Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Cancelling, Scheduling Special Meetings

[Brian Baresch (baresch]

>I agree that a presenter may not know exactly how long a discussion will 
>take, but a presenter (either an experienced individual or committee)
should 
>be able to guesttimate how much time it will take to achieve whatever goal

>they have in mind.  That said, some goals are easer to predict time for
than 
>others.  The more serious the issue and the closer to consensus you need
to 
>get, the more difficult it becomes to predict, especially with larger
groups. 
> Be generous with more serious issues, then add more time.

We've found that this works -- the presenters estimate how much time an
item will take, then the timekeeper watches the clock and keeps us aware of
how much time we're taking. If it looks as if we need more time, the group
decides whether to extend discussion, drop the subject, or defer it to next
week (or to a committee).

If it looks as if we'll run out of time, we decide whether to let the
meeting go long (child care is a frequent concern) or shorten or defer some
items. So far it's gone smoothly.

Best regards,

Brian Baresch
Delaware Street Commons
Lawrence, Kansas
www.delaware-street.com