Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: meeting dynamics

[Rob Sandelin (robsan]

vicky de monterey  asked:

>Please post some stats on
>this for your active group. Tell me how much time per week feels like
>enough, too much, too little.. and other thoughts about the dynamics of
>meetings.

Sharingwood typically meets  2-3 hours per month as a large group.  
This is sometimes enough, and sometimes it isn't, depending of course 
on what is on the agenda.  Lately we have been meeting more to do 
programming for our second phase.  The amount of meeting time is a 
continuing source of angst.  Some don't want to meet at all, others 
want to meet enough to get good discussions and decisions. We set a 
limit that the general meeting is over by lunch time which is obeyed at 
the expense of the agenda.  The general commitment to meetings is low 
by many in the group and this is somewhat a given due to the nature of 
our community. We have our land and homes already so there is much more 
sense of not having to push anything hard.  We can get by with being 
more leisurely about getting things done, although this sometimes has 
resulted in things taking enormously long to accomplish or not being 
accomplished at all. Member time and energy is the limiting factor in 
much of what we can do.

Committees meet as needed.  Some committees meet 2-3 hours per week, 
others meet 1-2 hours per month, others meet 2-3 times a year.  Many 
things get discussed and decided around the dinner table.

Meeting dynamics is a big subject.  We are small still, typically 
around 20 adults at a general meeting and this allows for a different 
dynamic than 35 or 50 adults would have.  We use general meeting time 
for general announcements, reports on stuff happening in committees, 
discussion/brainstorming of ideas, decision making on proposals from 
committees or task forces, group bonding.

I am in an odd position within my community in that I have been 
involved with an intentional  communities networking organization for 
several years and have had the opportunity to watch and be a part of 
some extremely well facilitated consensus meetings.  So I tend to be 
somewhat frustrated and cynical about our group meetings, especially 
what we call consensus.  So discount this appropriately.

General meetings rarely start on time and often the items at the end of 
the agenda get compressed or punted.  In my observation and opinion  
quality consensus decision making is sometimes compromised by time 
constraints which hurry a decision before it is ready.  We also often 
have very passive facilitation which is something we could use help 
with.  Facilitation is not just running down the items on the agenda.

Other dynamics come from the individuals involved.  Sometimes a 
minority of the members do a majority of the talking. These same 
individuals account for the vast majority of what gets done and all the 
leadership.   We do use a round robin, but that is rapidly growing 
impractical given the larger size we are moving to.  Several members, 
especially new ones, who are not very brave or good at speaking what 
they think and feel sometimes get drowned out or ignored. I am not sure 
we hear everyone very well but we also try to get feelings identified 
in sharing circles, around dinner, in chance personal meetings so I 
think things which are bugging people do have a chance to bubble up 
somewhat.  It has been a long time since a meeting was derailed by 
unexpressed feelings so maybe it is working.   Strong, active, 
facilitation could help with this.  I am becoming more and more 
skeptical about using consensus as a decision process in a group which 
has little or no sense of shared mission, but that is a whole other 
discussion.

We sometimes do cover an amazing amount of stuff, very hurriedly rubber 
stamp decisions with out a lot of thinking, and sometimes we get sort 
of stalled out around a particular thing. The key difference is how 
much people care about any given thing on the agenda.  Too many of the 
members seem to care very little about very much.  Usually something 
which doesn't get a real sense of being finished gets sent back to a 
committee or task force, but occasionally it gets worked through in the 
meeting, although more than once this has resulted in a solution which 
is less than optimum.  Occasionally something comes up which has such a 
range of feelings about it that it just gets dropped and no decision is 
ever made.

Every once and while we do actually have a transformational consensus 
experience, where every one is tuned in and actively engaged, and we 
synthesize a brilliant solution or idea.  This is very exciting when it 
happens and provides a spark which keeps even the most jaded member 
coming to the meetings.

Rob Sandelin
Sharingwood