Civic Engagement and the Restoration of Community

Six Conversations That Matter ^SM

The Lens or Strategy

The strategy can be summarized by the phrase, “change the conversation, change the culture.”

Reconciliation of community, or a future different and not determined by the past, occurs through a shift in language. Operationally, this means engaging in conversations we have not had before.

The concept is if you can change the room, you have changed the culture, at least for that moment. We change the room by changing the conversation.

Not just any new conversation, but ones that create a communal accountability and commitment.

Certain conversations are satisfying and true yet have no power and no accountability. For example:

            Telling the history of how we got here

            Giving explanations and opinions

            Blaming and complaining

            Making reports and descriptions

            Carefully defining terms and conditions

These help us get connected, or increase our understanding of who we are, plus they are so ingrained in the social convention of a culture that they demand respect. They just do not, however, constitute a transformation.

Transformation occurs through powerful conversations which are the embodiment of accountability and commitment.

Here are the conversational shifts that are other than just talk:

Invitation replaces mandate, policy and alignment

Possibility replaces problem solving

Ownership and Cause replace explanation and denial

Dissent and Refusal replace resignation and lip service

Commitment replaces hedge and barter

Gifts replace deficiencies

Each of these conversations leads to the others. Any one held wholeheartedly, takes us to and resolves all the others. In the absence of these, it is all just talk. No matter how urgent the cause, how important the plan, how elegant the answer. These are the conversations through which the community is transformed.

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