Course Format
Our Intensive Course is designed as a special training course in Process Work and Deep Democracy where we get to be both researcher and research “object”. We are the garden, studying the diversity of our ecosystem and how to learn from its relationships so we can garden better, while flowering and blossoming ourselves in the course of it.
We bring together the roles of facilitator, coach, and client in a real ad hoc community. Our learning is both theoretical and skill-oriented, while at the same time a lived community experience and a garden to personally grow in.
We co-create with our co-learners eye level learning and teaching, where individuals get (self)coaching tools to understand themselves in moments of conflict and polarization, learn to facilitate polarized teams, communities and organizations, and develop fluidity in facilitating hot conflicts across vastly diverse communities. Our learners are encouraged to make practical project development as part of their learning journeys, resulting in initiatives and start-ups worldwide.
Face-to-Face
and Online –
Hybrid Course and Hybrid Community
In 2021, under the influence of the Covid pandemic, we for the first time held a hybrid Intensive. About 70 of us met face-to-face in Paris and about the same amount were online across the world. We had two parallel Intensives, with powerful and deep experiences working as one group (with a large screen and mics on the f2f side of the course) and powerful experiences in each group (f2f + Online) on their own.
The process of working through the difficulties present in that experiment, and the WAY we worked through them, resulted in a lived experience of new relationships between Global South and Global North that is unforgettable. It moved us to structure all of our future Intensives as hybrid events.
The Intensive is a hands-on learning event, with mini lectures in the morning followed by a large group process, facilitated by one of the learning triads (formed on the first day). In the afternoon, we break up into small groups to practice either self-facilitation + coaching skills in pairs, or facilitation of the small group. There will be a fair amount of demonstrations, but the focus will be on opportunities to practice what you are learning, as you wish.
Our Intensive groups (usually around 100 people) are a mix of newcomers with no background in facilitation or process work, Process Work and Deep Democracy practitioners who are part of our training programs, and experienced leaders and facilitators from related approaches.
Many of us are life-long learners who join in for a training, and then might drop out for a shorter or longer time, according to their own process.
Daily Format
F-2-F
We work as a whole group every morning from 10 -1, with theoretical presentations followed by a large group process. Some of these group processes will be with online+face2face participants together, and some will be separate.
We have a longer lunch break for networking and experiencing Amsterdam.
From 4:00p.m. to 5:30 we work in small groups of around twenty people that stay together throughout the course.
From 5:45p.m.-7:00p.m. trainers and participants present or debrief the day, process issues that came up during the day, etc.
Online
We live stream the morning theoretical sessions for online participation.
The second half or the morning is for group process, either within the online group community, or with the entire group or participants, online + face-2-face.
Small groups will also take place at specified times arranged for your timezone.
Some evening sessions (5:45p.m. – 7:00p.m.) will be recorded, and some will be livestreamed and recorded.
Public Open Forum
As in every Intensive, we will conduct a public open forum (on one of the evenings) on an issue that is current for Amsterdam and globally relevant for all of us. Public Open Forums are promoted citywide and open to anyone.
Below you find an overview of the umbrella topics of the day, and the skill set that is tied to facilitating them.
Please use the sign-up link below! if you have question email us at mpere@deepdemocracyinstitute.org, and you can also talk to one of our faculty members.
After registering, you will receive links and information about lodging possibilities,
things to do around Amsterdam!
