Bay Area Nonviolent Communication (BayNVC)

BayNVC's mission is to help create a world where everyone's needs are met peacefully and people have the skills for making peace. BayNVC facilitates workshops, series, intensive retreats, and practice groups throughout the U.S. We offer NVC trainings to local organizations like churches, businesses, schools, and healthcare institutions as well as counseling for individuals, couples and families. Our Leadership Program offers a yearlong, community-based opportunity for those interested in teaching NVC. Graduates of the Leadership Program are now teaching in diverse locales such as Sri Lanka and Thailand.

Resource Link: http://www.baynvc.org

Center for Strategic Facilitation (CSF)

CSF is a partnership of consultants experienced in training, facilitation and organizational development, who collaborate to expand the use of participatory approaches and methods by individuals, organizations and communities. CSF is affiliated with The Institute of Cultural Affairs, a leader over the past four decades in promoting lasting positive change in communities, nonprofit organizations and businesses. They utilize a distinct and proven approach developed by the ICA called the Technology of Participation (ToP), and offer a number of trainings on facilitative leadership and group facilitation methods.

Resource Link: http://www.strategicfacilitation.com

Center for Wise Democracy - Dynamic Facilitation Training

The Center assists communities in creating Wisdom Councils - randomly-selected, facilitated 'juries' reflecting the larger diversity of the community - which engage in dialogue about the larger system and arrive at creative consensus on shared visions. These visions in turn serve to increase the quality of the dialogue among the larger community. "Dynamic facilitation" is used to facilitate Wisdom Councils, and the Center provides trainings in dynamic facilitation regularly.

Resource Link: http://www.tobe.net/info/general.html

Community At Work

The authors of "Facilitator's Guide to Participatory Decision-Making" offer a variety of courses on group facilitation skills, effective teams and consulting skills. Community At Work is also a consulting firm, specializing in group decision-making.

Resource Link: http://www.CommunityAtWork.com

Dalar International Consultancy

Dalar International Consultancy, Inc. offers a holistic approach to leadership development and organizational development that achieves results that some call miraculous. We offer consulting, coaching/mentoring, and meeting facilitation services to those who wish to work with us, always customized to the unique needs of the client, and yet always within a holistic perspective that works with four levels of consciousness: mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical consciousness.

Resource Link: http://www.dalarinternational.com

Don't Just Do Something, Stand There!: Ten Principles for Leading Meetings That Matter

Marvin Weisbord and Sandra Janoff. Berrett-Koehler, 2007.

Weisbord and Janoff - creators of the Future Search method - offer ten principles that will allow you to get more done in meetings by doing less. The key is knowing what you can and can?’t control. You can?’t control people?’s motives, behavior, or attitudes. But you can control the conditions under which people interact, and you can control your own reactions. Based on over 30 years of experience and research, the authors show exactly how to establish a meeting structure that will create conditions for success, efficiency, and productivity. Equally important, they offer advice for making sure your own emotions don't get in the way - for knowing when to "just stand there" rather than intervene inappropriately, unproductively, or futilely.

Resource Link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1576754251/ref=nosim/?tag=futusearnetw-20

Fielding Graduate Institute - Dialogue, Deliberation and Public Engagement Certificate Program

In 2004, Fielding Graduate Institute, in collaboration with The International Institute for Sustained Dialogue (IISD) and the Kettering Foundation, launched this unique 16-week graduate level Certificate Program. The program strives for the development of "virtuosity" in our practice of dialogue and deliberation. "Virtuosity is what results when people follow their passions to know something well and to perform skillfully. It combines at least three things: (a) a 'passion' for what you are doing; (b) an ability to make [clear] distinctions and (c) the ability to engage in skilled performance.?” We have designed the course to enhance participants?’ abilities to engage in skilled performance.

Resource Link: http://www.fielding.edu/hod/ce/dialog/index.html

Full Circle Associates

The consulting practice of Nancy White and a network of independent professionals, Full Circle Associates provides strategic communication, online community development, facilitation, marketing, and project management services for the community, non-profit and business sectors. Full Circle focuses on online and offline strategies with a passionate interest in online community and collaboration, and provides training in online facilitation and distance collaboration.

Resource Link: http://www.fullcirc.com

Future Search Network (and trainings)

The Future Search Network initiates future search conferences, innovative planning conferences used world-wide by hundreds of communities and organizations. The conferences meet two goals at the same time: helping large diverse groups discover values, purposes and projects they hold in common; and enabling people to create a desired future together and start implementing right away.

Resource Link: http://www.futuresearch.net

Harwood Public Innovators Lab

The Harwood Public Innovators Lab is an intensive, four day experience that will help you create new pathways to accelerate change and engender authentic hope in your communities ?– finding ways to get past the negative conditions in public life that stand in the way of progress. During the Lab you will examine how you can see, think about, and engage in your work from three important perspectives ?– how you engage communities; how you think about your organization?’s role in change; and what you need to do as an individual to be effective and stay true to your own values.

Resource Link: http://www.theharwoodinstitute.org/join/events/publiclab.html

National Charrette Institute (NCI)

The National Charrette Institute (NCI) is a nonprofit educational institution. We help people build community capacity for collaboration to create healthy community plans. We teach professionals and community leaders the art and science of Dynamic Planning, a holistic, collaborative planning process that harnesses the talents and energies of all interested parties to create and support a feasible plan. And we advance the fields of community planning and public involvement through research and publications.

Resource Link: http://www.charretteinstitute.org

Public Conversations Project - various workshops

The Public Conversations Project offers workshops to help participants experience and understand the values, principles and premises that guide their work and practices. These workshops invite practitioners to develop a 'reflective dialogic mindset' in which alignment is sought between belief, intention and action. Two of PCP's popular workshops are The Power of Dialogue and Inquiry as Intervention.

Resource Link: http://www.publicconversations.org