Susan Wilson Golab’s Transformative Session at the 2024 Facilitation Lab Summit
At this year’s Facilitation Lab Summit, Susan led a deeply impactful workshop titled “Developing Narratives that Bring Voice to Targeted Audience.” Susan, a seasoned educator and facilitator, guided participants through an exploration of their own identities and experiences using storytelling as a powerful tool for connection and empathy.
The session began with Susan sharing her personal journey as an English teacher and the importance of storytelling in her life and work. She emphasized the vulnerability involved in sharing personal stories and how it can lead to transformational change. Participants were encouraged to reflect on their own stories and identities, setting the stage for a profound and introspective workshop.
Susan introduced the concept of “narrative transport,” where participants immersed themselves in their own stories to uncover new insights and perspectives. She provided an example of a “Where I’m From” poem, showcasing how sensory details and personal memories can vividly bring a story to life. Attendees were then invited to write their own “Where I’m From” pieces, focusing on the tactile, sensory, and emotional aspects of their experiences.
Following this individual reflection, participants engaged in a constructivist listening exercise. They shared their stories without interruption in pairs, creating a safe and supportive space for deep listening and empathy. This exercise highlighted the importance of truly listening to others without the urge to respond or self-promote, fostering a sense of trust and connection within the group.
The workshop then transitioned to a group activity where participants created character profiles based on real-life stories of military families. Susan had gathered these stories from a friend with extensive military experience, ensuring the profiles were authentic and grounded in real experiences. Participants worked in teams to represent these profiles visually, capturing these individuals’ hopes, dreams, and challenges.
To deepen the understanding of these profiles, Susan introduced the “Think, Feel, Care” framework from the Agency by Design initiative at Harvard’s Project Zero. This framework encouraged participants to consider the systems and emotional responses affecting their characters, as well as their values and motivations. Through this exercise, attendees developed a more nuanced and empathetic understanding of the military families they were representing.
The workshop concluded with a gallery walk, where participants viewed and reflected on each other’s profiles. This exercise allowed them to identify common themes and patterns and to consider the broader implications for community engagement and problem-solving. Susan wrapped up the session by inviting participants to share their insights and takeaways, emphasizing the importance of empathy and deep listening in facilitation.
Susan’s workshop was a profound experience for all involved, encouraging participants to look inward and understand the power of their own stories. By fostering a space of vulnerability and trust, she demonstrated how storytelling can be a transformative tool for personal and communal growth. The session was a highlight of the summit, leaving attendees with a renewed sense of empathy and a deeper connection to their own identities and those of others.
Watch the full video below:
Transcript
Susan:
Really, as we think across these last two days, we really started a little bit in understanding ourselves. We’ve been looking at the soil and the place and how that impacts us, culture. We’ve been looking at those challenges of design. We’ve been thinking about the entities, in terms of university, those who they want to serve. And we’re going to bring it a little closer, well a lot closer. And I belabored and really thought about this for a long time. And I think Erin said we’ve had time to build trust, because where I’m about to take you is not something I would step into blindly with a group because there is some vulnerability to when we start telling our stories because it’s our identity work.
So storytelling, I’m an English teacher, high school teacher by trade. I usually try not to say that because then people think they have to talk perfectly grammatically correct and that I’m going to pull out my red pen at any moment. Grammar was not my jam. Writing creatively was, and storytelling was so important to me. When I reflect back, even in my work in the classroom, it was always about seeing and knowing each child. I left the classroom about 17 years in and I felt like it was a vessel that kept getting filled with liquid because I would in a year have about 120 different students and I wanted to know their stories, but I never let go of their stories.
So it took longer and longer for me to learn everything and I felt like my bandwidth was filling up, but I realized how important was for me to see them and for also to share something about me. So who am I? If you talk to anyone from Michigan, we’re going to pull out our hands, tell you where we are and I’ve already done it a few times. Some people called me out and say, “Oh yeah, Michigan.” They put their hands up first and they really knew where I was located and it wasn’t like a really well-known town. I was very impressed.
Usually when I’m out of state, I tell people I’m from the Detroit area. I am really an hour north of Detroit, but Detroit has a lot of identity for Michiganders and I, on the other side, just finished my doctorate. And what you see on the floor there is 33 years of journaling. So my dissertation was a study of myself, it was an autoethnography and it was about identity. So I was looking at my stories and how my stories changed across my professional life and what that meant. And there were some eras of me that I didn’t like so much and I was happy to get over those again in my study. But I am very much about transformational change and that’s what you see in that far corner. And a lot of that work is very intimate because you need to have all the voices in the room and you need to make space for trust and vulnerability.
National Writing Project is one of those biggest transformational change agents for me because that’s where I learned to do this hard, vulnerable work. And then I started leading it with adults and that led me to being a consultant in a region. And that led me to meeting Eric and setting up lots of what we call beloved communities where people could come and just like we’re doing here, we’re learning from each other. And we feel like, I’ve heard several people say, “I’m with my people, I found my people.” So as an educator, we’re notorious for freestyling and putting things together. So as I’ve been experiencing the two days, we might have gone through a cycle. So I remember early on a mentor saying to me, I did teaching in my bones. And she said, “You’re really a strong teacher, but you also need to learn how to name what you’re doing.”
And I almost feel like I’m learning that again in this community because I will do things in my bones as a facilitator, but translating that into like, so what did I just do and why did I just make those decisions? And so I bring that up because I found this book, just recently, that’s really like oh my gosh, that’s exactly naming what it’s taken me 30 years to really refine and do, is to create these transformational learning experiences for people. And a lot of that is tinkering with people’s identities, which can be very delicate work, and it’s usually over a long span of time. So I really was drawn, and I still haven’t finished all of this, but I said to Eric, I raised my hand. I said, “I got to come lead the session because this is like I finally found what I am. I’m a transformational change agent.” And it is through storytelling that you get there.
So narrative is a big part of this. So I also know that we are in that beloved community where we’re trying to learn from each other. So the way I thought about this is, we’re going to step in, we’re going to step out and reflect, and we’re going to step back in and it’s going to be this cycle. So we’re here also, and like Douglas said, I very seriously took the challenge of why we’re here. So what we’re doing is in service of finding something that we can offer back to ACC as we wrap up these two days.
So we’re going to do that through something called narrative transport. And I like this, you maybe have heard about in facilitation about immersion. You can do an immersion through a narrative, put people in the doing of it, don’t necessarily have them experience it from someone else, but immersion is where you have to build… In your safe space, put that down on paper for yourself. And if you think back to the title of my session, it was not about making meaning, but meaning making. If you get into writing, it’s through the act of writing that you, many times, see something you didn’t know before you started writing. And so writing actually gets you to seeing something you would probably not have seen before. So to me, that is really embodying narrative transport.
So in a minute I’m going to ask you to be also thinking about telling your where I’m from story, but I wanted you to see an example of one way you might be thinking about how would I tell that story? It’s going to be a little bit different than all the things that we’ve done up to this point, but some things might flow into it.
Speaker 2:
I am from cow print, tea kettles from Windex and allergy shots. I’m from the two-story white house with red doors built identical to the one next door but with a basketball hoop out front. I’m from cloud painted ceilings, fully stocked bird feeders, and the backyard rope swing. I’m from midwinter confused daffodils and dad’s front porch roses that he would insist we go and smell before we leave for school. I’m from lazy Saturday mornings dedicated to making M&M pancakes, sometimes shaped like animals. I’m from a tall father and a short mother. From thrift store lovers, beach snobs, ice cream addicts, and family dinners. From Maynard, the National Geographic photographer, and Susan, the Vietnam War military wife, and way too many Uncle Johns. I’m from brainiacs and goody two shoes. I’m from hats off during the anthem and generations upon generations of US military from Air Force to Navy with devoted patriotism.
I’m from Yorktown, Virginia, an area filled with military brats, always coming and going and yet I can never fully relate. I’m from don’t talk back to me, and go ask your mother, and if you ever need to leave a situation, just blame it on your parents. I’m from Vacation Bible Schools and Caleb Christian Radio. From long car rides of listening to the Chronicles of Narnia and from cheesy pre-meal prayer songs. I’m from Mom’s chicken pot pie and Dad’s perfected chocolate chip cookie recipe. I’m from annual family beach weeks with endless amounts of white Florida sand making dribble castles.
Attending grandma’s afternoon tea parties with evening line dances and sunsets, always fishing with my father. I’m from (singing). And from daddy daughter dates, from sister fights, from learning baby talk to get my brother to love me the most. I’m from Mr. Rogers, Veggie Tales, Barney, and sneaking in some Sagwa the Siamese cat. I’m from the Teletubbies are silly and Arthur talks back to his parents too much. From princess books and Polly Pockets. I’m from Easy Bake Ovens and Hip Klips. I’m from a family who believed in curfews and believed in grace even more.
I’m from Tickle Monster games and hide-and-go-seek in the dark. I’m from the land of half-winded hurricanes where everyone ran outside to watch the branches fly. And I’m from short-lived snow storms that leave an inch of snow on the ground and the whole town is shut down. I’m from the smells of the coast and seafood festival and the noise of Busch Gardens roller coasters. I’m from endless Christmas gifts from sunrise Easters and special birthday plates and from brokenness and broken people and yet there is beauty.
Susan:
I’m not expecting you to feel like you’re going to become a poet in an instant here. In the center of the table, which might be hard to find, we’ve got a lot going on these tables. If you have a notebook, you can use a notebook, but find some paper and this is what I invite you to do. Now you could start, like she did, always with that reframe like I am, I am am. You could write narratively if you wanted to, or you could draw pictures, you could map it out, whatever symbolizes something about where I’m from.
Now you notice that she did lots of different things, like things that were tactile. I can taste, I can smell the sounds, the songs, little phrases. It can get as small as that. So you’re bringing it down, and you’re not censoring, and you’re not trying to be perfect. So what this is called is a head-to-pen, which means you have to keep moving that pen across the paper, and not stop and start perfecting and letting the voices stop you from getting some ideas out. I’m going to give us three minutes. I’m going to ask that you do this by yourself and give everybody that silence around them to be thinking about this.
So you will have a chance if you want to add or freestyle in your own pieces. This is not as soon as that pen goes down the end of what you could be crafting. So I want to note to all of you, I didn’t say stop. So especially when people are in a writing flow, and I think you heard Eric do it earlier where you say, “Can you find a pausing spot?” And letting people have that moment to finish out that last thought or just finish out your last thought, your last line, and be patient because especially when people are putting something down so personal and vulnerable, it feels like a [inaudible 00:13:34] when you cut them off. So we’re about to step into, you’re going to be pulling this with you, a constructivist listening protocol. So I think we’ve done a little bit of that across the two days.
But a constructivist listening protocol is something that I picked up in some of the work I did with the National Equity Project and it really especially is designed for very vulnerable conversations. And when you’re really trying to have an inclusive sense of belonging, constructivist listening is really about holding space for the other versus thinking of how you want to self-promote or add on. Have you ever been to that event whether with friends or family where you feel like people are just listening to get the hook for the next thing they’re going to say, that’s the next topper to the story? That’s not what constructivist listening is. So you are going to be taking with you in a minute your notes, but I’m going to give you, and I appreciated what Solomon shared with us today with experiential learning about you can push but give safe space.
So here’s the safe space. You can take with you, your notes I’m from, but you can determine what you want to share. You don’t have to have them see it, and you don’t have to read verbatim everything that you just wrote. You could do any way you want to tell something that came out of that thinking time work. But you’re more than welcome to read it as well. The hard part about constructivist listening is, and I think we’ve got an even number now, we were odd. We should have just dyads, two people, and each person gets three minutes. So that person will introduce themselves because I’m going to make you get up and move, to mingle around the room. You’re going to introduce yourself, decide who wants to go first. Now when that person is having their time to share, you have to give them three minutes without, “Uh-huh, yeah, and.” You can nod, you can smile.
You don’t want to look too stoic because that’s also very awkward. But you cannot start asking questions or engaging them to tell you more. And here’s where it gets really awkward. They have three minutes. If they stop talking at two minutes, 30 seconds, you continue to wait until the three minutes. Because in that silent space, you’re giving them more time to think and they probably will add on, but they might not. But you have to stay there, quiet to that end of that three minutes and that is the hardest part I’ve ever seen adults have doing this activity.
All right, so I’m going to tell you when to switch because we’re going to do this, well, we’re going to do this once, but I’ll tell you when to switch to the second partner. So stand up, find somebody in the room, meet up and get ready and I’ll tell you when to start.
Okay. However… Rock, paper, scissors, who touches their nose last, however you want to figure out who’s going to go first. And I’m going to start the clock. Now remember listening partner, you’re listening, completely lost in their story, not about thinking about, “Now, what am I going to say later?” Right? I’m listening and holding space for you to tell me your story for three minutes. Yes.
Speaker 3:
Does the story start with the piece? [inaudible 00:17:37].
Susan:
It’s wherever they want to start and whatever they want to add and delete. All right, go ahead and get started.
All right, thank your partner and now it’s time to switch. All right? So second partner.
All right, thank your partner. I had the beauty of watching across the room and I’d like to invite, if anyone’s willing to share, anything about the experience of what you just went through.
Speaker 4:
So first, these two days have been way heavier than I expected it was going to be. But I think how significant creating a safe space can be. I felt so much more comfortable saying these things. I just feel like it does feel like a very genuinely safe space to do this stuff. So it’s not as terrible as it could be to get into all this stuff with people, some coworkers I barely know, versus a ton of strangers. It was very educational in that way.
Susan:
Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 5:
I can go because technically I’m part of the conference too.
Susan:
You are.
Speaker 5:
I don’t just work here. I’ll say I hope my partner doesn’t mind that, like, she ran out of things. And it was interesting to see what came up when she had to come up with the more on the cuff, digging deeper. It was really, really cool to see that. Anybody else want to go?
Speaker 6:
So I will say from the experience, one thing that was interesting was I was still looking for a response, some type of feedback, maybe it wasn’t the word, but the head nod, a smile, something that told me that at least what I was saying was landing and was somewhat interesting.
Susan:
Yeah, it’s amazing how much we look for affirmation.
Speaker 7:
The flip side of that, though, is I was dying to jump in and say something because she would say something, I’d be like, “Oh yeah, I like that, too.” So I was dying to connect with her in that way.
Susan:
Yeah, the first few times I did this, and I did this in my work environment and it is, it’s a little unnerving, but it does get really quickly to a trusting community and it makes you realize just how much you’re not really listening when you’re in conversation. The image I had up earlier, you’re already like, “Okay, I got to sound even smarter. What can I say?” Especially in those professional settings, you’re feeling like you got to show up and represent and win those brownie points. And so to honor really listening and giving space to each other, as it said, it allows in that vulnerability. And I did see vulnerability and thank you for those who really let those raw emotions show, that’s powerful. So what I’m going to ask you to do is go back to, whether it’s in your notebook or it’s on your paper. Now think about whether it was on paper or what you said, what did you self-censor out of your story or maybe ad lib into your story?
Now, this is just you. You get to keep these to yourself. So this is not, I’m not going to make you put it up on the wall and have to confront, “Yeah, that’s what I did.” What did you maybe ad lib or self-censor? And as you really think about that, and think about the stories that you do tend to lean into telling, what kind of patterns are you noticing about yourself, and the stories that you are sharing out, or that mean a lot to you? Okay, now this is safe. It’s all in your paper, it’s not going anywhere but with you. So be honest with yourself.
So after you finish that last thought, I want you to shift, keep your pencil or your pen moving. How do I want to be seen? What holds a lot of importance for me? Again, find a pausing spot. So we’re going to have to be really efficient in our space and time. But it’s super important for us to have cross-pollination in the room. So that’s why I’m going to stay true to this, even though we are running a little bit short on our time.
I made this up, the two-step mingle, but maybe it’ll become a thing. But it’s a layering of how you have people meet up in the room and carry what comes from one conversation then into the next conversation and then maybe back to a home plate. So what I’m asking you to do is to go back to that constructivist listening partner.
Now you don’t have to tell them exactly what you put in your write. You get to share what you want to share. So the question is that you’re going to talk about, and I’m not going to make you stare at each other, three minutes, three minutes. I’m going to truncate that. So we’ll just say it’s about three-minute time that you’re together. So you’re sharing with them, “What came up for me on this? What am I realizing?” Because I’m just going to be up front. I’m asking you to do identity work. So what are you learning about yourself, and how you see yourself, or how you want others to see you? All right? So go find that partner and then I’m going to ask you to come back to your table for the next round.
Okay. I’m going to ask you to pause. Jazz hands. Before you go back to your table, let me give you the next step. So you know as soon as you sit down, what you’re set up to do. You’re taking those conversations that you just had back to your table and what, as a table, you’re trying to figure out is at least in this shared team, what seemed to be in common experiences that we have? What are things that we really highly value? What is it that binds us together?
Because in a minute or a few minutes after that, that’s going to come into play because that’s the lens through which you’re creating something, are those things that you bring in through your identity. So you’re going to go back to your table and as a table in about two, three minutes, do a quick share around to get a sense of, okay, so what seemed to be common experiences that people can all circle up around in this room?
We can just wait.
Okay. Hopefully you got a chance to get at least some idea of some commonalities. You’re going to hold on to that. So why did I do all that? Why did we do all that hard work? Because what I was thinking of as we wrap up these two days is, imagine the people we’ve been talking about solving issues for are standing in the middle of your table. How do you bring their voices into the room? We’re not talking about them. We want their voices in the room doing the talk. And so I needed to first start with you grounding yourself in what’s my identity lens in terms of the things I feel I know, the things I feel I value. But it was also then to flip it and say okay, so at your table, you know what those in common experiences are, but you probably have some blind spots.
You don’t have all the experiences of some of the profiles that I’ve now put on all your tables. It’s not your story, it’s not your background. So what we’re trying to do is to step outside of our identity, but be very self-conscious and aware of how we try and pull what we know into how we’re trying to solve and build out a voice of these profiles. So you’re taking a stock of what is it that I know I bring into and it’s the lens I look through life. It’s the things I think are really important, but what I think is really important might not be how someone else views what’s really important. What I have as my background experiences maybe very different than background experiences of someone else. So first knowing who am I and being very conscious of what are the things that I lean into and sometimes I need to set that aside.
Does that make sense? Okay. So what I’m asking you to do is in teacher language, it would be a character profile. But at the center of your table I gave, and you might not have enough copies for everyone to have one, but you can share in between. When I heard about the challenge, I reached out to a couple who are long time friends, we actually went to college together. He was in the ROTC program and went on to be a lieutenant colonel in the army and just retired. And she was the wife that traveled, they did overseas, but I lost track how many times they were stationed at different places. And I said, I want to know the real stories. And so what I asked them to do was to, I created, some of you have a profile of a spouse, of an enlisted, and some of you have the enlisted member.
Something they taught me was, if you’re an officer, almost 100% of the time, you probably went through your undergrad and came into that position with a bachelor’s degree. But if you came in as enlisted, it’s very likely that you came in right out of high school, or you might’ve been in some trades. Now that was from them telling me this, is that 100% always the truth? No. But that was important for me to hear when I was thinking about the enlisted and the enlisted spouse. Now, it doesn’t have to be the spouse of enlisted, it could be a spouse of an officer. So I asked them, thinking of all the people they’ve met over the last 20 years, if they could create profiles for me, they might’ve taken pieces from different people, but what you’re seeing on that paper are real people that they met. These are real stories because I did not want to fictionalize that. It was very important that it was the real stories.
So you’re looking at that profile, and on one of the big posters, and you have some markers, however you want to represent the story because there’s going to be a point where there’s going to be a gallery walk and you’re going to be moving around. So we need to make it visible quickly. How do you capture that person? What are their hopes, their dreams, what’s some important back story? And you can add on, I just gave you some bare bones so you have enough, and that’s where I said it’s like you’re creating a character profile off the basis of someone real.
So that’s okay to add those fictional embellishments. If you want to have some favorite quote they say, whatever. You’re bringing them to life and you’re trying to represent that on the poster. So you don’t have much time to do this. Let’s just see where we’re at in five minutes. Any questions? You really can’t do this wrong, it doesn’t have to look like that. On the one large Post-it, make a character profile, however you want to represent it, it encapsulates this kind of information.
Okay, pause. It’s okay, it’s not a clean ending. I know that you’re in the midst. Then there’s a hot debate going on here. I love it, love it. Because if you’re debating, that means you feel empathy for these profiles. They’re real people. That’s really amazing. There’s one more step we’re going to take and thank you, thank you for that hard cognitive lift at the end of day two.
So for about the last two, three-ish years, I had the opportunity to collaborate with the principal investigator of Agency by Design, that’s out of Harvard’s Project Zero. If you’re in the education world, that’s one of the meccas of learning. But something I’m learning is that the things I’m learning over in the educational world definitely translate over into a non-education-based audience. So I wanted to share this with you, and we’re going to lay it on top of our profiles.
And this is, you can go to their website and find a whole lot of protocols, but this one’s called Think, Feel, Care. And the Agency by Design is really, especially, would be a facilitator’s delight because it’s a hands-on way of putting people into what could be very difficult conversations and realizations. So you’ll definitely want to check that out. But this is what you’re doing and it’s okay if you want to add it onto another poster, large Post-it poster, or if you want to just layer it on with some Post-its on what you already have drafted because we’re going to get up at the end here and travel around and see what other people’s profiles have. But now you’re embodying that person and you’re saying, “Does this person understand the system and their role within it?” So the system being the military.
So when I think back to Dirk and Eric, there’s all those systems nested together. So however you want to take it, you can. What is this person’s emotional response to the system and to their position within it? And our challenge has been about having an opportunity to get employment. So you’re probably going to have that wrapped somewhere in there. And the care, what is this character’s values, priorities or motivations with regard to the system they find themselves in? What’s important to this person? So we’re going to do a little bit speed round here. So I’m going to give you about four minutes, and then we’re going to get up and we’re going to roll.
Okay. If we were facilitating with a longer… This would take longer. So I’m taking us through the steps and unfortunately we only get to put up to ankle height and the depth of water, more time is definitely needed. I do recognize that. But I do want to show you the full arc of what I was trying to walk us through. So last step. There were I think eight profiles in the room. Four were of a spouse and four were of enlisted. I am inviting you, you don’t have to go with your team, but find at least two other profiles. And I’m not going to… A gallery walk, I would’ve had where we would’ve had Post-its where you’re also putting in a chalk talk element to it where you can have conversations going on, we just don’t have the time, but it’s still important for you to see at least two others for what we have to do at the very, very end.
So you’re going to go and find at least two other profiles. On your own, you’re going to be thinking about these questions. What’s striking me now as I think about the one we created and then these other two I’m seeing? Are there patterns that are emerging? What questions are really starting to burn that maybe weren’t burning earlier? And what next steps or recommendations? Does our profile, or back to all of the profiles, what would we say? So you’re going to have about four minutes to do that travel and think work. All right, ready?
Just so I know when you’ve been able to get to at least two others, just get back to your tables and we’ll wrap this together. First of all, I want to thank you for respecting and bringing to life the real people that are on these pages, and for us honoring their voices in the room and in the conversation and in the problem solving.
I’m going to collapse a few things, but I think it’s important for us to at least have some kind of voices in the room. If we had the time, I would’ve brought you back and because what I was doing was trying to get you out and about so that you came back and had really an idea of all the variations to see the patterns and get down to okay, there’s some repeatables here that are really important. There are the themes that are covering all the stories. But I’m going to shift that and I’m going to ask you to think about what you just experienced, what you just put together in your profile, and what would you want to share back? If this is our last moment to speak for these individuals, what do we want to leave in the room that’s important about their story, and what we’re trying to solve for and with them?
Speaker 7:
Trying to maintain relationships and family within a system that spews people around.
Susan:
So trying to maintain family and relationships because you’re always popcorning in all over the place.
Speaker 8:
Military have the responsibility to support these families.
Susan:
The military has-
Speaker 8:
And the country.
Susan:
And the country.
Speaker 8:
Because of the service these people give, there’s an obligation to do more.
Susan:
Thank you. One more.
Speaker 9:
They recognize the personal sacrifices they make themselves and their families and they do it anyway.
Susan:
So last, now we’re going to step back out of that. So I just put you in a total immersion experience and you’re stepping back out and now thinking about it from your facilitator identity, what is, if anything, that you’d want to share about how you went through that experience and what you’re starting to think about?
Speaker 10:
So I think it is really important to keep the complexity of the individuals who we may be discussing in any workshop, or any kind of project, that if any problem we’re trying to solve, or any solution that we’re trying to get to, inherently has individuals who are affected by it. And I think before this exercise for the military families, in my mind, we’re very straw men, not very complex, not very rich, not all of those pieces.
And so by personalizing and bringing in these much more rich profiles, that it also brings back to, I think for the participants and as a facilitator, that’s like this is not someone outside yourself, we’re so different from who you are. And so that you understand your own complex inner life, and stresses, and the other people you’re engaging with also have these complex lives and entanglements and all of that. And that has to always be center of mind in thinking about communities.
Susan:
Thank you. I couldn’t have said it any wiser, thank you.
Speaker 11:
Thank you, Susan. This was just very, very deep work at its finest in terms of the empathy part of design thinking. And it really reinforces that at least I feel like we skip over the empathy very quickly in that. And it’s really important to… I wonder if we’d done this first thing yesterday, what would’ve been the result? And at the same time, I appreciate where we are in this of realizing we went through this whole process and now we have this opportunity to challenge all the assumptions and the decisions that we made about because we’ve learned so much in this last hour with you. So thank you.
Susan:
Well, thank you. And thank you to everyone and thank you Douglas for letting me have a few extra minutes. And thank you for being my first group to facilitate where I’m transitioned. Thank you.
