The Tipping of Our Field
Reflections on the closing of the 2008 IFVP Conference in Chicago
Julie Gieseke |
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The Tipping Point conversations started in Northern California, in February of 2008 with two gatherings among Visual Practitioners to explore what the future of our field could look like. Inspired by Malcolm Gladwell’s book, The Tipping Point, we wanted to explore what it would take for a small, focused group of people to impact our profession on a global scale. We asked each other what we could do individually and collectively to contribute to this change. As a participant in the first conversations, Nancy Margulies suggested bringing this conversation to the Chicago 2008 conference for a broader discussion among our community of practice. The Tipping Point conversation took place at the end of the three day conference, completing a very high-energy and inspiring conference with practitioners from all over the world.
Nancy and I began the session with a short video of interview clips gathered from participants over the previous two days. The question was, “What does the future of the field look like?” People responded with personal and profound visions. From this video introduction, Nancy invited the Visual Practitioners to consider “What the world is calling us to do?” Everyone wrote down three ideas on a big index cards and then shared these ideas in groups of two or three. Eventually each table came up with their top three choices and created a visual for each one. A representative from each table presented their ideas to the room. I collected these images and taped them to a large map that Nancy was creating. As each table shared their visions, Nancy captured among the collage of images that was being created by everyone in the room. [You can view the Tipping Point panel here.]
The energy grew and expanded as ideas for ways in which we can build, expand and tip our field were shared. With a vibrant panel of inspiring Tipping Point ideas, it was time for a call to action. Nancy revealed that the remainder of the IFVP conference T-shirts had been purchased and would be given to any participant that would stand up and make a personal commitment to take action towards any of the ideas that were presented. The stack of T-shirts went quickly as people stood up and voiced their intentions, connections and plans to do their part.
Some of the actions that Visual Practitioners were already doing or committing to take were:
- “I leave my materials with the client, like reusable whiteboard sheets, teach them a few tricks and that creates the space for them begin to use the process themselves.”
- “I am going to work hard to get the facilitators I work with to build into the agenda some time to demonstrate a training in recording for the participants so that they can do it themselves.”
- “I am working to create large maps of the mess in California, we will leave them on display in the halls of the Capitol.”
- “I am bringing the organizers of the C40 to present with Visual Practitioners, to get visibility and the potential for with the strong politicians that will be there.”
- “At the IAF North America meeting in Vancouver in August, they would like to have a sub qualification category for Graphic Facilitation, which means exposure to the 10,000+ members world-wide.”
- I want to work in developing a visual language for the aboriginal peoples of Canada, bringing the Visual Practitioner community in collaboration with the idea of building a visual language.”
- “I am volunteering to launch a Speaker’s bureau for the IFVP as a tool for spreading the word, which can have a national reach and an honorarium that will benefit the IFVP.”
- “I am teaching my 9 year old this tool, and to teach his teacher, to offer this learning tool for other visual learners, and it could satisfy some of the for the arts exposure that they’re not getting.”
- “I encourage each of us to post small recordings on our sites, using some of the simple technology tools we learned about, so that people all over the world could be virtually exposed to these methods.”
- “I am committing to work hand in hand with conflict resolution mediators taking on an intra-organizational or inter-group conflict to use the visual methods and eventually bringing this to other organizations such as NCDD.”
There was a great spirit of collaboration and possibility that evolved as practitioners spoke of the ways they could individually contribute to the tipping of our field. We noticed that there were more than enough people in the room to tip our field in a global way. Whether each of us had a specific action plan or not, what was important was that each of us held the intention to share our work, talk about our work with passion and continue the energy that had been collectively generated over those three inspiring days in Chicago. To demonstrate this point, Nancy shared a video she made that visually translated a Dr. Seuss poem about the quantum interconnectedness of everything and the paradigm shift needed to transform our world. This was the shift were beginning. Rob Benn closed the conference with a remark that though we are parting, we are not far apart and that our work together will bring about the tipping point and we will collectively grow and benefit. We completed the conference with the knowing that everyday we do the work as Visual Practitioners, we are connecting to our community and expanding our field.
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