Community brainstorming tools

Belief in external experts and our dependence on their telling us what to do next has become commonplace. However, much of what we need is around us. We need ways to unlock the knowledge and ideas of our community. Two approaches often used by Transition groups are World Café and Open Space.

The following information will help you run sessions on them. 

Open Space Technology[i]

This is for groups from 10 to 1,000 people who need to explore a major issue. Its originator, Harrison Owen, bases it on four guidelines:

1. Whoever comes are the right people.
2. Whatever happens is the only thing that could have happened.
3. When it starts is the right time.
4. When it’s over, it’s over.

 ...and one ‘law’, ‘The Law of Motion and Responsibility’:

“If, during the course of the gathering, any person finds themselves in a situation where they are neither learning nor contributing, they are invited to use their feet and go to some more productive place.”

Step-by-step guide to running an Open Space event 

• You’ll need a room large enough for those attending to be able to sit in a circle (or, in the case of large numbers, in concentric circles), a wall you can stick things on to, and places (rooms, tables, corners) for conversations.
• An overarching question must appear in publicity and invitations for the event.
• Sit participants in a circle. In the centre is a pile of sheets of A4 paper and pens. On the wall is an empty timetable, with the timings of the different sessions on one axis, and the various breakout spaces on the other.
• Explain the guidelines and process of Open Space, and say that the only rule for proposing a question (other than it having some relevance to the overarching question) is that you host that discussion and take legible notes.
• Anyone with a question writes it on a sheet of paper and sticks it to the timetable in one of the time slots. If there are more questions than available time slots, the leader or participants can consolidate relevant ones. Once your timetable/agenda is complete, allow people a few minutes to look at it and work out what discussion sessions they want to go to. Then announce the start of the first session.
• In theory, the rest of the day will now organise itself!
• At the end of each session, let people know it is finished, collect the note-filled sheets, and put them on the wall in the area called the ‘Marketplace’.
• It can be very useful to have a ‘Newsroom’ – someone who is scribing the notes from the sessions. They can then give people leaving the event a printed account of what was discussed, post the notes online or send them to participants the following day.
• Leave 30-40 minutes or so at the end for a go-round to reflect on the process rather than issues raised.
• The notes generated can be typed up and circulated to everyone who attended. No specific consensus is reached as such; it is rather a harvesting of ideas from which future activities will emerge.

Open Space is great for gathering ideas that lead to practical projects. Meeting others who share your passion helps turn ideas into action.

Those who have ideas bring them to an Open Space looking for collaborators. Open Space makes private ideas public and helps kick-start explorations around their feasibility, which then attracts others.

World Café

This has been summarised as being about ‘awakening and engaging collective intelligence through conversations about questions that matter’. It differs from Open Space in that it is more directed and explores specific issues. It rests on the ancient truth that food and drink prompt thought and conversation.

How to run a World Café session: 

• Plan the event well, frame the question(s), and decide who should be there and how you will invite them, where and when it will be, and what results you want.
• Create a hospitable space with round tables set out café-style, with room at each for about five people, with sheets of paper, marker pens, flowers, perhaps a candle, and food and drink.
• The questions (either one overarching one or a number that explore different aspects of an issue) should be clear, thought-provoking and relevant to those attending.
• Encourage everyone to contribute by moving people around frequently. Every 15 minutes, ring a bell to show it is time to go to another table. Over a few hours, participants meet most, if not all, the people in the room. Each time people move, they bring threads of the previous conversation they were in to a new group of people. Each table has a host, who records the points on the sheet of paper. Each time the groups change, the new session begins with the host sharing what was previously discussed at that table, and the new people briefly share what happened at the tables they were on previously.
• At the end, draw the event together through sharing what came out of the discussions. You might pin up all the written-on sheets of paper for all to see, or each host could summarise the main points on his or her table. This could then be followed by a more general ‘go-round’ for sharing reflections on the process and what deeper questions were raised. This summarising process can be continued by typing up the sheets and emailing them to everyone a few days later as ‘minutes’ of the discussion.

 Ambience, good food, conversation, lots of mingling and ideas – World Café and Open Space. Begin!

Resources 

• One very powerful tool is ‘The Art of Hosting’: www.artofhosting.org/home
• The World Café: www.theworldcafe.com.
• There is a great clip from the Powerdown Show showing World Café in practice at www.youtube.com/watch?v=Su_w9gYrtuk.