[Ssf] Including...

Jase spodulike at freeuk.com
Fri Jan 14 20:12:55 GMT 2005


On meetings, I would suggest a formal structure is drawn up, this is not to
make it appear heavy and procedural, but to address the concerns talked about.
For example,

In advance:
Facilitator for meeting is nominated who is responsible for drawing up agenda
and making sure there is meeting space. Agenda is drawn from campaigns, elist,
forthcoming events and generally agreed on elist. Try and use phone trees and
snail mail(?) for agenda discussion also

In meeting:
If there are more than 8(?) people then nominate two facilitators and so on so
can break down into groups easily if proper discussion is needed and keep an
eye on how the meeting is going - I think the main reason meetings are not
like discussions in real life is that in real life you rarely have a
conversation going with more than four people in it, and usually less. The
more we can break into groups the more we could genuinely discuss things,
again it needs strong facilitation and agenda points with things like
presentation of a point followed by group discussion followed by report back
with ideas. Or we could have creative talk in pairs followed by a more formal
discussion for each point.

Person nominated to do timekeeping. Need some general agreement on
speaking time, like no more than five minutes if someone else wants to speak.
When people are asked to wind up then they have to wind up, maybe we could
have a 'raspberry rule' where if people don't shut up everyone blows
raspberry's till they do:)

Facilitator shows round agenda and then has a go round group with people
introducing themselves and adding any items/issues they want to talk about to
the agenda. Agenda revised, similar items condensed etc.

Go through points. Timekeeper responsible for making sure there is time to
cover all points. If there is not sufficient time to discuss an item then
interested people will have to meet after, or another time, or split off and
go into a corner if reaallly urgent. However I think it is VERY important that
all items are discussed - one person's mountain is another person's molehill
etc.

People HAVE TO SPEAK THROUGH THE FACILITATOR, it just doesn't work otherwise
and we have power imbalances as Cuthbert describes

Where action is required, it is the responsibility of the facilitator of the
meeting (or the person who is facilitating that action?) to make sure someone
is signed up for doing that. Thought Chris made a very good point about the
issues of responsibility and not letting people down. For me each project
itself needs a facilitator, someone to look after it and be a point of contact
building that project outside the meetings, then it would be much easier for
people to be involved on a more casual basis and to get involved with the
tasks after the meeting rather than feeling pressured into saying yes straight
away. There should be sensitivity and flexibility to accomodate the different
levels of commitment different people can offer. And if no-one wants to be
facilitator for a project then why are we doing it?


As for campaigns, for me they need to be developed outside the ssf meetings,
which do not have the structure for that. Seeds for Change recommend going
round people in a campaign group, asking what everyone likes to do, and then
using those skills and interests as a way of campaigning. So for example for
the benefits campaign, if we had people interested in writing and poetry the
group may decide to produce a booklet with contributions from those who have
been through the system, social history, commentry, poetry, art if anyone was
up for it, and so on. But that would need to be done through a seperate group
because otherwise people may be co-opted onto stuff they don't want to do
because "you can do that, how about doing that for me" and it becomes work
rather than play. I like play:) Campaigning needs to have more of it.

I think there just needs to be a structure to let people know what they are
getting in to, and let us know what is going on. I leave you with one Pierre's
lovely guidelines (as on
http://wiki.sheffieldsocialforum.org.uk/LSFs_at_ESF2004_open_space_guidelines
)

Guideline #7 Facilitation :"what can we do for our forum"?
We want to TRANSFORM the world, make a better world possible. Let us start
with the forum space, and help making it a SPACE OF GOOD QUALITY SOCIAL
PRACTICES Contribute to making the forum space a better space, more
participatory, more inclusive, producing a higher quality of content and
developing new ways of working together

The space and method of the forum is a tool for social transformation , where
people can feel think and speak differently - and GATHER COLLECTIVE STRENGTH
TO ACT TOGETHER
So listen, observe, interact, respect, ponder, propose, invent, experiment
What kind of knowledge, ability, idea can we bring in this space, as user or
as facilitator, to make it better ?
Join in FACILITATION TASK GROUPS set up within the forum process to improve
how the forum includes people and how it develops ACTIONS
offer volunteer service to translate, transcript, install facilities, develop
software, draft, sketch, play, perform, interact with forum participants -
questionnaires - collection of certain content - activity reports, proposals,
suggesting modes of activities, helping emerging contents, producing
collective representation of contents produced

Jason x

----- Original Message -----
From: "noone noone" <machinevman at hotmail.com>
To: <Ssf at lists.aktivix.org>
Sent: Wednesday, January 12, 2005 5:37 PM
Subject: Re: [Ssf] Including...


  I think that it is the nature of email and internet communication that
leads to some people not wanting to say too much too early, I think that it
is really difficult comiting to somthing that you are not sure about and to
people that you may have only met a few times.  It takes time to build trust
and understanding and instant emails don't lend themselves to this task.

  As for political meetings, unfortunatly, those that are use to them are
going to find it far easier to make their point and those that arent will
find it more difficult to make their point.  Whats more, because alot of
people (and especially the experienced ones) want to make their own mark on
the meeting other will be left on the side lines and the meeting will be
alot slower.  Lots of other factors are in play also e.g. gender inbalances
and the more it seems like a few people dominate the more extreme ideas need
to be thought up to re-balance the meeting e.g. going around and letting
everyone have a chance to speak or using some sort of magic microphone and
these ideas tend to slow the meeting down even more.

  I think that there is something wrong with the way people communicate in
meetings, especially when compared to real life.  In a meeting when anyone
talks the spot light is on them and when someone asks a question the spot
light can end up being ping ponged between two individuals, effectivly
excluding everyone else.  In a two hour meeting if an agenda is not produced
a good few days before the meeting then when one is produced (often two
minutes before the meeting begins) it gives people very little time to think
things through and make sensible suggestions.  Once individual personalities
are taken into account often a conflict in a meeting ends up being because
of personalities clashing/grating and some people not being able to get on
with others, in real life if i dont get on with someone then i dont have to
spend time with them - problem solved.  In political life if people dont get
on with each other often it ends up with some people leaving the group or
just not taking part.

I don't know what the solution is but i think that being aware of our own
behavour/actions is definatly a step in the right direction.


from
cuthbert


>From: Chris Malins <chrismalins at gmail.com>
>To: Ssf at lists.aktivix.org
>Subject: Re: [Ssf] Including...
>Date: Wed, 12 Jan 2005 15:56:23 +0000
>
>Well, as I see it we have this list, SSF meetings regular, SSF meetings
>arranged specifically and the Democracy cafe to use. The Democracy cafe
>idea is good for the purely open structure, it can allow people to throw
>around a few notions with no pressure of time, no need to keep all present
>considering the same idea and without an expectation that action needs to
>be taken away from it.
>
>It would seem to make sense that SSF meetings should be facilitated with
>some moderately enforced time constraints to deal first with specific ideas
>raised via email or other forms of contact and coming out of Democracy
>Cafes etc, but that some time should be set aside for new ideas to have
>preliminary spontaneous attention, albeit not necessarily resulting in any
>decisions. Within this structure I would suggest that we can remain relaxed
>about the minutiae of agendaing and be positive about arising issues which
>need immediate action.
>
>Perhaps one major barrier to people committing to get involved in issues is
>that people don't want to be in the position where they let anyone down. I
>personally like to have a controllable set of responsibilities that I am
>answerable to someone or ones for, and then put extra time into
>non-committed stuff. This is not necessarily very organisationally
>efficient for the group as a whole! For instance, I could say, 'Wow Dan,
>writing stuff sounds like a good idea, I'm sure I could churn out an
>article every couple of weeks', but I don't want to get committed to doing
>something like that regularly, so instead I keep stum, and offer to
>proofread which is a clearly defined manageable task. Maybe I will
>occasionally put pen to computer screen, maybe not.
>
>I guess that the gist is that what i want is to be able to sit back and
>contribute when I see a project that is of particular interest or fits my
>skills (which I am doing at the moment with various groups). I don't want
>to get drawn in to feeling responsible for doing stuff that I can't
>sustain, where I could be letting people down. And I suspect that plenty of
>people have the same sort of caution.
>
>
>Chris
>
>Dan wrote:
>>Hi again,
>>
>>Jeez, sorry for all the e-mails, but I've got one last question.
>>
>>Question: what can be done to be more open and inclusive?
>>
>>There are currently 40 members in total on this list, and many more people
>>'out there' who one might imagine would want to be involved in SSF.
>>
>>Stuff is generally written saying, 'please get involved / please muck in'
>>- but I get the sense that it doesn't work.
>>
>>What might be the reasons for this?
>>
>>To everyone else out there on this list - what would involve you?  What
>>are you looking for?  What do you want to see happening, and do you have
>>any time to contribute to making it happen?
>>
>>I sometimes get confused between two opposite poles: if a meeting is
>>totally open - 'come along and bring your ideas' - the meeting can drift,
>>and people don't bring their ideas because they don't have a sense of what
>>it is.
>>
>>Opposite to this is, say, me or Kev or Jase or anyone else running away
>>with their own ideas - leaving no space for input.
>>
>>What can be done?
>>
>>Dan
>>
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>Ssf mailing list
>Ssf at lists.aktivix.org
>http://lists.aktivix.org/mailman/listinfo/ssf

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