Collaboration skills are necessary to facilitation, group leadership, and public engagement at any level. We all work with people. As public sector consultants, we usually find ourselves bringing different groups of people with varying perspectives to work together on common goals. You need to know how to collaborate and how to cause collaboration. Together we are even better. There is a reason why it is our motto. Collaboration is the core of democracy and it’s how big things get done. Here’s some of the latest information we have found on collaboration skills. Thanks for letting us share it with you.
For those of us who love ice hockey, ’tis the season! As a fan of ice hockey and my work, it struck me that a hockey match is kind of like a public meeting that, if facilitated properly, can end up being a satisfying experience for most. Like many public ...
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Whew! The holidays are behind me. As I reflect on the past several weeks, I realize that preparing for a house full of family around the holidays is a lot like preparing for a public meeting.
Anticipation. We all know that the actual time needed for planning and designing ...
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Facilitation Training
Every person who attends a meeting is an individual and it is essential that you not assume everyone is the same. The Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is an assessment tool designed to measure psychological preferences in how people perceive the world and make decisions. The questionnaire was ...
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In September, TPC presented a session at the IAP2 Annual conference in Montreal to explore key issues facing the future of public participation. When everyone is connected to everyone else and opinions can be posted to the world from your phone, does anyone really care about coming together to talk ...
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For the past thirty years, I have specialized in angry people. As a public participation specialist, I am often called in to communities that are hurting. People are facing real problems—living next to hazardous and radioactive waste sites and other environmental issues, seeing property diminishment from development, loss of jobs ...
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How are consensus decisions developed?
Consensus becomes possible within groups that are committed to honoring each person’s contribution. The collaborative problem solving process involves a shared commitment to listen 
respectfully to each other and the choice to allow each unique perspective to inform the whole view. A consensus-building group will ...
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Some quick thoughts about what we saw and heard at the September IAP2 North American conference in Montreal about capturing and responding to public opinion – specifically related to online engagement. As you may know if you attended or signed up to get our updates, we released the results ...
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This summer, we surveyed IAP2 leaders and practitioners about the condition of our field in 2016, and the public participation survey results are in.
In fact, we presented those today during our 2016 IAP2 North American Conference session, titled “Over Our Dead Body.”
If you were in attendance, ...
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