Full transcript between Ted Rau and our Authors on Climate Words host and Climate Books coordinator, Rebecca Gerny. This conversation was recorded on December 9, 2024.

Rebecca Gerny: Hello and welcome to Authors on Climate Words. I'm joined today by facilitator, speaker, writer and organizer, Ted Rau. He is the co-founder of Sociocracy for All and the governance lead at Dark Matter Labs and is an expert in collaborative organizing and decision-making that prioritizes inclusivity and the collective over the individual. He is also the author of Many Voices, One Song, Who Decides, Who Decides, and Collective Power, which we will be discussing today.Thanks so much for joining me, Ted.

Ted Rau: Thank you so much for having me.

Rebecca: So first, I'd just like to invite you to introduce yourself in your own words and share anything I might have missed in that brief introduction.

Ted: Sure, so first thing I'd like to say is my accent is German. I was born and raised in Germany and actually finished school then, came to the U.S. in 2010 because of my work in my previous career, which was linguistics, which actually shows in my work still. Although I then got introduced to governance and more collective ways of being together and governing in a cohousing community that I moved into with my kids. So that's how I found my entry into this work.

Back then in particular, also one of the reasons I was looking at intentional communities was because I was just feeling this deep longing for more collective ways of being. And that's still really the track I'm on. That's really still what I'm doing. And that's clearly the draw to what brings me here. Then wanting to do that well, right? Because there are better ways and not so ideal ways of being and working it again.

Rebecca: Yeah, your background in linguistics is also really interesting because obviously at Climate Words are really focused on words. And so I think really parsing out how words play into how we create communities and how we facilitate decision making is really interesting.

I was first introduced to Sociocracy through Climate Words, actually, because that's how we model and we really use a lot of your sociocratic practices to organize ourselves.

I think just to start us off, can you talk about your journey with the phrase sociocracy, maybe define it for our listeners? And when did you feel the need for this word or realize that this word and this tool would be really helpful in that kind of community creation or organizational development?

Ted: So first about the word, and it's not everybody's favorite, sociocracy. And the idea is that “socios” are the ones that we associate with, and then “-cracy” governance, right? And actually the word as well as the system that we call sociocracy now, and the sociocratic circle method was put together in the late 1970s by Gerard Endenburg, an engineer in the Netherlands. And so the system as is, I stand on the shoulders of a lot of people that both put together and then spread the system.

The idea is if we contrast it with democracy, right? Democracy means, “demos” means the masses, govern. And the way we do that is by voting, typically, right? What we lose in voting is kind of the nuances and understanding if somebody votes no, why are they voting no, for example, and all of that.

The idea of sociocracy is to bring the decision-making closer to the doing. So another good contrast, I like going with the contrast because that's what we all know, right? In a hierarchical situation, the idea is that somebody decides and then other people do, right? Like the boss or the manager makes the decisions and then they tell you what to do and then you just do it. And all the typical problems that come up with that, right, is that managers don't actually know how the work is done and all of that. So the idea of sociocracy is that those who do stuff actually decide and that we reorganize organizations so that can happen.

Maybe I should, should I give kind of the broad concept of sociocracy while I'm here because that fits right in?

Rebecca: Yeah, great.

Ted: Then sociocracy does two things. One is it does that reorganization so that those who are doing things also make the decisions. What that means is that there's a lot of teams that we call circles that hold decision-making power and those are made up of the people who actually also do the work. So a very simple example. Those who do the things on the website, like who manage the website, make decisions about the website. People who do certain things that say you're a publisher, they do stuff and then they also make the decision about the publishing and so on and so on. If you have a garden circle, they are the people who are the main drivers of the garden, they make the decisions about the garden. It sounds so obvious, but this is not how our world typically functions, right? It's easy to forget that because it's so common sense and logical that sometimes I have to remind myself that not everybody runs this way.

So that's distributed decision-making. So now we have a situation where an organization, a lot of decisions are made in all kinds of places. And that's really cool because now we're also more resilient because, for example, back when COVID hit in my organization, I don't remember there being one meeting about it, about what do we do now, because all the different places just made their own adjustments, like in many, many different places, many different decisions. It just kind of happened magically. And I know from other organizations that told me the same thing.

The other piece that sociocracy offers is a way of decision-making and its consent decision-making, which simply means decision moves forward if there's no objection and an objection would mean to say, “Hey, this doesn't work for our organization.” So you can't just walk in and say, I don't like it because I'm having a bad day today. You would actually have to say, well, here's how that doesn't work. The proposal that you're bringing actually conflicts with what we've said previously we would do and therefore this is not a way forward. And then we rework it until it's better. And those two intersect. So how we decide and who decides what, intersect. So for example, it's a good idea to not give everybody consent rights on everything because otherwise you have the situation that people walk in and they were not part of previous discussions, they just walk in and lead with an opinion. So we have the decision makers really be the circles that do the work that are in an ongoing context with each other and then they can hold it.

And then the one last thing about sociocracy is that it connects, it has a way of connecting those circles and the roles and all of that with each other so that we know what is held where and there's a clear sense of that. But that's, we don't even need that level of detail here right now.

Rebecca: Yeah, I think it's really interesting. I like how you started with those comparisons or the opposites. And I'm curious, what kind of brought sociocracy out for you? Like you said, it does feel pretty instinctual or like it makes a lot of sense. But obviously in our contemporary world, it's not how we commonly organize. And there's a lot of different power structures that tell us to organize differently or that organizing is supposed to be in one way. So I'm curious, how did this kind of come up for you in your life and what caused you to lean into that and promote that as an alternative to what we have currently?

Ted: Yeah, for me, actually in my journey, it was meetings that were so different. Just the way meetings felt was just so different. And it's actually a true story that I always refer to. So at the end of a meeting that I was a part of here in my community, we were asked for our reflections on what this meeting was like. And I said, wow, I'm leaving this meeting more refreshed and more connected than when I came and I thought to myself, “wait, what?” That's not how meetings are typically like. Typically, you're like, oh God, I'm so glad this is done, right? And it's like, no, I feel refreshed. I feel good. I want to spend more time with these people. I'm excited about what we're doing. I love the time that we spend together. Like, “wait, wow, what just happened?”

And one of the ways that Sociocratic meetings are different, which you, Rebecca, know, is rounds, it changes everything for me, it changes everything. And this is like old, old, like thousands of year old circle practice of you speaking one by one, by one, by one. And that means people actually listen to each other. So it's not this race of kind of getting a word in or you say something, somebody else shoots it down, but you bring what you have to offer and you all together look at it. Like it changes the pace. It changes the vibe. It's just so satisfying by contrast. So that was what really drew me in because as I said, I was looking for more collective ways of being and more connection and belonging in my life. And that really hit the spot for me of just spending time like that.

Rebecca: And you've mentioned a few of these different words that I think really help especially facilitate meetings in sociocracy and I'm wondering if we could just spend a little time clarifying them for our listeners. You've mentioned the circles and rounds, as well as consent-based decision-making. So maybe if we back up and talk about facilitation for a moment and how one facilitates a meeting and what that looks like in order to enable that space that you're talking about? What does a meeting look like?

Ted: Yes. Let me actually back up one other step which is, why do we have meetings? Because typically people just have meetings because that's what you do, right? And I noticed we actually have to start there. Why do we have meetings? The idea, often in especially hierarchical situations, is that we have meetings to control what everybody's doing, right? Everybody has to report on all of that. But in a self-managed organization, that's not the point of the meeting because we assume people are where they want to be and do things that they see the purpose of, that's why they do them. So that's not the need for a meeting. The need for meeting now becomes to align the things that we're doing. So that if I'm doing a thing and you're doing a thing, we have a space where we can say, “wait, is there any way in which we could have more synergy?” Or we notice, “oops, when I do this and you do that, it actually somehow has some negative effect. How about we align that better?” So basically leading up to a meeting, what we do is we notice in our daily work, or whatever, weekly, it doesn't matter. In our ongoing work, we notice where there are things where we have coordination failures. And then those become agenda items. So a typical agenda item would be, “I do this and Rebecca does that. And somehow we drop the ball between us. How, what can we do about that?” And of course, one would always go to that person first, but often there are things that we as a collective need to hold, right?

So, there could be different reasons to talk. So for example, it could be that our collaboration would work better if I told you more about how I do things. And then it's a report. Or we could work better together if we actually had an open discussion about something. We call that an exploration. Or we could work together better if we made an agreement with each other on how we go about something in general. That's what we would call a policy decision. So all of these different needs or reasons to talk, like reports, explorations, and decisions, become our agenda.

And now, if we come to the meeting, the first thing that would happen is that we do an opening round or a check-in. Many people know that by now it actually has come up in more and more in non-systocratic places now, but it's the basic idea of just basically sharing how you are, like that moment of human decency of like, wow, we just entered a space together. How are you?

And to me, it's also even more than just normal decency, it is also providing an opportunity for people to take some responsibility for how they show up in a space. Like for example, if I'm super tired or I'm super distracted because my kids haven't left for school yet or whatever, it's good for me to say that, right? Because if I look distracted, people will then go, “ah yeah, right, Ted shared that this and that is happening. We're good, right?” So we set that context with each other so that we have a better way of understanding each other and supporting each other. So that's check-in, there's a lot of good things to say about that.

Then the next thing that would happen is just basic housekeeping, like who has to leave early, all these things, who's typing today, all of that, the next meeting. And then a really interesting moment that I think is pretty unique in sociocracy, and I'm a huge fan of that, is the making an agreement by consent of what the agenda will be. So it's not just that somebody prepared the agenda, that too, ideally. Or we whip it together in the moment, but we agree to it by consent. So only if everybody in the group says, yes, I'm willing to spend my time like this with this agenda, we would have the meeting. And that's important because so many times there are groups where we talk about something and really it's not relevant to everybody or somebody hijacks the meeting for the thing that they have going, but it's such valuable time, right? It's one of those principles that I'm not really willing to compromise on. Like we consent to the agenda and then of course we can change it, by consent. Like if we notice we want to talk longer about something, sure, it's not about being rigid, it's about being intentional.

Then we talk about our different items. Then we ask, typically real quick, is there anything else for future agenda while we're thinking about it? And then we evaluate the meeting where then we can hear what didn't work because everything ideally should always be on an upward trajectory, improving over time, including our meetings and how we have meetings.

So all of those different pieces on their own do something, but in cohesion, together, it creates a culture where people listen to each other, where things get done and where there's a basic human connection and respect for each other's work.

Rebecca: Yeah, I've really appreciated it, even in non-sociocratic settings, like just taking some little tips, like I manage a group of interns and I feel like, and I wonder what you think about this, and in your book, you've written a bit about it as well. It also allows people to take more agency over their decisions when they know that their decisions are being heard and that they're being listened to. And especially with my interns who don't really know, they don't have particular responsibilities at our organization or whatever, but they feel now that, “okay, I'm being listened to, I'm a part of this team”, rather than, “oh, I'm just doing this job for this organization and here are my tasks.”

So I'm wondering if you have any reflections on what that kind of facilitation really creates in the space or creates for the team dynamic and the organization as a whole.

Ted: Yeah, I mean, I just completely agree with you that it's that shared core responsibility that, for me, makes the difference. So it's actually a totally new thing for some people. Not only do they get to say something, but also we ask for their objections or their consent, which is the same thing. Because for many people, it's like a whole new concept that they could say no. But then they ask themselves, “wait, do I say yes or no to this? Right? Like, wait.” So it's this whole thing of often people want more power or more voice, participation, call it whatever. And then they wake up to the fact that it comes with responsibility. And that's so interesting to see all the time. It's like, “oh, I get to say no. dang, now I have to decide whether I'm a yes or a no.” And I really think about it all of a sudden, because that's a whole different level of playing, being co-responsible.But it's exciting. It's exciting. It's a little scary. It's stimulating for sure. It stirs up a lot of stuff for people. But any decision that is made in this way will of course be, we'll have much more buy-in to it. That just comes with it automatically.

So it might be, I'm not even sure that's always the case, but it might be that it might take a little longer to come to a consent decision, but it's absolutely worth it, I think. Because then we don't have to run after people because it's already clear that that's what we're going to do.

Ted: Yeah. And in your book, you talk a lot about, and you have so many examples of different times, because you work with organizations to implement sociocracy. And I'm curious, obviously in the context we're talking about, it's kind of like self-organized communities or smaller nonprofits. And I'm wondering if you can share a little bit about what it looks like to implement sociocracy at an organization, what makes it easy, what are some challenges and where are the places where there's a little grinding, like it's not as easy for people, where there's some pushback. Where, you know, activists all come together and are like, “yes, I'd love to hear what you have to say.” Versus your boss.

Rebecca: So let's go over the steps first, because this is something that people miss quite often. So I'm not sure this is super accurate, but it's a way in to say that, in a way, there's a hard way and a soft way into Sociocracy. The soft way is all the things that you can just go do in your next meeting. Like it sounds like you do with interns and so on, like introducing a check-in and doing rounds and all of that. That's great. And it's only the beginning, right?

Because what is really the most fundamental thing about sociocracy is the fact that we share power. So now decision-making is in all those different places and we even decide together who decides what, basically. So now there is no central control anymore because everything is kind of handed over into the decentralized system. And so that shifting of power is the hardware shift basically. And that's not so easy to inch your way into. That's a little bit of a like, no, eventually you have to jump in and swim.

So I would say that sociocracy implementation typically has two steps. There's kind of the warming up and the acculturating where people learn about facilitation and they start making their agendas, they do rounds, they consent to the agenda, they do meeting evaluations, all of that. But then eventually there has to be a moment where those who have the power currently in the organization come together and say, yes, we are now hereby transitioning into a shared power system. And that often requires a little bit of, always requires intentionality, because it is a significant shift. It's a little bit like the difference between talking about the wiring in a car or the plumbing or whatever and then actually changing how it's plugged together. So you have to do the replugging and there has to be a distinct moment where you say, this is now where the power sits.

So implementation, for example, if we help or if organizations implement themselves, is often that people learn and poke around and try things out and so on. But then there has to be the moment where you officially ask, do we hereby implement the system and where's power now? And that often comes kind of with the rule set of what we would call a governance agreement or a constitution that spells out how it's done from then on.

So what's easy and what are the challenges about it? There's so many different ones. So what's easy is, it's not rocket science, this has been done, right? So there's a lot of material that we put out with Sociocracy for All about how to do this and templates and whatnot. What's really challenging is, first of all, in many activist organizations, for example, is that it's not so clear where the power is sitting currently. And then you can have the situation where people, where there is nobody there to say, yes, this is our new system, because everybody looks at each other and nobody knows who decides, therefore we can't decide how we decide now. I've spent so much time with that issue, so much time. It's really disheartening and maddening a little. I think I'm quoting that in Collective Power, right? There was a group that told me, we all agree that we want to bring you in and implement sociocracy, but we don't know how to make the decision. These things happen all the time and these groups typically…

Rebecca: You need sociocracy, to make the decision to move to sociocracy.

Ted: Yes, and here's a comparison that actually works. I think it's very solid, that comparison. It's a little bit like not having a language in which to talk about what language we should have a conversation in. It's just exactly like that, as fundamental. And I think people don't understand that because why would we?

We learn about how government works in school, but we don't learn about how governance and organizations work. So we really, we simply don't know. And then people think like, oh, this is just another way of doing things. No, it's actually as fundamental as speaking a language for an organization. And I think people underestimate that. And then they get whipped with like the full everything of, because it's not only that it's a systemic change, then there's all the cultural stuff. Then there's all the personal egos, like you can ease it, like it's really playing with fire.

So, yeah, so the biggest issue is if there's currently no system or if people mistrust the system, right? You can also have a system in place, but people mistrust it. So even if the old leadership, so to speak, with best intention, implement social advocacy, because it came from them, people are going to hate it. And then you're also checkmated again. So there's a lot of ways in which this can go wrong. And that's not the fault of sociocracy. That's just the fault of governance being something that we don't have a lot of experience with as a species.

Yeah, if there is pushback, it's often, there's different levels of pushback. Some is around “oh, this sounds too good to be true,” which is kind of funny because that's often what makes it hard. No, if you just let us do it, then it actually will work.

Rebecca: It will work.

Ted: It will work! Just believe that it works and then it will work because it's one of those things, right, where you basically, it's, you are stepping into a shared story, right? As long as you all believe and act accordingly, it works. But if somebody constantly undermines it, no, then it doesn't work. It's like inventing a currency. If you tell each other that it's not going to work, of course it's not going to work. Anyway, so-

Rebecca: Everyone has to believe and participate. And every single individual matters in the collective.

Ted: Yes. I mean, if you can have some critical mass, if there are one or two people that sometimes poo poo a little, like as long as there are enough people that say, no, this is what we decided, this is why it's important and this is how it's done, then you can hold it up. But if there's too much resistance, it will slide back and it will slide back into chaos and informal hierarchies. I see that all the time.

Yeah, so the pushback and then another important piece, I think, especially for who I expect is going to listen to this is if there's sometimes the pushback of, “oh, this is so formal.”

Rebecca: I've even felt that when learning it. Like there's a lot of systems and processes.

Ted: And, you know, part of me, part of me agrees. And that's actually a struggle that I've felt in writing Collective Power, which is talking a lot about these things, is that there was always this voice in me, like, “gee, there must be an easier way of doing this.” Because if you take Collective Power seriously, it's a lot of different things. Like, how do you actually really make decisions together? It's a lot of different things. And I think we can buffer some of it with just trust and say like, oh, “you know, we're not going to need a decision on this, we just trust each other,” but it will never fully replace it. So I think the better you understand each other without talking, the easier it will be, but that should not be like in-lieu of a governance system. So if you have a proper governance system, but most of the time we kind of understand each other, implicitly, but then we have something to fall back on.

Very much like, let's say conflict resolution, right? Where ideally you have a conflict resolution system that you don't use because you always figure out how to do it without it. That's the idea. So that you need the governance to move you along and have all the rituals around, and have to have meetings and so on, but you don't need to ever really go back to your constitution and say like, “okay, you know, like, how do we do this?” Because ideally, you already have all the human systems in place.

Rebecca: But it's a system to fall back into when you have conflict or when you need to make a decision that is not straightforward, or you don't have built up trust, or you don't know who is responsible for that. I think that's what's helped me in kind of sticking to the really kind of formal processes is it serves a purpose and a need in that way. And I think maybe the pushback, at least personally, is because we're used to these systems where we don't have any responsibility and so we don't have to do the work of making those decisions. And so then when it is put in our camp, we're like, “oh, this is actual work that we hold now together?” And it's a little weird, but it's actually, like I started saying, once you hold that decision, it's more empowering. And I think the word that really that brings up for me is that power with, rather than just, “okay, I'll let my boss make all those decisions and I can be carefree about it.” Instead, we're all holding that power together and we do have some responsibility to do the work and not just kind of skirt through deferring to someone else.

Ted: Right. And there's another piece I want to bring in that fits well to that, what you just said. And that is that it's also really easy to say, “Oh, this is so much process. Why don't we just dot dot dot if you just do things the way you want to do them.” Okay. That's nice. But how do you really do things together? Right. Without the assumption that everybody wants to run the way you run it. Like how many times am I in a meeting where somebody says like, “Oh, we don't have to talk about that, and like, says who? That seems very clear in your mind, but have you asked the others? So a lot of the formality, like for example, in rounds, and that's not, I mean, it's formality in that it follows kind of a system, not that it's strictly restrictive. Rounds are in a way life insurance to not just assume that you have it all figured out and everybody else should just get back together and do whatever you think is right.

I mean, the world is really easy if you take it…

Rebecca: If I was the dictator of the universe.

Ted: Yeah. Obvious, obvious. Just do the way I think.

Rebecca: Everything would be perfect.

Ted: Exactly. So there's a certain bias that people bring, right? That speaks through the, “oh, why do I need all this formality?” Well, because you're not the center of the universe. That's one reason. And that's not something people want to hear because in their head it all sounds easy.

Rebecca: I want to go back to the example you brought about language because I think obviously we think about language so much and it is, in a similar way, it's the way in which we see the world and organize ourselves. And if we don't have the words to describe something, it's difficult to make action or get together around it. And I'm wondering what has been the role of words and language in sociocracy and in organizing systems? What do you kind of see as the role of language in these spaces or in this work?

Ted: Yeah, this is actually something I'm thinking about a lot these days again, because there's so much to say about who gets to say what. And I don't even mean decisions. I mean, just making an assertion about something comes with power, right?

Rebecca: We have so many platforms from which to speak as well.

Ted: Yeah, so who gets to say this is not worth doing, for example, about something, whatever it is, who gets to say? So in a way, the way I understand that interface between governance and language now is that language comes with a lot of choices, right? Categorizations, the way we label things and all of that, the way we make statements. But it also comes with the power to make those statements, to assert something in the world. And in a way, governance is the way to distribute the power to make assertions or other acts about the world. So there's a very close connection that is really growing on me over time.

The other piece is actually maybe between the lines, right? It's the connection between the people and the affection and the coherence that people feel with each other that maybe is not so easy to express in words in the first place, or it's more in between the lines and kind of choice of words and body language and all of that. So there's so much more. So I'm thinking actually in the work that I'm doing right now more about all the different ways in which language as in just the words in the sentences might not even, we might be missing a whole other piece. And governance systems that are just purely built on words and take out that human connection piece might also be going astray a little.

Rebecca Yeah, that makes me think one of my questions for you is like, what are the ways in which Sociocracy doesn't solve all the problems? And it's similar too, for us, obviously, what ways do words not solve or what ways to language as language miss. I think obviously organizing and how we organize is really key to enacting our goals as a community. But I’m curious if there's any learnings you had, like where it falls short or what it needs in order to enact those goals that we are collectively aiming for.

Ted: Well, the two things that are kind of jumping to my mind first, one is, Sociocracy is only a governance system. It doesn't claim to be more. So it does not do systemic oppression in the world. It does not undo trauma, all these things. Like it doesn't claim to do so. So it is just a government system. Other work still has to be done. Anti-oppression work still has to be done. It's just basically starting from a power-with place to take it from there in terms of governance, that's all it's trying to do. And so we see Sociocracy as interconnected and interdependent with all the other practices that are happening that are necessary.

The other piece is, in addition to what I've said about that already, there has to be enough coherence and shared trajectory between people already. Like if you imagine, here's a good comparison. Imagine, imagine two friends, okay. Let's say in how they want to be friends, like in all of their interactions, they had to use words for everything. That would be insane, right? That would be absolutely insane. So many times you just have to read somebody's expression. You give them a quick hug. All of those little things make the glue between people. Right? So same in organizations. It's exactly the same thing. If you had to spell out every piece of behavior, desired or not desired, if you have to spell it out individually, that would be insane. I don't want a policy on everything. I'm not even a big fan of agreements about how to show up on all of that, because it's like, where do you begin and end? Like, it's just so many things, right?

So I'd rather build the culture and the skills and the connection and the coherence between people so that it is just so obvious that we only talk about it if there is something that is really in the way. Instead of having to now make an agreement on how do I sit in my chair? I mean, it can get really, really crazy. So that's the piece that Sociocracy does not address, doesn't claim to address even, and that I think one has to strengthen so that then you can stand with both feet, right? One is to have all the ineffable things, all the connection, love and affection and mind reading, almost, between people, and then you have the governance to move the things forward that need more explicit and verbal cues.

Rebecca: Yeah, and that makes me think about how we build that other like ineffable community or shared worldview. And I know you've done a lot of work in nonviolent communication. And I think that that's a piece of this. And I'm wondering if you could maybe just share a little bit about that and how that type of communication or how we talk to each other really plays into creating these community dynamics.

Ted: Oh yeah. So in a way, you know, like here's how I would put non-violent communication together with Sociocracy, for example, with governance in general. I'm going to play it a little bit, like play a little bit of an edgy game saying like, let's look at governance just as the need of sociocracy. Okay. Sociocracy wants you basically to be really quick and efficient and be able to surface information to make decisions about things so that you can govern your work.

What we need for that is we need people able to identify what's going on for them very quickly so they can tell us so that then we can act accordingly. So let's say something in a meeting didn't work for you. What's really good from a sociocratic point of view is if you can deliver us that information as exactly as possible. Which means, and that's when nonviolent communication comes in, ideally it's a good description of what's going on for you. Like, “hey, when you talked for that amount of time I was really impatient and it didn't meet my need for partnership.” Okay. And so if you can tell me that I go like, “Oh, I get it. Thank you.” You translated it into something that is very easily accessible and also took out all the blame. So therefore you just give me access to the nugget and that really helps. So in a way, what I'm looking for is all those practices that give us quick access to actually quite rich information, right? So that we can hold it between and among us and that can help us navigate together, either via governance or just via whatever else.

So all of the systems that do that, like appreciative inquiry and TheoryU and dragon dreaming, constellation work. All of those pieces, I think, add something to the mix that then helps the whole to operate better.

Rebecca: Yeah. And just cause I'm not sure that everyone who's listening might know what non-violent communication is, can you give us a little background or intro?

Ted: So it's something that's been around for a few decades. I would describe it, this is me describing it, as a way to build emotional literacy, so being able to name your feelings, feeling your feelings, and naming your feelings.

And then the idea is that we have feelings because they point to something deeper, which there's called a need. So, in my example that I used earlier, somebody might be feeling impatient because they have a need for inclusion. So, the cool thing about non-violent communication is that it gives us that bridge that you're not just saying, “I'm impatient and frustrated,” like, okay. So, you give us basically what's the deeper underlying thing of inclusion. Because the cool thing about that need is that it's something that's very inviting. Like if I have a need for inclusion or you have a need for inclusion, all I want is for that need to be met. Whether that's possible or not is beside the point, because we're trying to maximize this and meet as many needs as possible, but it's so inviting. So it's a very easy way to kind of get people on the same page of this is something that we all want.

And then there's more to it. There's also more to it just in terms of how to make requests. Like how can I ask people to support me to meet my own needs? So yeah, it's easy access. It's the richness of it and it's the invitingness of it that is really powerful about it.

Rebecca: Yeah. And I think we're not as used to, especially in systems organizing or like in larger organizations, we're not used to sharing our emotions or being heard. And so being able to bring that into these spaces, I feel like is really helpful.

Ted: And may I just add something to that? Because it's funny that often we're censoring ourselves, right? From bringing emotions into workplaces, which is just so far away from where I want to be. And I'm not talking about workplaces as self-help groups, but I'm talking about, if feelings with non-violent communication, if feelings are a pointer to something deeper, like a need, why would they ignore it? It just makes no sense once you think about it that way. It makes no sense to ignore a feeling and it's actually this great pointer to something that is potentially super important and relevant for all of us to see.

Rebecca: Yeah. And often in conflict, which happens everywhere, like feelings are a part of that and needs are a part of that. And if we don't include that or if we don't make space to discuss that it makes it more difficult to come to a conclusion together. And I'm wondering, how does this fit into more conflict resolution in general? And do you have tips or experiences on what gets people to collaborate and come to a consensus together. In your experience of working with different types of groups? Obviously the media love to say that we're all very polarized and that none of us agree these days. And I'm just wondering from your perspective, what helps people agree or what helps people get on the same page or hear each other?

Ted: Yeah, there's one thing I want to name first, which is working together. Because often we have different opinions that are polarized because we have no shared reality. And that's also another, like through the back door almost, it's very easy to miss in Sociocracy, is that brilliance of putting decision-making power into groups of people that work together. Because we have to have a product ready by the end of the week, I'm not going to start a whole big discussion about something theoretical and abstract. It's like, “no, we have things to do here.” So it's just working shoulder to shoulder in the same reality on the same thing that unites people.

Rebecca: Building solidarity.

Ted: Yes. So I think often we get tripped up by words again. When it's when it's a shared experience that is such a unifier. So that's a piece.

And then the other thing is skills, I guess. And of course, people get scared. I totally get that. And there's a lot to learn, for example, in Sociocracy, around skills of integrating objections, for example. A very simple thing is that if somebody objects, one of the options that we teach is to say, “oh, can we try it out for a short period of time?” Let's say I bring a proposal, you object and I say, “Ok, I get that. Would you be willing to try it for a month?” And then there's a good chance you might say yes. And that doesn't mean I've now dismissed the objection, right? We agreed together that a month is safe enough to try it out. And there's so much to learn from that because during that month, we're now acting together again, right? We're now again in the doing, which means we're not having some theoretical abstract discussion, but we are immersed in the work. And then, the way I think about it, reality gets the last word, instead of some theory about us or some opinion. So that's just really brilliant to always go back to the doing and see, “okay, what does the world look like a month later” and then talk about it again.

Rebecca: Yeah. And I'm curious just from that perspective, do you find that sociocracy is easier in the physical world versus the virtual world? Or are there any differences when we organize digitally or broadly in that way?

Ted: I don't find it a huge difference. The one difference I think is that, well, maybe that's not even true. I guess as long as it's clear what we're doing, it doesn't matter. If it's not clear what we're doing, which can happen both in person, right? When people just meet and they're not really fully clear on what they're doing. But I think sometimes online it's even more tempting to kind of just meet because “I don't know,” but there's no kind of clear doing connected to it, and then it's hard to make any kind of decisions.

Rebecca: Yeah, it's got to be grounded in reality and the work. I really appreciate that. Just as we're running out of time, I wanted to give you the opportunity to share if there's anything over the years of working with groups like that has surprised you or you've learned after doing this work or anything about your thinking that has changed or evolved as you've worked with different groups of people to help them organize.

Ted: Well, first of all, I've learned so much. The biggest thing that comes up for me is just how everything is always connected, right? Like sometimes, for example, I once actually went through the effort of just describing. Let's say somebody disagrees in a meeting or objects or whatever, what are the hours, weeks, years, sometimes decades, or even millennia of history that led to this moment. It's just insane how complex everything is. So I often think about sociocracy. Sometimes people want to reinvent systems like Sociocracy. I see that a lot. They're like, “oh, I don't want sociocracy. That's like a whole system. Let's just do this and this and that.” And then you just watch them reinvent it and you're like “there it goes it's happening again.” So much reinventing the wheel. A lot of it is like traffic control. Sure, we could argue about whether we drive on the right or the left side of the road. But once we've decided it helps us all, so can we just do it, please?

Like rounds, for example, like do we have to do this each time, debate whether it's good to do or not? How about we just do it? We see what happens. So there's a lot like that where I just sometimes wish there was more pragmatism of just pick a tool, use it and evaluate it in six months. But don't just open that can of worms again and again and again, because it's already complex to be humans together. It's so complicated. Just pick a tool, use it. That's my advice and that's what I keep going back to. We're making things too complicated, I think.

Rebecca; So my last question I like to ask everyone, before we end for the day. Obviously we've spent a lot of time talking about Sociocracy and the related words in that practice. And I think a goal of climate words is to encourage curiosity and discovery. And I think this has been a really good place for people to learn what sociocracy is.

But I'm wondering just for you in terms of your journey, is there a word right now that doesn't have to be related to Sociocracy or even to climate, but just a word that's coming up for you that's been resonating with you or you've found very helpful in your life right now and why?

Ted: I'm going to pick the word coherence, although it's not my favorite word yet. I feel like there's a word that still doesn't exist yet or something that describes that state like group flow or something like that, you know? Something that describes like that sense of connectedness and being on the same planet, in the same world, in the same trajectory about our future, like just having that shared something. Coherence sounds a little bit too sterile as a word, so I don't love it, but that's the content that I'm thinking about a lot. And it's popped up several times in our conversation, I think that very certainly.

And I think there's a sense of, right, that so much is broken and kind of the future is broken, times are broken and all of that. And I think what I have this deep longing for is to have that reference point of something that we could be moving towards and that would be the word. That's very high on my list.

Rebecca: Yeah, I appreciate that. I like the word coherence and kind of like a shared understanding. I think about it, and I think I said this earlier, in the way of solidarity. I think that's more of a leftist organizing practice, but like, how do we build group solidarity? How do we get everyone to see that we are in this together? And that's the way that we then be able to see that goal that we all have, is to come together first and see, “oh yeah, you, me, we’re in the same boat.”

Ted: Maybe togetherness is what we both mean. Togetherness is also something like that. That would be a candidate.

Rebecca: Despite our differences. Anyway, thank you so much. This was such a lovely conversation.