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- The World Café GiGis (Girl Geeks) Project
The World Café GiGis (Girl Geeks) Project
Voting Summary (Elevator Pitch):
The GiGi’s project applies understanding of social networks, community development, and online technologies, to enable the World Café global network to become increasingly self-organizing, self-sustaining on behalf of life affirming futures.
Supporting organization:
The World Cafe Community Foundation
URL:
http://www.theworldcafe.com
City:
Mill Valley
State/Region:
California
Country:
United States
Project Vision Statement & Potential Social Impact:
Imagine starting a global movement from your living room based on a profound understanding of how conversations can change the world. That is the possibility being embodied by the global practictioners of The World Cafe, an innovative and exciting approach to hosting and convening "conversations that matter" on critical issues that can make a difference to our common future.
During the last ten years, a dynamic global network of leaders have been developing and using an innovative social technology called the World Café (www.theworldcafe.com) to foster positive systemic change at many levels of organizational life and society.
Since the publication of The World Café:Shaping our Futures Through Conversations that Matter (2005) , the World Café approach to multi-stakeholder engagement, constructive dialogue, collective intelligence and cooperative action is being used to address critical issues in thousands of groups in government, community, business, health, and educational institutions on six continents. The World Café is being used around critical questions like global warming, Israeli Palestinian relations, interfaith dialogues for peace, indigenous rights, intergenerational collaboration and youth leadership.
The World Café is now poised to join the Web 2.0 era in a powerful way, with a new website, on-line community tools, and blog “Conversation as a Co-Evolutionary Force” to engage this important insight much more broadly. It is the first step towards network activation on a broad scale to enable more people to use The World Cafe to amplify social impact.
An incredible intergenerational team of women technologists and community developers (the GiGis—Girl Geeks) has come together to nurture the World Café as a leading edge learning laboratory for the creation of hospitable space, beauty, on-line dialogue and network evolution, not only on behalf of the World Café but of other major initiatives, including key causes and projects of NetSquared members.
The GiGi’s project is using our best understanding of social networks and community development, supported by virtual technologies, to enable the World Café global network to become increasingly self-organizing, self-sustaining, and self-renewing on behalf of life affirming futures.
Sustainability (financial) model:
I, Juanita Brown and my partner, David Isaacs, co-founders of the World Café have been instrumental in guiding its growth and assuring the funding for its development during the first decade. Now in our 60’s we are “stepping to the rim” of the global community and encouraging new leaders to come forward as we and they continue to contribute in appropriate ways. Personal tithing has been a key source of support over the last decade.
We are now moving from a hub and spokes model to a network model, nurturing local resource development appropriate to each hub. There is a critical need for network infrastructure, activation and facilitation to support the whole.
The World Café Community Foundation, created in 2001 and granted 501c3 status in 2003, is now available as a legal entity through which monetary and in-kind contributions to support the World Café can be received, honored, and invested in ways that increase the capacity of the World Café network as a whole to effect positive change and societal impact.
Potential obstacles:
•Possible linguistic and cultural barriers working in a global network
•Limited internet access in parts of the world
•Connecting a face to face dialogue culture in an on-line way
• When there are face to face gatherings, concerns about disproportionate burden for travel costs for members with less financial resources
Resource Needs:
* Funds to support the development of regional hub leaders and technology stewards. This may include basic technology infrastructure (access costs, computer), to supporting their regional travel needs as they activate the network with both F2F and online activities
* Funds for documentation, translation and interpretation
* Continued infrastructure technology and process development.
* Small grant fund for local network activities, such as development of regional web hubs for the Latin America Pallomilla, Cafe Asia, World Cafe Europe etc. These are self determined regional hubs.
Key Milestones:
Key Milestones/Brief overview of 90 Day Project Plan
- Complete latest upgrades to the virtual network infrastructure
- Identify community technology stewards in each of the six regional network hubs and begin nurturing a community of practice for the tech stewards. This will begin the process of bridging between the F2F culture in an online supported network.
- Convene online the network leaders and stewards to identify network activation activities. Some initial prospects include a World Cafe on Global Warming, the role of visual recording and facilitation in stewarding conversations, and youth gatherings.
Project Summary:
Imagine starting a global movement from your living room based on a profound understanding of how conversations can change the world. That is the possibility being embodied by the global practictioners of The World Cafe, an innovative and exciting approach to hosting and convening "conversations that matter" on critical issues that can make a difference to our common future.
During the last ten years, a dynamic global network of leaders have been developing and using an innovative social technology called the World Café (www.theworldcafe.com) to foster positive systemic change at many levels of organizational life and society.
Since the publication of The World Café:Shaping our Futures Through Conversations that Matter (2005) , the World Café approach to multi-stakeholder engagement, constructive dialogue, collective intelligence and cooperative action is being used to address critical issues in thousands of groups in government, community, business, health, and educational institutions on six continents. The World Café is being used around critical questions like global warming, Israeli Palestinian relations, interfaith dialogues for peace, intergenerational collaboration, indigenous rights and youth leadership.
An incredible intergenerational team of women technologists and community developers (the GiGis—Girl Geeks) has come together to nurture the World Café as a leading edge learning laboratory for the creation of hospitable space, beauty, on-line dialogue and network evolution, not only on behalf of the World Café but of other major initiatives, including key causes and projects of NetSquared members.
The GiGi’s project uses our best understanding of social networks and community development, supported by virtual technologies, to enable the World Café global network to become increasingly self-organizing, self-sustaining, and self-renewing on behalf of life affirming futures.
