I was first introduced to consensus in 1977 when I got involved with a local anti-nuclear group. The meetings were long and tense, and seldom did decisions ever get made. After five very long meetings I gave up and stopped going. I guess everybody else did too because the group disbanded a short time later. I was not impressed with consensus. A couple years later I watched another group victimized by a consensus process that left people frustrated, in tears, and ready to leave the group. I was pretty convinced at that point that consensus was a plot hatched by the powers that be to kill off citizen activists groups. And then I stumbled in on a group that had an incredible sense of togetherness and community, that got decisions made quickly and well, and where people left the meetings feeling empowered and excited about the group. Consensus not only worked, it worked really well. In later years, after visiting many social change groups and intentional communities meetings, I have seen a wide range of groups using consensus. Some struggled, some failed, others functioned excellently.
The scientist in me became interested to figure out why there was such variation in outcomes between groups using the same decision method. In comparing and contrasting the experiences I saw groups having using consensus, I came to an obvious, but pretty well supported conclusion: A consensus process is only as good as the skills of its facilitator and participants.
Over the past seven years I have had the privilege of watching some excellent facilitators work their magic. I have also experienced the pain that ineffective and poor facilitators inflict upon groups.
It is very easy to be a mediocre consensus facilitator. You simply stand in front of the group, run down the agenda, call on people, and then if things go badly, punt the item to another meeting, or after lots and lots of tense discussion that goes nowhere, you simply let the controllers or other domineering types decide the issue after everyone else has abandoned the issue and just wants to go home.
There is a better way, and that’s why I have created this resource.
My experience and learning has taught me that the quality of a consensus meeting is directly related to the skill and commitment of the facilitator and the commitment of the group to a set of effective behaviors. Mediocre facilitation, coupled with dysfunctional meeting behaviors leads to poor results, long and tiresome meetings, and lack of participation. Excellent facilitation leads to excellent meetings that are short, productive, that people feel good about and want to come to.
The intent of this resource is to help you become an excellent consensus facilitator of a social change group or Intentional Community. Even if you have no interest in actually running meetings much of the knowledge contained here will be very valuable to help you understand how and why your meetings go well, or badly. This booklet is full of practical advice, tried and tested techniques, and several ideas to solve problems. The references list is full of highly recommended materials to add to your library.
Like most good training material, there is even a handy acronym to help you remember the important parts. An excellent facilitator uses her POISE to be effective. Poise stands for:
Planning: You want to plan each facilitation carefully.
Observation: Watch your group members and learn about them.
Intervention: Reinforce the functional and discourage the dysfunctional behaviors.
Self awareness: Understanding what you personally bring to the meeting and how it effects others.
Evaluation: Learn from your successes and mistakes so you are always improving.
My assumption is that you are part of a group that uses, or wants to use consensus as a decision making process. Since consensus requires trust, and faith that the group can find a best answer, I am also assuming that the group you work with meets regularly and has consistent enough membership that you can observe members over the period of several meetings to learn some things about them.
When I had mostly finished the early draft of this booklet I realized, like most authors, most of the work in it is not really mine. I have watched and learned from numerous groups and taken training and picked the brains of several really excellent facilitators. Much of this book is a synthesis of all those people and their work.
I first would like to acknowledge the Fellowship for Intentional Community. It was at a 1992 board meeting when I watched some really excellent facilitators in action, and my eyes were opened to the potential. I would especially like to mention Caroline Estes and her fine work in training facilitators around the country, Laird Schaub who also has taught many, Betty Didcoct and Geoph Kozeny. Many of the really good facilitators I have encountered have taken workshops from one or more of these folks.
I would like to thank all of the many intentional communities that have hosted Northwest Intentional Communities Association gatherings, and all the many gathering participants for sharing their wisdom and lessons, including facilitation tips and tricks. In particular I owe much to Fred Lanphear, who has modeled some excellent facilitation at numerous NICA meetings, and also to Jonathon Betz-Zall. To the many e-mail and personal conversations with Stuart Staniford-Chen I have learned much. A great many ideas came from the Cohousing-l e-mailing list, where hundreds of participants in dozens of communities freely share their wisdom and experiences. And finally, I need to acknowledge the Sharingwood Community, as a living laboratory for consensus process in an ever changing and growing group.