Most nonprofit planning falls into one of two defaults: a small leadership team makes the decisions and rolls out the plan, or everyone gets pulled into a sprawling process that struggles to converge. Leaders who want something more inclusive often hesitate, because "participatory" sounds a lot like "consensus-driven," and they've seen how that goes. But here's the thing: inclusive participation and clear decision-making aren't in conflict. You just have to intentionally design for both.

In this 90-minute interactive session, we'll work through practical tools that help you design planning processes with intention — processes where it's clear who's involved, how, at what level, and why.

This session might be for your or your organization if…

·        You've tried to run an inclusive planning process and it turned into a free-for-all

·        You've made decisions at the leadership level that landed poorly because people felt shut out

·        You default to "get everyone in a room" because you're not sure what else to do

·        You want staff input but worry that asking means giving up the final call

·        You're heading into a planning cycle and want to set it up differently this time