Strengthening Individual and Group Capacities for Collaboration and Consensus

People often ask me about the name of my business. What does the Circle mean?

Throughout history the powerful symbol of the circle has carried the concept of wholeness, focus, harmony and the bringing together of people. It occurs often in nature and in Native American culture. A circle focuses and encompasses. These are concepts that I hold in my work. I help a group focus its vision, its people and its action. I value the inclusive participation and profound respect of each person and their contributions. We consider the whole system and bring people and ideas together in consensus. The methods draw out the spirit of individuals and a group in a way that leads toward healing and wholeness in working relationships.

I live on the eastern side of the beautiful Sierra Nevada Mountains and spectacular Lake Tahoe. So the name, Sierra Circle Consulting, is quite meaningful for me.

Another question I am often asked is “How did you get into this work? How did you learn to do this? “

Years ago I sat through lots of boring, tedious, meetings - faculty meetings at school  (years ago I was a pre-school and elementary school teacher),  committee meetings at church, and task force meetings at work. A waste of my time! They were terrible! Surely there had to be a better way, but I didn’t know what to do. Robert’s Rules of Order seemed so cumbersome, stilted, formal and old fashioned. Banging on the table with a gavel seemed more appropriate for the courtroom than a meeting.

One summer I attended a program  for teachers at the Institute of Cultural Affairs (ICA) in Chicago, and observed the work with the Fifth City Community Development Program. Those meetings were different. Everyone was engaged in talking and planning together in a lively and respectful way. I observed some sessions with youth groups - gangs actually - tough guys talking seriously about issues in their lives and their neighborhood. Amazing!

I learned the ICA’s methods for practical, responsible group participation. I began using them in my classrooms. They worked with my fifth graders and pre-schoolers; they also improved faculty meetings and parent conferences. I was hooked! I went back to the Institute as an intern and later joined the staff. I discovered my passion for participatory processes and whole system change as well as a love of travel. I’ve had ample opportunity to do both.

Outside the US, I have lived and worked in Osaka, Hong Kong, Rome, and Jakarta. From them I traveled to many other cities, rural towns and third world villages. My work took me to China, Malaysia, Thailand, Australia, India, Belgium, Scotland and Venezuela and around the USA. I helped re-package a community-based consulting program into a signature consulting program for organizations, Leadership Effectiveness and New Strategies (LENS). I often facilitated this unique strategic planning process with education, industry, business, community, government, and non-profit groups - many of which were multi-cultural. The participatory methods worked successfully in all these different situations and cultures. LENS was later adapted as the basis of the ToP® Participatory Strategic Planning process.

I am a founding member of the International Association of Facilitators (IAF) and the ToP® Trainers Network. The former is a professional organization for people who use group facilitation in their work. The latter is a community of practice.

I continue to do this work because I know that so many of our issues today could be creatively resolved with collaborative effort and consensus decision-making around our complex critical issues. This is my way of addressing some of the world’s problems, one meeting at a time. My passion is to strengthen individual and groups capacity for collaboration, authentic dialogue and consensus decision-making to participate in the creation of our future and a more human world. It’s exciting to see the energy of a group released with just a few simple ways to create a meeting environment that supports inclusive participation and profound respect, teamwork, creativity, action and reflection. I find my energy and spirit released in the doing of them.

An example of a current project is helping develop a corps of facilitators in New Orleans (my hometown).They facilitate meetings that give local people a voice in rebuilding their neighborhood and developing the resilience to create a viable future for the city. Another is strengthening the teamwork of a group that has experienced burn-out and grief.

Education & Professional Development

• Following graduation with a BA from Hendrix College, I pursued Masters Degrees in Education from SMU and Oklahoma City University
• Certification from the American Montessori Association
• The Global Academy of the Institute of Cultural Affairs
• Training in Future Search Conferences, Open Space Technology, and Appreciative Inquiry
• Coachville’s Certified Coach Intensive Training
• Accelerated Learning Course Design Training
• Disaster and Crisis Intervention Training: Facilitating Psycho-Social Reconstruction. Global Faciltators Service Corp Training

Professional Affiliations and Achievements

• International Assocition of Facilitators, Founding Member
• ToP Trainers’ Network, Founding member and Mentor Trainer
• Nevada Arts Council, Circuit Rider Consultant to Nevada arts and culture organizations
• ASTD, Northern Nevada, Past President & Board member
• Bay Area Organizational Development Network, Past Board member, Co-Editor of Vision/Action Journal
• Chambers of Commerce: San Francisco, member and Committee Chair, Reno-Sparks, member
• Hong Kong Association of Business and Professional Women, Executive Committee, 1997
• Hong Kong Institute of Human Resource Management  
• Who’s Who of American Women, 1981/82
• ICA Champion, 2003.

Publications and Presentations

“The Story of Hai Ou, A Chinese Village in Transition”. ICA Development Project Publication, Chicago, Illinois, 1980

“From Village to Boardroom: Planning That Empowers”, article in the Vision/Action Journal, Bay Area Organizational Development Network, San Francisco, CA., 1992

“Rural International Development”, Chapter 25 in Discovering Common Ground. Marvin Weisbord, Editor. Berret-Koehler Publishers, San Francisco, CA., 1993

“Transforming a Defense Research Organization”, Chapter 5 in Participation Works. James Troxel, editor. Miles River Press, Alexandria, VA., 1993

Book Review of “The Dance of Change”, by Peter Senge. In Group Facilitation: A Research and Applications Journal of the IAF. Number 3, Spring 2001

“The Architecture of Participation”, Chapter 5 in The IAF Handbook of Group Facilitation. Sandor Schuman, editor. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA., 2001 

Articles on Facilitation and Training for Sierra Wings, ASTD Sierra Nevada Newsletter. Some of these articles can be found at my Free Stuff page.

Guest Lectures on the Technology of Participation at the California Institute of Integral Studies, UC Berkeley, JFK University, California School of Professional Psychology, Sonoma State College, Morrison University and the Hong Kong Institute of HR Management. I’ve taught Continuing Education classes at the University of Nevada, Reno.

Presentations on particpatory meetings and methods for ASTD, BAODN, ODN, AQP, and IAF conferences

Curriculum Co-Development and Editing: “The Global Language School.” “MindMining: Harnessing the Creative Power of Committees, Teams and Meetings.” ” Facilitating for Results.”  ”Designing and Leading Workshops.” “Seminars for Effective Mission.” “Leadership Effectiveness and New Strategies, the Facilitators Manual.” “ToP® Group Facilitation Methods, the Participant’s Manual.” “Town Meetings for Youth, Workbook.” “Vision/Action” Journal of the Bay Area OD Network.