Step-by-Step Guide to Hosting a No Better Time Conference

Step 1

Identify and convene a small group of conference organizers who reflect the diversity in the local and campus communities and the diversity of the participants you hope to attract to the conference.

Step 2

Create a list of conference goals. For No Better Time, our aspirations might have been, in hindsight, a tad unrealistic. We wanted to attract a broad range of people doing work that might fall under the umbrella of deliberative democracy, including those doing intergroup dialogue, conflict resolution, issue-based deliberation, intercultural learning, collaborative governance, community organizing and advocacy, social and racial equity, and youth engagement. It might have been easier and more efficient to run an invitational conference, but we wanted to widen the circle of people doing this work and uncover new perspectives. We wanted attendees to consist of a close-to-even mix of academics and practitioners. We wanted to model best practices in deliberative democracy, which meant letting the participants set the agenda and decide what topics needed to be addressed. We wanted to generate outcomes that could be acted upon. And we needed to do all this cheaply and in just a few days. All of these objectives presented design challenges.

Tip: Create a glossary of terms. We didn’t, and it was a mistake. It’s essential that people understand what they are talking about – not necessarily that there is consensus on language, but simply some shared understanding of the scope.

Step 3

Send out a call for proposals, but keep it informal and simple. We posted announcements on various web sites, of course, but the real outreach was electronically word-of-mouth. We knew we’d done well when we heard from one person, “FYI, I have received your &%$^$# post-card six times. The word is OUT!” It helped that we created a post-card.

Tip: Consider using a “learning exchange” format. We defined learning exchanges as “truly democratic and interactive discussions, rather than traditional academic panels.” And we were rather undemocratic about our expectations, including our often-repeated mantra, “Learning exchange leaders don’t get to go first.” Click here to learn more about the Learning Exchange Leader Job Description. Click here for the Learning Exchange Leader FAQ.

It was pretty hard to make the learning exchange leaders adhere to the job description, and some did not (which we heard about in the post-conference survey). When it worked, it worked well enough to have been identified in the post-conference survey as the best feature of the conference.

Step 4

Select the topics and start creating the program. As topics came in, we posted them on the conference web site. That way, people could see if a topic was already “covered.”

Tip: We were intentional about who led sessions: most were organized by both practitioners and academics, and we were attentive to diversity in perspectives, social identity, position, and geography in session leaders, topics, and framings.

Tip: Try to persuade people to run only one session. It’s easier to schedule and it reinforces the message that we are all learners here, not just people who have something they want to make sure others know about.

Tip: Consider the progression of the dialogues. Both Matt and I are Everyday Democracy senior associates, and we were influenced by the progression generally followed in community-wide study circles. They generally follow a sequence that begins with personal considerations (“What does this topic mean to me?”) and moves to a consideration of broader perspectives (“What are the causes of the problem we are addressing?” or “What kind of future do we envision on this issue?”), and finally to action (“What can I do? What can we do?”). The dialogues are typically summarized in reports, and reports from the multiple dialogues are synthesized and then discussed in a larger, action forum. We encouraged learning exchange leaders to use the same kind of progression.

Tip: Let participants create the agenda. Anyone could propose a learning exchange, and we encouraged people to propose topics that interested them even if they knew nothing about it. We accepted vague suggestions. When we received more than one proposal on a related topic, we acted as matchmakers and requested that those who share an interest work together to design a session.

Tip: Try to involve people before the conference. We sent participants (and added to the web site) an FAQ to prepare them for a different kind of conference experience. We posted a similar FAQ on the web site. We invited participants to review the learning exchange descriptions and to volunteer to co-lead an already proposed session and to contribute advance reading materials.

Tip: Let the themes emerge based on what participants want to discuss. We identified the conference themes after we had a better idea of what would be in the program. The themes we ended up with were:

This isn’t to say that we didn’t frame the conference in advance. We had to do that, of course. But that framing shifted slightly as proposals started coming in, and we wanted to be responsive to participants’ interests.

Step 5

Map out your program. This took us more time than we ever imagined, because we needed to accommodate individual schedules (“I have to leave at noon on Friday…”) and people who were doing more than one learning exchange (against our advice). We also took into consideration themes and tracks, the sessions people were likely to want to attend, sessions that were not likely to draw the same people, “big draw” sessions, and more.

Tip: Compile conference materials that is easy to follow and that frames the issues and addresses logistics. Our conference packet included an introductory letter, conference framing questions, and ground rules (link to Ground Rules, attached), as well as a “program at a glance” and annotated program.

Tip: About plenary sessions. We had a lot to do in a short period of time. Our goals for the opening plenary were to build community, frame the issues, name some key themes that had emerged during the planning phase, and set a congenial yet focused tone. We designed something that was, we think, informative yet fun. Matt Leighninger created a much-loved home video using his children as actors as a way to define the work. David Campt used keypads to explore the demographics of attendees. Matt and I wrote and performed a skit that framed the issues while simultaneously revealing some of the dynamics between us as organizers.

Tip: Anticipate problems, one being that people would want to attend sessions that ran opposite each other or might be closed out of a session because of the room size/space constraints. We also knew that ideas would emerge at the conference, and that people would be torn between concurrent sessions. We set aside breakfast roundtables for new topics and for learning exchange leaders to meet with participants who had been unable to attend those sessions. Anyone could propose a breakfast roundtable, even at the last minute. People posted signs on their tables, and others wandered in and joined them.

Step 6

Establish ways to get feedback during the conference. To monitor and understand the themes and issues that emerged throughout this working conference, we solicited feedback and viewpoints from participants in a number of ways. Learning exchange leaders were asked to complete a worksheet and to turn them in by the close of each day. We invited participants to share ideas on index cards that we collected and analyzed. We conducted surveys in the opening and closing plenaries. Few people took advantage of these opportunities, which is fine. It’s just important that they be there so you can address problems, fill gaps, and meet expectations.

Step 7

Plan the closing plenary. In our case, we wanted it to be an action forum. And we’d asked learning exchange leaders to fill out forms and email them to us the night before the plenary. Our plan was to identify the common themes and let tables discuss and report out on each. Because we had so few forms to synthesize for discussion, this plan didn’t work out so well. Our final plenary was a little messy, and we regret that. We were able to identify some significant themes that we thought had emerged, and to create some key-pad surveys for an interactive session

Step 8

Survey participants. We were thrilled with a nearly 60% response rate, and we learned a lot from the responses. These, along with the learning exchange worksheets (which were all, eventually, turned in) served as the basis for the report [link to report]. Here’s the survey.

If you want to run this on a local level, you’ll have to be realistic about how much time people will be able to dedicate to it, and three days is not realistic. You might want to consider sponsoring community-wide dialogues that take place over a number of weeks. Or an abbreviated version, with only one slot on the program for concurrent learning exchanges.