Staff are often called together to discuss organization planning for the future such as strategic plans or setting goals for the coming year. A common way this is often approached is by an administrator setting out general topics followed by some general discussion. The staff then fill out index cards or online forms or put sticky notes on poster paper hung around the room. These notes then get taken away and compiled or tallied by some smaller group or an individual. Then, they are brought back to a subsequent meeting to be voted on.

A much more productive approach would be to use CL techniques such as Gallery Tour, Circle of Speakers, or Exchange-A-Question. In this way the groups can thoroughly process and evaluate ideas by bouncing thoughts off one another and refining them before sharing them with a larger group or the whole staff. Subsequently, when the ideas are compiled and brought back, it’s not just a random list of scattered thoughts. The participants appreciate seeing the results of their work with their colleagues, and once those ideas are finalized into a plan, the level of buy-in and enthusiasm for the implementation will be qualitatively greater. This is especially powerful when the staff may not all know each other well due to working in different locations or departments or do not normally work together.