Diana’s Services for Cohousing Communities

Diana Leafe Christian is website host for the interactive feature Finding Your Ideal Cohousing Home in the Member’s Area of the website of the Cohousing Association of the United States (Coho/US).

Diana offers consultation-workshops for cohousing communities in the US and Canada. These primarily focus on:

1. How people can work well together to co-create a thriving community, with methods for communicating well and dealing effectively with conflict—including “structural conflict” as well as interpersonal conflict, and
2. Consensus decision-making and facilitation re-trainings—recognizing the pitfalls of “pseudo-consensus” methods and benefiting from widely used community practices to help meetings become more lively, upbeat, productive, and fun . . . and thus much better attended.

She also offers workshops on starting new communities. See “What Cohousers Say.”

She regularly contributes articles to Cohousing magazine. Recent articles have included “Making the Most of Your Cohousing Visits,” and “‘Forest’ Cohousing in Japan,” Part I and Part II.

Diana has presented workshops at Coho/US’s annual national conferences, and at the 2008 Cohousing Conference will offer a pre-conference workshop, “Antidotes to Five Common Sources of Community Conflict.” She will also present breakout workshop sessions, “Finding Your Ideal Cohousing Home,” and “Cohousing in Japan.”

What Cohousers Say about Diana’s Consultation-Workshops

“Your workshop was absolutely splendid, with no pussyfooting ‘round about the darker parts.”

—Sharon Oddie Brown, Roberts Creek Cohousing, Roberts Creek, B.C.

“Your workshop was totally awesome! Thank you so much. The energizing boost to our community spirit is palpable.”

—Miriam Evers, Windsong Cohousing, Langley, B.C.

“I don’t think I ever learned so much in such a short time. No fluff. All meat. You manage to present such a wealth of information in a way that keeps us fully engaged and entertained. We were able to happily stay focused for two days because there was always something happening that kept our interest. The workshop was fast-paced and never boring. I love the way you interspersed information with stories, humour, and even ‘street theatre’! You have a gift few other workshop presenters possess — you make it easy for all learning styles to stay focused. You are very animated physically and in your tone of voice, make silly drawings, give fascinating examples to illustrate points, and then leave us with a thick volume of written material to be enjoyed later. It was also great to know that you were so intuitive. You really helped us clarify the action steps to take on an issue that would have plagued us for a long time if we hadn't taken this workshop.”

—Susana Michaelis, Pacific Gardens Cohousing, Nanaimo, B.C.

“Your consultation was invaluable in helping our group clarify some critical issues—including helping us understand that our vision and mission was ours and not something that we would morph as newcomers seek to join the group. You were highly prepared, brought great expertise with a strong but gentle presence, and offered exceptional facilitation. We highly recommend you to any cohousing community needing support (and a great many really do).”

—Craig Ragland, Project Manager/Member, New Earth Song Cohousing, Bothell, Washington; Director, Coho/US

“Not only was your workshop chock full of extremely valuable information for people who are into making a cohousing community successful, I believe the rest of the world (e.g. workplaces or families or any group of people that must function together) also could benefit from the concepts you taught. And your teaching style was marvelous. Crystal-clear, entertaining, consciousness-raising, brilliant, and memorable. I'll bet 10 years from now you could ask me about that workshop and I'd just have to call up my recollection of the drawings you made and the explanations and stories you told and it would all come back to me easily. You had me wriggling my toes with glee—the ideas were that right on.”

—John Chandler, Edmonton, Alberta

“I loved your no-nonsense approach and that you refused to be highjacked by group members. What you said was what we needed to hear!” 

—Alison Etter, Roberts Creek Cohousing, Roberts Creek, B.C.

“You were a strong breath of fresh air for WindSong Cohousing.Your workshop was well-organized, jam-packed with value, and creatively delivered, often reminiscent of a stand-up comedy routine! You think on your feet and address the group's questions as you go along.There was no dozing off! You quickly identified the root causes of several of our challenges and conflicts—the lack of some important foundational agreements and structures that we didn't even realize we were missing. You also imparted clarity on the tension we were feeling between caring for individuals vs. caring for the community as a whole. It was definitely beneficial to have you articulate things that would have been difficult to hear from within our group. Many Windsong members said it was the best workshop they'd ever attended, and the valuable handouts you distributed are a lasting bonus! Our community is now abuzz with excitement, hope, new energy, and enthusiasm to re-create ourselves.”

—Valerie McIntyre, Windsong Cohousing, Langley, B.C.

“You were certainly a hit! Six shifts in our meeting process have occurred as a result of your consultation-workshop in October at Cranberry Commons:

1. More effective agenda coordination—we have changed the format and timing for including items on the agenda.
2. The workshop has empowered facilitators and the community at large to evaluate a red card for validity and consider disallowing the block if it is not valid. We are currently formulating agreements on Guidelines for Blocking.
3. We are in the process of developing a list of behaviours that are not acceptable at meetings and have empowered our facilitators to interrupt and stop them. For example: complaining about decisions already made and speaking for people who are absent are considered unacceptable behaviours.
4. One of the members is developing a proposal for the community to pay for facilitator training—this has already been agreed to in principal.
5. We have added a line item to our yearly strata budget for "community development" to allow for ongoing training.
6. We have a proposal in place which defines guidelines for prioritizing decisions and determining who has authority to make what kinds of decisions.”

—Ronaye Matthews, Cranberry Commons Cohousing, B.C.; Founder/Director, Canadian Cohousing Network

Article, “Consensus Workshop at Cranberry Commons,” by Ronaye Matthews. pg. 4, Canadian Cohousing Newsletter, Winter, 2007/2008