Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Groupthink - preparation prior to consensus

[Norm Gauss (normangauss11]

Jeanne:

>Also consider the meeting preparation, does your group get exposed to the
>proposal before the meeting so that they might be able to express concerns
>before the meeting or is the meeting the first exposure the group is
getting
>to the proposal?

The pattern in our community is that ad-hoc teams are formed to work on a
proposal and present it to the community.  The theory is that all work in
the proposal is done within teams before presenting for consensus.

In both cases where consensus blocking occurred, the community had not been
given a thorough detailed written proposal a few days before the business
meeting so that people would have a chance to study it and initiate
penetrating inquiry.  Also, in both cases, a sense of urgency to reach
consensus during the business meeting was presented.  (In one  case, the
urgency was more imagined than real. So the belief that consensus was needed
immediately caused many people to hastily approve it.  Of course this sense
of urgency might be used as a ploy in order to get the approval the
committee needs.)

Our community has detected defects in the way we have done things in the
past, and efforts are now underway to formulate a template for building
proposals.

Norm Gauss
Oak Creek Commons
Paso Robles, CA