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The Technology of Participation
(ToP) is an interrelated series of techniques for working with groups, formulated
and refined over years of experience with many kinds of people in many environments,
from an air-conditioned boardroom to the shade of a banyan tree. Thousands have been
trained in ToP methods and use them every day.
John Burbidge wrote about ToP in the fall 1993 issue of New Designs. According
to Burbidge, the ToP methods are clear and simple; tap the group's wisdom and experience
at a profound level; are both poetic and pragmatic; produce tangible results in highly
useful forms; provide a conduit for broad-based community input; and are easily applicable
and transferable. Through the use of ToP methods, he wrote, "They made decision-making
processes inclusive rather than exclusive. They looked for experts from within, rather
than from without. They honored everyone's input and wove it into a common fabric.
Work became fun and creativity became commitment."
Some of the techniques that ToP uses, combining them in various ways as needed, are
the Workshop Method, the Focused Conversation Method, event planning and orchestration,
and the Strategic Planning process. Following are brief summaries of each method.
The Workshop Method sets up a way for a group to work together to make a decision,
solve a problem, or come up with a plan of action. It makes use of these five steps:
- Set the context.
- Brainstorm data and ideas.
- Organize the data into patterns.
- Name the key insight of each
cluster of data.
- Evaluate the work and discuss
its implications.
Workshop facilitators accept all
responses as food for the group's creative process. They listen to what's being said
for the unspoken concerns that may lie underneath, trying to leave their own assumptions
outside the room.
The ToP Focused Conversation Method helps a group to reflect together on a shared
experience or event and decide on a collective response. The nature and sequence
of the questions asked are carefully planned, progressing from objective (getting
the facts) to reflective (emotions, feelings, associations) to interpretative (values,
meaning, purpose) to decisional (future resolves).
A third method is a guideline for orchestrating events. The five elements that should
be thought out when in planning an event are: Space (audiovisuals, theme-setting
decor, location, seating arrangements), Time (pace, agenda, format), Eventfulness
(change of pace, humor, music, celebration, awards), Product (charts, documents,
proposals), and Style (honoring everyone, balance, preparation, body language, keeping
on track)--otherwise known as STEPS.
The ToP Strategic Planning process progresses this way:
- Map out the group's practical
vision of the future.
- Analyze the underlying contradictions
preventing that vision from being realized.
- Set the strategic directions
to deal with the contradictions.
- Decide specific actions to be
accomplished.
- Draw up an implementation timeline--the
who-what-when-where-how.
The book Winning Through Participation,
by Laura Spencer, presents the ICA approach in some detail. Although many of her
insights are drawn from ICA's work in the private sector, they can apply to work
in CYD as well.
Burbidge begins his article with a conversation with a man named Sudashiv Bhosale,
who says, "In our village, we always started from the top and ignored the bottom.
A few people made all the decisions. ICA taught us to start from the bottom and go
to the top. They showed us how to think things through, to anticipate obstacles and
to work from there to reach our goals." If it works in a remote village in India,
it can work here too.
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