On September 6, 2011, Schultz worked with the non-profit organization No Labels to conduct a “town hall meeting” in New York, where people could call in to share their perpective on what’s causing the “crisis of confidence” in America. Branded as a “Conversation with America,” Schultz sought outreach through online advertising, mass e-mailing, and by running ads in the New York Times and USA Today, urging “Americans to participate in the forum and insist politicians to end their hyper-partisan behaviour.” Schultz said he was inspired to hold the town hall meeting after receiving hundreds of e-mails and letters from citizens who are struggling in the current U.S. economy.

Now for some points on what went down during the town hall meeting:

- Where was it held? The venue was Cooper Union, a prestigious private college in Manhattan. However, it was slightly repurposed to look like your local Starbucks, complete with eager-looking young people in the background, sipping on their Starbucks drinks and typing away on their Macbooks. The whole thing was streamed online.

- Who was there? An impressive group of individuals hosted the meeting, including a senior political columnist for Newsweek and CNN contributor; the President of the Grady Health Foundation in Atlanta; a Professor of Management from the Harvard Business School; and the President of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

- What happened? Over a 90-minute time period, the panel discussed the issues at hand and took questions from call-in viewers. However, the broader focus seemed to be on encouraging people to take the pledge to withhold campaign contributions.

So what should we make of this? From a process perspective, “A Conversation with America” does not represent the most robust public engagement initiative for a number of reasons. The hosts of the meeting were not unbiased and promoted a clear agenda, many of the questions that were asked were very similar and seemed to be a bit leading in nature, and there was corporate branding everywhere. However, I’m assuming that Mr. Schultz is placing more focus on the message rather than the process.

Political ideologies aside, I think this is an inspiring example of high-profile business leaders, particularly those from companies with popular consumer brands, taking a stand and using (some form of) public engagement to get citizens to “wake up”!

-Tristan Eclarin-

What flies under the radar in the rest of Canada is the fact that Edmonton City Council recently passed a comprehensive and far reaching environmental strategy called The Way We Green (TWWG). Its goals and policy directions, including on climate change and energy, are nothing if not forward looking and very ambitious.

The Alberta Climate Dialogue project (ABCD) is a five-year university-community initiative (2010-2015) exploring how new forms of citizen participation in policymaking can enhance Alberta responses to climate change (I serve on ABCD’s Steering Committee). ABCD and the Centre for Public Involvement  (CPI) are exploring a partnership with the City of Edmonton to co-create a public participation campaign that seeks to advance climate change policy and action in Alberta.  This partnership would also advance knowledge, capacity, and practices of citizen dialogue and deliberation in Alberta and beyond.

On September 23, ABCD/CPI hosted a workshop for the City of Edmonton leaders, community stakeholders who were involved in the creation of TWWG, and ABCD’s leading researchers and public participation practitioners (as both presenters and participants). I had the pleasure of facilitating this event which set out to better understand how citizen deliberation can support the City’s responses to energy transition and climate change; leverage expertise to inform the City’s public engagement efforts; and help align key energy and climate change objectives on a public engagement spectrum. Judging from the buzz at tables and the thoughtful contributions about how serious citizen engagement could really help the City administration and Council to implement TWWG, the workshop was a success.

Following on the heels of this workshop, ABCD convened its annual planning session – this year participants contributed their research and practice expertise to support the Edmonton initiative, including design and learning dimensions. Graphic recorder Avril Orloff captured a snapshot of key elements of ABCD’s work and aspirations in the drawing included here (click on the image on this screen and the next to view it in detail).

Stay tuned for the next chapter in the City of Edmonton / ABCD / CPI partnership story – citizens and the City implementing wise choices for environmental sustainability.

-Mary Pat Mackinnon-

These reports can be different in style, content and format, depending on their purpose.  Sometimes, they will be analytic and will only be available several weeks or months afterwards, once data collected has been carefully reviewed and assessed.

Other times, “what was heard” descriptive summaries are all that is required and these can be produced in shorter periods of time.

For some in-person dialogues, it’s possible to produce a written report for participants even before they even leave the event at the end of the day.  This can really provide them with tangible evidence of what has been accomplished.

Here’s how:

1. Before the dialogue, start preparing a draft template for the report.  The background, objectives, list of expected participants and overview of the dialogue can all be written in advance.
2. Create outlines for the report sections that will be completed by the facilitation team during the event.  This can include sub-headings, bullets or tables to display key points and summaries.
3. Before the event, make arrangements with a printing company at or very close to the dialogue venue to have copies of the report printed quickly.  Make sure to give them the expected number of participants and outline delivery plans to have the report copies brought to the venue.
4. At the event, the facilitation team takes notes and works through health and lunch breaks to analyze this data and enter the key points directly in the pre-developed report template.
5. In the final health break of the day, send an electronic copy of the report to the printing company.  This draft will contain a summary of the dialogue up to this final break.
6. Distribute the preliminary report copies to participants as they leave, explaining that a final report will be distributed in the following weeks.  This version will contain the results of any final discussions that occur between when the preliminary report is sent for printing and the end of the event.
7. Following the event, distribute the final version of the report to participants.  Email may work best for this.

Producing quick reports for in-person events will seem like magic to participants, but it’s really the result of careful planning and preparation before the event even happens.

The Vientiane Youth Leaders’ Forum gathered 42 youth from around the world to engage in dialogue. The Forum organizers, Mines Action Canada, invited me to design and facilitate the final session of the week. Working closely with others on the Ascentum team (Manon Abud and Mary Pat MacKinnon) as well as the conference organizers, I designed and facilitated a generative dialogue and planning session on the Annual Plan for the newly-formed “Youth to Youth Network”.  The intention is that this network will sustain Forum momentum and relationships into the future.

Designing and facilitating the session was no walk in the park. Challenges included extremely limited time (2 hours, for a session that would normally require 4-6 hours), varying levels of English language skills, and differing political, economic and cultural realities in each of the delegates’ home countries.

To try and overcome these challenges, I met delegates in smaller groups in the days leading up to the session to review the process, and answer any lingering questions. I also identified ‘champions’ – delegates passionate enough to adopt particular action items and could encourage others to join them to discuss them further during the dialogue. By employing a modified “Open Space” format, participants were able to identify and discuss actions that were most important to them. People could take part in English or by engaging with others who spoke a different language. Dialogue was supported by three multilingual facilitators who helped foster small group dialogue. Despite the challenges of a short event, participant delegates produced and prioritized a rich list of activities on which youth across the Network should focus over the coming year, including the development of an interactive and comprehensive online space for collaboration.

- Stephan Telka -

They are also powerful tools that can make in-person dialogues awesome – both in terms of generating shared information and giving participants a more engaging experience.  

And, researchers estimate that there are over 5 million Canadians with Smartphones.  They are becoming more common as tools for business and/or personal use.

Earlier this week, we read a great blog by Dwayne at LearningCycle.ca called “35 Ways to Use an iPhone in a Workshop”.  Some are there for fun but there are quite a few thoughtful ways to use iPhones or other Smartphones in workshop.

Here are our favourite 5:

Camera: Use it to snap pictures of group activities, flip charts, and other knowledge products participants create during small group breakouts.  These can be analyzed and included in reports, as well as shared online.

Video: Use it to capture the “story” of the day – the opening, group interactions, individual conversations, and even personal “what I learned” or reflections interviews at the end of the event.  This could be easily edited and kept as a time capsule, shared with participants only or posted online for the broader community experience the event as well.

Twitter: With an LCD display and active search enabled, use it to ask participants questions and have them @message or DM replies.  140 characters isn’t much, but it can help participants express their ideas concisely!  (You can read an earlier blog with more tips for using Twitter at in-person events here)

Wikipedia app or Google search: Use them to check facts, conduct quick research and bring additional knowledge to play to inform deliberations and make they are truly evidence-informed.

Networking: Use it to help participants build professional networks or stay in touch.  On the free Bump App for iPhones, participants can “bump” fists with their devices and exchange contact information wirelessly.  It’s as easy as shaking hands… only more fun.

A big thanks to @learningcycle for a great blog that got us thinking…

Ellis Westwood & Stephan Telka

My case study is on the first phase of the initiative, which focused on identifying the goals necessary for a comprehensive and inclusive mental health system in Canada. In the process of reviewing a wide range of literature, conducting interviews with key members of the MHCC and analyzing public consultation reports, I’ve learned quite a bit on the issue and public engagement strategies in general.

I’m nearing completion of the case study and thought I’d share a few of the key lessons to be learned from this initiative:

• Multiple ways to participate accommodates a broader diversity of perspectives: The process allowed people to attend either a series of in-person dialogues or take part in an online consultation. The in-person regional dialogues allowed the MHCC to have a real conversation with people; they could directly answer questions, probe responses further, and experience the dynamic between people in the room. This method had a higher representation of stakeholders, such as health workers, representatives from health organizations and government officials. In contrast, the online process was open more to the general public, and allowed individuals the opportunity to express themselves without the confines of time and location.  These methods complemented each other well.

• Carefully think through data collection and analysis so you can plan accordingly: During the consultation events, the same pre- and post-test questions were used to gauge the opinions of all three participant groups (i.e. in-person, online citizen and online stakeholder). This was an intentional strategy, because it allowed for a comparative analysis of participant attitudes before and after the engagement process. In the end, there was very little variance in responses, which demonstrated both positive and enthusiastic support for the MHCC’s framework and overall approach.

• It’s important not to pre-determine the outcomes: In terms of support for the MHCC framework, there was a remarkably high degree of congruence across all participant groups. This meant that, even with the wide range of audiences engaged, there was strong evidence for the consensus that the MHCC needed to move forward. This lack of divergence between public, stakeholder and government opinion was not an expected outcome. However, it helped demonstrate that the will for action was there. All that was needed was a clear strategy (as well as a responsible organization) to lead the process on a national scale

The Commission used the public and stakeholder feedback to revise their final Framework document and ultimately, to help guide the extensive amount work that they still have ahead of them (Phase II of the process is expected to begin soon). But overall, this is a very promising example of effective public participation.

- Tristan Eclarin -

Before your event…

• Create a Twitter account for your in-person event(s), right at the start of the project planning and design stage.
• Develop a hashtag up-front (#yourevent) so you can search for and store your followers’ tweets – before, during and after the event.
• Tap into the twitter community to build a community, share knowledge and recruit participants for the in-person event
• Involve your followers in designing the in-person event by asking for suggestions and ideas
• Create a buzz about your in-person event by sharing sneak previews and breaking news about speakers with your followers.   Many will re-tweet these to their own networks of followers.
• Just before the event takes place, create a site where live tweets can be displayed.  One great tool for this is LiveTwit powered by WordPress.

At your event…

• Setup a projected LCD screen to display live tweets.
• Build time into the agenda near the beginning of the event to explain the live tweet process.  People can tweet to you @yourevent or tag their tweets with your hashtag (#yourevent).
• Encourage people to tweet photos of the event.  They help capture the moment and the emotion of the day.
• It’s a best practice to invite members of your pre-developed twitter community to live tweet the event beforehand.
• Alternatively, under a different design each table could be given a laptop and means to share their ideas with other groups by live tweeting them in real-time.  This allows for quick thematic analysis and knowledge sharing.
• Throughout the day, facilitators could walk participants through the live tweets and use to foster additional dialogues.

After your event…

• Twitter gives you a platform to build on the success of the event, gather feedback and leverage a community for follow-up action.
• Shortly after the event, thank your twitter community for participating.
• Ask for people to post feedback, all searchable using the #yourevent hashtag.
• Invite your followers to tweet about what they are each going to do to follow-up on the event and what actions they are going to take.

- Ellis Westwood -

Because we facilitate both face-to-face and online dialogues here at Ascentum, people often ask us “how are they any different?” or “which works best?”

We’ve recently run an online dialogue with several partners in the US that showed some of the differences between online and face-to-face and why, in certain instances, online approaches can work better.

Ascentum worked with the Kettering Foundation and the National Issues Forums Institute (NIFI) to run an online dialogue to bring together 10 people from across America to think, talk and deliberate together on options for health care reform.  Using Ascentum’s dialogue tool, participants posted comments, ideas, stories and questions over a period of two weeks to explore health care choices and identify what solutions they could, and couldn’t, agree on.

We’re working on an analysis of the dialogue, which we’ll be able to share with you in the next few months.  In the meantime, here are some of our early reflections on how the dialogue went and what it taught us.

• Relationships are different online and in-person: While online dialogues can lack the “personal touch” of in-person dialogue, this physical distance actually made it easier for participants to respond to each other’s ideas without these being interpreted as personal criticisms or attacks.

• Online provided an opportunity for deeper dialogue: The online dialogue ran for 2-weeks, with participants contributing each day.  This extended period time allowed for “offline reflection”.  In addition, the dialogue tool made it possible for participants to share links (news items, articles, blogs, etc.) and bring new knowledge or perspectives to the table.

• Online allowed for more accurate and informed dialogue:  Having a written record of people’s comments, together with offline time to do research, allowed participants to “fact check” statements and post corrections.  This allowed popular myths to be debunked and inaccurate claims rectified.

• Different moderation approaches are required: The dialogue required more active or “present” moderation, through regular questions, polls, syntheses and daily summaries.  Online moderators also faced the challenge of keeping participants involved and engaged over a 2-week period.

Ultimately, online and in-person tools have different strengths and weaknesses.  Ideally, a process would have both and compare the dialogic outcomes of each.

That’s it for now.  Stay in touch to get the full debrief of the health care dialogue later this winter!

- Ellis Westwood and Manon Abud -