Re: Consensus and inclusion | <– Date –> <– Thread –> |
From: Stuart Staniford-Chen (staniforcs.ucdavis.edu) | |
Date: Thu, 12 Jan 95 23:16 CST |
Rob Sandelin writes: > decision. One of the things which has surfaced now a couple of times > is that members who were NOT at a meeting where a decision was made, > later had a problem with the decision and we had to go back and deal > with it, either in person with the individual or at a meeting. We > publish decisions to be made at the meetings in the newsletter or in a > handout which is distributed to everyone so members know in advance > what is being decided at a meeting. Our process is assuming that people > not attending the meeting know about and are in agreement with the decision. N St. has an appeal process for this situation. A decision can be appealed for up to two weeks after the meeting that made it. Then we have to schedule a meeting with the appealer to go over the issue again. This process is *very* rarely used (I can only think of one case), but it is there if necessary. For that reason, we sometimes implement decisions (eg spend the money) before the two weeks are up in the hope that no-one will appeal. We aren't supposed to, but we do. We tend to be a lot more careful over this kind of thing if the decision is a big one. > I am beginning to think that when members are not present at a meeting > where a consensus decision is reached by those present, that they > should be personally contacted and asked if they also "do not have an > unacceptable level of conflict" to use the Sharingwood jargon, before > we determine that we have reached consensus. I wonder if you might have trouble doing this because the absent people didn't hear all the discussion/sharing/compromise that went into the decision and will therefore form their opinion in a different frame of reference than the rest of the group. If you insist that they all must consense, this might make it harder to reach decisions. Maybe not if you are all sophisticated enough about the process. It does also put an extra step into the process (and therefore an extra opportunity for the group to flake and not implement the decision) The way we do things has the merit that the person who is unhappy has to make the running. (A reasonable atonement for missing meetings in the first place :-). > as consensus? What if someone is pissed off about the issue and > doesn't attend the meeting because they are feeling pissed off and > disfranchised? Is it still consensus? Yikes, look at all those worms > squirming in the can! Yes indeed! We have had this and it's a *big* problem. I believe it hasn't happened recently. We don't have a good way of handling this (in my opinion - other N Street people may differ). Maybe this would be a time for your Process and Communication committee to step into the breach. Best wishes from Sunny California, Stuart. stanifor [at] cs.ucdavis.edu N St Cohousing (wet but not drowned).
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Consensus and inclusion Rob Sandelin, January 12 1995
- Re: Consensus and inclusion Mike Adams, January 12 1995
- Re: Consensus and inclusion Stuart Staniford-Chen, January 12 1995
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