself in the 1 year program as the 3 days were so exciting and promising in terms of my personal growth.” – Tremeur Balbous, Consultant & Integral coach

“Take facilitation to a whole other level. The Next Stage Facilitation three day intensive shakes you out of conventional and stifled facilitation modes and expands your view to multi-perspectival, grows your competencies toward integral–exploring what it means to work with individuals, the collective and the topic at hand in a balanced, elegant and effective way, and, it strengthens your intuitive faculties to sense and trust the energetic field of the room and respond.” – Michelle Elizabeth, Consultant

Watch Integral Facilitator Lead Teacher Diane Musho Hamilton’s recent Google Book Talk on conflict resolution:

For more information, visit https://tendirections.com/next-stage-facilitation-3-day-intensive.

Announcing the “D&D Showcase” at NCDD 2014

Posted on July 21, 2014 by Sandy Heierbacher

We’re excited to announce that we’ll once again be holding our popular “D&D Showcase” at this year’s National Conference on Dialogue & Deliberation. The Showcase is a high-energy networking activity that provides a way for about 25 people in our field to introduce their work and their ideas to the majority of conference participants. The Showcase takes place during the reception on the first night of the conference (Friday, October 17th, from 4:30 to 6:00 pm).

It’s a fun way for conference-goers to meet some of the movers-and-shakers in our field, and hear about some of their latest projects, programs and tools.

Here is a slideshow of images from our Showcase at NCDD 2012 in Seattle…

Here’s how the Showcase will work…

During this 90-minute session, conference participants will stroll around the ballroom, chatting with presenters, listening to their brief spiels, checking out their posters and picking up handouts. We’ll also have finger foods and beverages available (and a cash bar), adding to the social atmosphere of the session.

The conference planning team is selecting people to present during the D&D Showcase who are passionate about sharing tools and programs we know will interest our attendees. Contact conference manager Courtney Breese at courtney@ncdd.org if you are interested in being featured in the Showcase — but please note these slots are very competitive!

The presenters, who will be prepared to give short spiels on their Showcase topic, will strike up conversations with participants who are strolling around the room, perusing the “wares.” No timers or buzzers are involved.

Here’s a great video of Kai Degner (former mayor of Harrisonburg, VA) giving his “spiel” at the well-received Showcase event at NCDD 2008 in Austin…

Also see Janette Hartz-Karp and Brian Sullivan presenting at the 2008 Showcase event (we called it the “D&D Marketplace”) here, and check out the video of Noam Shore, Lucas Cioffi, and Wayne Burke presenting their online tools here.

Presenters are asked to display simple “posters” during the Showcase (more on this below), and to provide handouts and business cards for participants who are interested in learning more or following up. Showcase presenters should be ready to succinctly express what’s important for conference participants to know about their resource, method, research, program, etc. and to elaborate and answer any questions people may have.

The Showcase will take place in a different ballroom than the one our plenary sessions are held in. Showcase presenters will be stationed at high-ball tables (tall cocktail tables) that will be set up in a large U-shape for optimal flow. Reception food will be presented in the center of the room. Presenters will use their tables to display their posters as well as handouts, any giveaway items, and laptops if they have something to share online or on their computers.

What we ask of Showcase presenters…

Prepare a quick spiel or “elevator speech” about your Showcase topic that will get people interested in learning more. Practice it until it comes out naturally. We suggest you prepare several spiels of different lengths (30 seconds, 1 minute, etc.) so you can adjust quickly to different circumstances during the Showcase.
Prepare a simple, visually interesting poster and bring it with you to the conference (details and options below).
Bring handouts about your program, method, online tool, publication, etc. that include further details. Include your contact information and web address on your handouts, or provide a stack of your business cards.
Show up for the Showcase session about 20 minutes early (by 4:10pm) so we have time to make sure everyone is set up and has everything they need by 4:30.

Join us for our July 29th Confab on Event Closings

Posted on July 14, 2014 by Sandy Heierbacher

Join us on Tuesday, July 29th from 2-3pm Eastern (11-12 Pacific) for NCDD’s next “Confab Call.” Register today to secure your spot!

Confab bubble image This will be a different kind of Confab. We’ll be tackling a very practical challenge that many dialogue and deliberation practitioners face, and that NCDD itself faces every time we plan an NCDD conference. The confab will dig into challenges and strategies for planning and managing effective closings at participatory events.

We have four great practitioners who will serve as conversation starters: Lisa Heft, Adrian Segar, Tim Merry and Susanna Haas Lyons. All have extensive experience closing large-scale events using approaches such as Open Space, World Cafe, Conferences That Work, Art of Hosting and 21st Century Town Meetings.

The confab will be an informal conversation (no pre-planned presentations!) where our all-star cast of practitioners will share different strategies for closing participatory events (with an emphasis on larger events). NCDD’s director, Sandy Heierbacher, will share some of the ways we’ve closed our conferences in the past, and what some of our challenges and concerns are. For instance, for large participatory events like NCDD conferences, how can you involve everyone in the room in a way that is powerful and meaningful, without being too cheesy or taking too much time?

We’re encouraging members of our 2014 conference planning team to be on the call and participate by asking questions and sharing their own experiences, and we’ll likely brainstorm ideas for closing this year’s conference. We look forward to a fun, productive confab that serves both our community and the upcoming conference!

Let us know if you work with legislators — or would like to!

Posted on July 7, 2014 by Sandy Heierbacher

Later this week, Hawaii State Senator Les Ihara and I are both involved in an exciting workshop at the Kettering Foundation that will bring together 26 state legislators from 20 states to talk about effective public engagement.

Les asked me recently to gather information about NCDD members who had worked with legislators (or are currently working with them), and with all the conference goings-on, I haven’t been able to squeeze it in. But I think we can still help Les, and create a list of NCDDers who either (1) have experience working with legislators, (2) are interested in working with legislators, or (3) both! I know Les’ impression is that there are not many NCDDers working with legislators, and I don’t believe that is the case at all.

Will you help me change Les’ mind and help me better represent you at this meeting by filling out the super-simple survey I’ve created.

Over the last few years, I’ve networked with about 50 legislators who operate with a collaborative leadership model, rather than power-based model; and I plan to form a Collaborative Legislators Network when the time is right (we’re getting close).

We’re designing our meeting agenda to support legislators who want to conduct new citizen engagement type activities over the next year, and I’m looking for people who may have relationships with legislators in these states: Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Texas, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.

If you haven’t yet worked with a legislator, I’d also like to know who might be interested in providing assistance to and collaborating with a legislator in your state. Thank you.

Aloha,
LES IHARA, JR.
Hawaii State Senator, 10th District

If you have worked with local, state or national policymakers, or would like to, please let us know by answering a few simple questions TODAY or TOMORROW. Again, here is the survey link:

Short Survey about Working with Legislators

Register for an Online Conversation on Fixing Politics

Posted on July 2, 2014 by Roshan Bliss

The National Issues Forums Institute, an NCDD organizational partner, is hosting an exciting conversation next Tuesday, July 8th, that we want to make sure you hear about. NIFI is inviting folks to register for an online conversation on the topic of its new issue guide, Fixing American Politics, utilizing new technology from our partners at the Kettering Foundation.

NCDD’s director, Sandy Heierbacher, and other NCDDers will be participating in this live at a workshop at Kettering, and we hope you can join them! You can find more details in the letter below from NIFI’s Northern Virginia affiliate or by reading NIFI’s original announcement here.

I’m writing to invite you to join a new experiment, an online National Issues Forum.

It takes place Tuesday, July 8 at 2:30 pm to 4:30 pm EDT. All you need to participate is a web browser and the willingness to use chat for conversation.

The topic is “Political Fix – How Do We Get American Politics Back on Track?” You can download the issue guide by clicking here. The issue guide provides the road map for our discussion and essential background. If you’d like to watch a three-minute video that previews the topic, you can view by clicking here.

You can register by completing the online form at the new website of National Issues Forums of Northern Virginia at www.nifnva.org. There are only a few spots left – first-come, first-served – but more forums are coming.

The forum is a test of a new software tool from the Kettering Foundation that will hopefully help bring moderated deliberation on national issues to a wider audience.

I hope you are as interested as I am in helping to develop this new tool for more people to participate in political life.

Sincerely,

Bill Corbett, National Issues Forums of Northern Virginia

Be Registrant #100! And don’t miss the Early Bird rate!

Posted on June 23, 2014 by Andy Fluke

Hi everybody! Andy here with a fun little milestone for NCDD’s 2014 conference. We are now at 99 regular registrations for this fall’s event. Which means you, yes you, can be registrant number 100! Not only can you take advantage of the soon-to-expire early bird registration rate, but you also receive the bragging rights that only come with being #100. Please feel free to have a tshirt made and wear it to the conference.

So register today and claim this auspicious moment as your own. But seriously, the Early Bird rate for the conference ends in a week and if you would like to take advantage of the discount you need to act fast. Use the form below to grab #100 for yourself and take advantage of the discount.

Online Ticketing for NCDD 2014 – DC Metro Area powered by Eventbrite

You can learn more about our upcoming national conference and all our programming here.

Deadline extended for NCDD 2014 session proposals!

Posted on June 16, 2014 by Sandy Heierbacher

In response to a whole bunch of requests for “more time,” we’re giving everyone one more week to get their workshop proposals in for the 2014 National Conference on Dialogue & Deliberation.

Session proposals are now due by the end of the day next Monday, June 23rd.

Submit your best ideas for creative, lively, valuable sessions at www.ncdd.org/ncdd2014/session-app and keep in mind the conference theme and the following tips for presenters…

Our theme for the 2014 conference, Democracy for the Next Generation, invites us to build on all the innovative practices and tools that have been invigorating the dialogue and deliberation community in recent years. Now more than ever, we have both the opportunity and, increasingly, the imperative to bring this work to a much larger stage in order to build a stronger democracy that is able to address society’s most pressing challenges.

What do we want the next generation of our work to look like, and how can we work together to get there? This “next generation” of democracy is the future that embodies the best of what we have to offer the world.

Advice from the NCDD 2014 planning team for potential session leaders:

Identify great co-presenters. Most workshops at NCDD conferences are collaborative efforts involving multiple presenters from different organizations and universities.
Look over past workshop descriptions. Peruse the list of workshops from NCDD Seattle to get a sense of the kinds of sessions the planning team selects. Session proposals are particularly welcome that focus on innovative solutions to common challenges, ways to take this work to scale or to new audiences, and deep dives into great projects (and thoughtful explorations of failed projects!).
Be innovative with your session. NCDD attendees are usually not too impressed with traditional panels or long speeches. Get them engaging with you and each other! Think about how you can get them out of their seats and moving around the room. And think about what you’d like to learn from them (not just what they can learn from you). Challenge yourself to run a session without relying on PowerPoint.
Share your stories. NCDDers prefer hearing your stories to getting a run-down of your organization or methodology. People are interested in learning about what you did, what you learned, and how they may be able to learn from your experience.
Share the latest. What’s the latest research? What are the latest innovations in the field? What new challenges are you facing? What are your latest accomplishments?

Email NCDD 2014 conference manager Courtney Breese at courtney@ncdd.org if you have questions about the proposal process.

Register for Frontiers of Democracy Conference July 16-18

Posted on June 10, 2014 by Roshan Bliss

In case you hadn’t heard already, we wanted to make sure to tell encourage our NCDD members to consider attending the “Frontiers of Democracy” conference this July 16-18 in Boston, MA. Hosted annually at Tufts University, the conference has become an important venue for leaders in democratic thought and practice to gather to share ideas and network.

This year’s conference will feature talks from, among others, Ambassador Alan Solomont, the dean of Tisch College; Gloria Rubio-Cortes, president, National Civic League; Josh Lerner, Participatory Budgeting Project; John Gastil, Penn State (communication); Tina Nabatchi, Syracuse University (public administration); Shelby Brown, Executive Administrator, State of Connecticut’s Office of Governmental Accountability; Tim Eatman, Research Director, Imagining America; Sabeel Rahman, Harvard (government and law).

And to top it all off, the NCDD board and our director, Sandy Heierbacher, are hosting a workshop on engaging engagement practitioners. That workshop and others can be found in the detailed agenda, which features talks, discussions, and workshops on some of the most exciting and innovative work being done in our field, and you won’t want to miss it, so make sure to register here today!

You can get a taste of what the conference will focus on by reading the conference framing statement:

Who’s on the bus, and where is it going? The state of the civic field

Civic work is proliferating: many different kinds of people, working in different contexts and issue areas, are expanding the ways in which citizens engage with government, community, and each other. It is increasingly clear that growing inequality, social and political fragmentation, and lack of democratic opportunities are undermining our efforts to address public priorities such as health, education, poverty, the environment, and government reform.

But attempts to label the responses – as “civic engagement,” “collaborative governance,” “deliberative democracy,” or “public work” – or to articulate them as one movement or policy agenda under a heading like “civic renewal” or “stronger democracy” – immediately spark debates about substance, strategy, and language.

Though it is clear we have many principles and practices in common, we differ on what we should call this work and where it is headed. In order for “overlapping civic coalitions”* to form, the potential partners would have to work through goals, assumptions, and differences. Join us on July 16-18 at the 2014 “Frontiers of Democracy” conference, in downtown Boston, for an invigorating, argumentative, civil discussion on the state and future of the civic field.

Frontiers of Democracy is sponsored by Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service at Tufts University, the Democracy Imperative, and the Deliberative Democracy Consortium, all of which have NCDD members in their leadership.

We know this conference will be a great space for NCDD members to gather, and we hope to see you then!

More information about the Frontiers of Democracy conference is available at http://activecitizen.tufts.edu/civic-studies/frontiers.

CM Conference Call on Inclusive Communities, Thurs. 6/12

Posted on June 9, 2014 by Roshan Bliss

We are happy as always to announce that CommunityMatters, a collaborative effort in which NCDD is a partner, is hosting its next capacity building conference call this Thursday, June 12, from 4-5pm EST. This hour-long conference call will focus on inclusivity and what it means to build inclusive communities.

This month’s call features thoughts from Moki Macias who is the Director of Community Building at the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Atlanta Civic Site and from Tramunda Hodges who also works at the Foundation’s Atlanta Civic Site as Community Building Coordinator. Moki and Tramunda will share their experience with promoting equal treatment and opportunity in community decision-making, and we are sure it will be a great opportunity for NCDD members to gain helpful insights around inclusion in our work.

You can find more about the call at www.communitymatters.org/event/inclusive-communities, and we encourage you to register for the call today by clicking here. We hope to have you join us on Thursday!

C2D2 Climate Change Deliberation Webinar on Thursday

Posted on June 2, 2014 by Roshan Bliss

NCDD’s sister organization, the Canadian Community for Dialogue and Deliberation (C2D2), is hosting a great webinar this Thursday, June 5th, starting at 12pm Eastern/9am Pacific that we wanted to make sure you heard about. The webinar will focus on learning from a climate deliberation initiative in Alberta and will be facilitated by three NCDD members. You can read more about or find out more by clicking here, and make sure to register today by clicking here.

C2D2 Webinar: Climate Change, Dialogue, and Deliberation

This webinar will provide an opportunity to learn about the work of Alberta Climate Dialogue (ABCD). This five year initiative (2010-2015) brings together a group of researchers and practitioners who are exploring how citizen deliberation can contribute to shifting engagement and policy on climate change locally and internationally.

This webinar will be an opportunity to discuss in detail what is being learned about deliberative dialogue practice from the following three deliberations:

Citizens’ Panel on Edmonton’s Energy and Climate Challenges, 2012 conducted in partnership with the City of Edmonton and the Centre for Public Involvement
Watershed Citizens’ Dialogue 2014, conducted in collaboration with the Oldman Watershed Council in southern Alberta
Energy Efficiency Choices, a virtual dialogue done in collaboration with the Alberta Energy Efficiency Alliance

In the spirit of the ABCD collaboration, the webinar will be facilitated by three of its members:

Dr. David Kahane, principal investigator and project lead, University of Alberta
Dr. Gwendolyn Blue, researcher, University of Calgary
Jacquie Dale, practitioner, One World Inc. and C2D2 Board member

ABCD’s work is funded by a Community-University Research Alliance grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada as well as contributions from universities, governments, and NGOs that are partners. Deliberative events are co-funded with government, civil society partners, and further grants.

You can find the original version of this post at http://c2d2.ca/c2d2-webinar-climate-change-dialogue-and.

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