Essential Partners Inc

Programs: The organization promotes constructive conversations and relationships among those who have differing values, world views, and positions related to divisive public issues. The organization fosters ways of talking across differences that decrease polarization, and increase mutual understanding and possibilities for collaborative action. Even when people are in protracted, polarized conflict, and have indelible differences, the relationships among them can shift and the "problems and the range of possible solutions can shift as well. Work by the organization facilitates such shifts. The organization straddles the intersections of theory and practice, research and training, service delivery, and publication. Part "think tank", part service provider, and part training center, the organization houses an unusual range of capacities under one roof. The organization has a solid and spreading reputation for providing responsible and effective service, conducting thorough research writing useful articles about our thinking and methods, and delivering outstanding trainings. The organization is recognized as a unique and valuable resource by our many clients, donors, and peers. With the organization's name change comes a strategic shift to intentionally supporting, measuring and evaluating the relationship between individual experience in a dialogue and community action plans. We seek to uncover the ways that individuals who engage their differences constructively can discover their essential partnership in forging effective community and organizational outcomes. Our partnership with universities, civic organizations, and community groups across the u. S. And abroad is aimed at achieving a world in which difference is an invitation to more constructive solutions. A robust monitoring and evaluation program launching in fy 2016-17 aims to track the stories and results of such partnerships and their impact on communities. Since beginning its work in 1989, the organization has designed, convened, documented, and evaluated numerous dialogues on a variety of public issues, including abortion, the environment, population and development, sexual orientation and religion, social class, and end-of-life issues. Dialogue contexts include confidential sessions among committed advocates on opposing sides, public conversations between concerned citizens, and meetings of leaders with shared concerns seeking to improve collaboration. The organization's consulting services are sought by networks and groups experiencing difficulty working together, e. G. , boards of non-profit organizations, religious institutions and faculty-parent groups. In situations where the perceived obstacles to collaboration involve political or demographic differences, we work with such groups ourselves or in partnerships with organizational consultants. As awareness of the multidimensional costs of any gathering spreads, so does the willingness to invest in preparation that will make the most of expensive face-to-face time. The organization's collaborative approach to conference design, facilitation, and consultation is especially attractive to those who want their conferences to be participatory, synergistic, and community building. The organization also conducts a respected and growing training program directed both toward: 1) professionals in mediation and other "third party" practitioners; and 2) organizations, networks and individuals who want to enlarge their capacity to convene, facilitate, and engage in more constructive conversations in their professional or civic lives. The cornerstone of the training program is the power of dialogue workshop which has been adapted to meet the needs of a variety of audiences.