A Community Shaping Its Future

How do you bring a community together to honor its past, confront its present, and shape its future?

The pandemic changed how we connect. AI is reshaping how we work and learn. And the relentless pace of change is challenging the relevance of long-established professional communities. Perhaps it's time for these communities to pause, reflect, and reinvent themselves.

Today, Bob ’n Joyce explore that challenge as we design a highly participatory, one-day gathering intended to help a professional community reflect on its history and imagine what comes next.

Drawing on elements of Open Space Technology and Future Search Conferences, we explore a process that invites an entire community into the conversation. We begin by reflecting on 30 years of shared history, exploring the defining moments, experiences, and contributions that brought the community to where it is today.

Then comes the harder part: taking an honest look at where we are now and challenging ourselves to imagine what a vibrant, relevant professional community needs to become in a rapidly changing world.

The common denominator? Trusting the wisdom of the people in the room. Rather than relying on a handful of leaders to chart the future, we explore how to create the conditions for a community to discover and shape it together.

Join us as we consider how two time-tested OD approaches can help communities honor their legacy without becoming captive to it. Because in a world changing this rapidly, even communities devoted to change must be willing to reinvent themselves