Table that motion or move to new tables?

"Be entrepreneurial. Identify groups and organizations that are interested in community organizing and community building. Find new tables to sit at that help you see the connections that exist in your community" (Ohmer & DeMasi, 2009, p. 306).

We are all busy people with great big lives and so most often resist getting involved in yet another group, taking up another cause, helping another struggling person, and all the new ways to take what little discretionary time we have each day, and each week. 

Organizationally, however, consensus organizers can likely do this by using those new connections to make their other work more efficient. Asking someone to step up and help with something you are doing so that you are free to make a new potential partnership connection with another group is empowering in multiple ways. 

The person you asked to help out with something you are already doing in your organization feels the confidence you have in them and frequently does their own adjusting to find the bandwidth to help. They hone skills or develop new ones, strengthening their own toolkit while they strengthen the organization. 

You investigate potential partnerships with another organization which has strengths your organization may not, while you may bring them organizational assets they lack. 

Perhaps it works out or perhaps it doesn't, but without sitting at that new table, it certainly won't.

References

Ohmer, Mary L. & DeMasi, Karen (2009). Consensus organizing: A community development workbook. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.