Assembly Facilitation Guidelines
Lessons from decentralised organising emphasise the value of cultivating processes for meetings and ongoing collaborating that are both clear and flexible. As this group grows, our way of being in assembly will need to be a bit different from a normal conversation, in order to ensure that we give room for everyone’s voices, and create safer spaces for difficult conversations.
One of the well-established facilitation tools for creating such spaces is to adopt a structured ‘container’ that starts with an opening circle to signal our move into this deliberate collaborative space and ends with closing circle that will bring us back to more familiar ways of conversing
For our initial assemblies, we are adopting an initial structured container to support as all to take turns co-facilitating assemblies. As we co-create our agreements and processes, we can also adjust these Assembly guidelines and add more examples.
The Agenda for each Assembly is shared by the Process & Stratergy Crew on our Loomio forum in advance (along with any links to current discussion), and meeting notes are added to the same thread within the following week.
Facilitation Container
Opening circle
- Acknowledgement of Country
- Statement of intent
- Arriving ritual
- Arriving circle prompt
- Expressing ’twinges’ (A twinge is something someone is having feelings about, they could be small or big feelings, but the idea is to bring the most minor discomforts or awkwardness into the awareness of the group. The point is to name the twinge and have it witnessed, not fixed or solved.)
Meeting Agenda
- Crew Updates (& opting-in/out by participants)
- The specific details and order of ‘meeting business’ on our agenda will change, as the examples below illustrate, yet we hope to cultivate a rhythm that allows for time for Crews to report their updates to the broader collective, time to discuss upcoming decisions, an opportunity to form/join/leave crews, and an activity to help us to build skills relating well together and practice navigating conflict productively, and emergent agenda items. This is long, facilitators may want to add a break and/or an energy-raising activity.
Closing circle
- Allocate buddies until the next Assembly
- Confirm date/time for next Assembly (+ Workshop)
- Call for co-facilitator for next Assembly
- Call for cook for the next assembly
- Leaving circle prompt
- Closing ritual
Examples
General Example 1:
Opening circle 20 min
- Acknowledgement of Country
- Statement of intent
- Arriving ritual
- Arriving circle prompt
Meeting agenda 1.5hrs
- Crew report-backs, peer Q&A, and time for participants to opt-in/opt-out to each Crew
- Discussion of upcoming decisions
- Rest break
- Facilitated activity (e.g., the 1-2-4-all facilitation pattern
Closing circle 15 min
- Set date/time for next Assembly
- Call for co-facilitator for next Assembly
- Call for cook for the next assembly
- Leaving circle prompt
- Closing ritual
Example 2:
Opening circle 20 min
- Acknowledgement of Country
- Statement of intent
- Arriving ritual
- Arriving circle prompt
Meeting agenda 1.5hrs
- Crew report-backs & peer Q&A
- Facilitated activity (e.g., exploring the critical uncertainties of our project)
- Rest break
- Discussion of upcoming decisions
- Re-formation of crews
Closing circle 15 min
- Set date/time for next Assembly
- Call for co-facilitator for next Assembly
- Call for cook for the next assembly
- Leaving circle prompt
- Closing ritual
Detailed Example from first Assembly
Opening circle 20 min
- Acknowledgement of Country
- Statement of intent
- Arriving ritual
- Arriving circle prompt
Meeting agenda (~1.5 hrs)
- Crew report-back & peer Q&A (10 min)
- First decision (40 min)
- Introduce interim decision making process, allow for reading time
- Introduce Loomio (what & why)
- Start Jamez principles consensus decision process - with reading time and discussion
- BREAK (5 min)
- Group exercise: Add retrofit elements to sample house designs (15 min)
- Empower crews (15 min) - Start the Rad Crew objectives & delegation scope consent decision process - Organise one-off meeting to plan seedling crew objectives (call for volunteers)
Closing circle 15 min
- Set date/time for next Assembly
- Call for co-facilitator for next Assembly
- Call for cook for the next assembly
- Leaving circle prompt
- Closing ritual