Overview
What Constitutes Action
Change the Conversation,
     Change the Community The Offer
What We Mean by
     Leadership
Change Your Thinking,
    Change Your Life
The Context for
    Engagement
The Lens or Strategy
Six Conversations
The Tools
The Invitation
The Order of Assembly
The Nature of Powerful
    Questions
The Questions

Civic Engagement and the Restoration of Community

Six Conversations That Matter ^SM

The Order of Assembly

Each meeting is designed to be an example of the future we want to create. It is this meeting in which the context is shifted.

The structure of gatherings is about the design of the room, the groupings of people, and managing the small group and communal discussion.

All change begins with a small group, for the small group is the unit of change. Even a large group meeting uses small groups to create connection and move the action forward. The small group is the structure that allows every voice to be heard. Everything has been said but not everyone has said it.

The room is a metaphor for the whole community, physically and psychologically. The room is the visible expression of the kind of learning and community we plan to create. This is what is meant by “change the room, change the culture.”

Rooms are traditionally designed to support patriarchal experiences. We may not be have control over the form and shape of the room but we always have choices

as to the nature of our occupation of the room. So the task is to design the room to meet our intentions to build accountability and commitment.

Here are the configurations that go into thinking about the order of assembly:

Seating in Circles. The circle is the geometric symbol for community and therefore for arranging the room. No tables if possible. Round tables (the shape of communion), better than rectangles (the shape of negotiation) or classroom (the shape of instruction).

Small Groups. Connection occurs in small face-to-face groupings. Certain configurations are better for learning and connection, others are better for closure and problem solving. Use diverse groupings for opening questions and raising issues. Use affinity groupings for planning actions and making promises. Start with the individual preparing alone, then talking in trios, next in groups of six, and then to the whole community.

Large Group. When people share with the larger group, they’re sharing with the world. Have them stand, as they are in fact standing for something. Ask their name so they can be known for their stance. Amplify all voices equally.

When people make powerful statements to the whole community, make them say it again slowly. They speak for all others who are silent, and in that way they speak for the whole. Also when people speak in a large group, they need to be acknowledged for the courage it took to speak out.

Note: All of this is part of an emergent, but well established methodology often called large group interventions.

Reception

Here is a sequence of events for opening a gathering:

Welcome and greeting – Greet them at the door; welcome them personally and help them get seated. People enter in isolation. Reduce the isolation they came with, let them know they came to the right place and are not alone. This expresses our hospitality.

Restate the invitation – To all assembled, offer a statement of why we are here. Use everyday language and speak from the heart, without PowerPoint, slides, video, etc. Use words and phrases that express choice, optimism, faith, willingness to act, commitment to persevere.

Connection – We must establish a personal connection with each other. Connection before content. Without relatedness, no work can occur

Encourage people who “know each other” to separate - it gives them freedom to be who they are and not who their colleague thinks they should be.

Connection is not intended to be just an “icebreaker,” which is fun, yet does little to break the isolation or create community. Icebreakers will make contact but not connection.

Some examples of connection questions:

What led you to accept the invitation?

What would it take for you to be present in this room?

What is the price others paid for you to be here?

Who in your life, living or dead, that you value and respect would you want to invite to sit with you and help make this meeting successful?

Late Arrivals – Welcome them without humiliation, connect them to the group.

Restored community becomes one step closer when every gathering is a demonstration of the future we came to create.

Departure

Ending is an element of engagement. We want a high-engagement ending to the gatherings. Treat the ending as important as the beginning and the middle.

Ask in the beginning for people to give notice of leaving. Leave in public, do not sneak out. When people leave early and won’t return, they leave a void in the community. It hurts the community; there is a cost, a consequence to the community.

Acknowledge their leaving in a deliberate way.

Have them acknowledge that they are leaving and where they are going

Have three people say, “Here’s what you’ve given us…”

Ask, What are you taking with you? What shifted for you…became clearer? What is one thing you’d like to say to the community?

Thank them for coming

Remove their chair – if it remains, it only acts as a reminder that there has been a loss