Former President Bill Clinton convened the first Clinton Global Initiative conference in New York in September 2005 and the 2nd annual conference in 2006. In each, 1000 leaders from around the world met, shared strategies, and commited to action against some of the world's toughest problems.

CoVision provided our Council accelerated feedback methodology in the four concurrent workshop tracks on Energy and Climate, Global Health, Poverty Alleviation, and Mitigating Religious and Ethnic Conflict.

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CoVision played on the world stage in January 2005 – providing our Council accelerated feedback method to the deliberations of 700 world leaders. The World Economic Forum in Davos was kicked off with a Global Town Hall Meeting to help prioritize the top “tough choices” facing world leaders in 2005. It was facilitated by our long-time partner, AmericaSpeaks of Washington DC.

For a full story and pictures, click here.

On July 20, 2002 more than 4,300 citizens from New York City and the surrounding region came together at the Javits Center for the largest-ever 21st Century Town Hall Meeting™. This event, dubbed “Listening to the City”, was produced by AmericaSpeaks and its partners in the Civic Alliance to Rebuild Downtown New York and was the first opportunity for citizens to respond to six proposals for the redevelopment of the World Trade Center site.

A call went out for volunteer table facilitators “from all 50 states.” 900 responded. 500+ were chosen and served admirably at their own expense. Never had there been so many skilled facilitators working together in the same room.

CoVision provided our Council™ fast feedback system, placing a networked laptop computer on 500 tables. The system allowed for the ideas generated by table groups to be gathered instantly, themed, and voted on. Largely unimpressed with the plans, citizens urged officials to “be bold” in moving forward.

In response to criticism that the proposals didn’t go far enough, top officials from the LMDC and Port Authority committed to 1) extend development beyond the original 17 acres of the World Trade Center, 2) incorporate more commercial and residential space into the plan, and 3) extend the timeline for selection of a final proposal.

In May of 2004, The Institute for Conservation Leadership brought in CoVision to help support Healing Our Waters, a conference which drew scientific and environmental leaders from throughout the U.S. and Canada to draft a federal-level agenda to address major environmental challenges to the Great Lakes. The process began three months before the 2-day conference and included four rounds of engaging the 100 participants online.

The online process first brainstormed, then identified the primary problems facing Great Lakes Restoration upon which the Federal Government can have the most impact, and finally fleshed out problem statements for each of the top three areas.

At the conference, participants were ready to engage deeply in order to develop solution statements for the three areas. By the end, the diverse group was able to reach consensus on where the federal government can most positively impact the effort to restore the Great Lakes ecosystem.

For further information about the process, click here.

In March of 2004, CoVision supported the American Camping Association Tri-State Conference which brought together hundreds of association members at the conference and hundreds more in related professional groups who participated online for a “virtual town hall” meeting.

This 2.5 hour brainstorming session was designed to identify the key ingredients for providing young people with a sense of empowerment. The process built a shared understanding of the challenges in reaching disempowered youth, and ended by building creative solutions by which organizations might overcome these challenges.

CoVision provided our WebCouncil™ collaboration platform which allowed the in-the-room participants and the online participants to have a similar experience and to engage in the same exercises. The result was a truly national conversation that generated solutions as well as cohesion amongst all participants and sponsors.

In November 1998, 600 executives of the one-month merged Nationsbank & Bank of America met for three days in Dallas. As the summit began, you could cut the tension with a knife. In the weeks before, CoVision had worked closely with Nationsbank executive development officials to sell each presenter on the efficacy of “interactive presentations” – where each would present for half of their time available, then invite instant feedback through the Council™ system, review themes generated by the Theme Team, and finally respond to the big themes/messages.

The CEO made his final decision to take feedback as he called out the question to CoVision from the stage. Within 10 minutes he had 200+ responses to the question, “What two things can you do that will save the company money through the merger integration period?”

By the end of the meeting, each executive had to make a personal decision regarding his/her employment contract with the new company. CoVision's Council system enabled participants to gain maximum possible understanding of the complex situation facing them through the series of interactive presentations.

Immediately after 9/11, the leaders of Agilent Technologies began a policy of “no air travel” for their employees. By the Spring of 2002, executives in the Worldwide Sales Division had to find a new way to coordinate the efforts of sales operations in Asia, Europe and the Americas with 3 global channel partners, 3 specialty partners and 20 country-specific partners.

The VP in charge selected GEO Group Strategic Services, Inc. to assist them in planning and implementing their initiatives – totally online. CoVision had recently completed the fullest implementation of a WebCouncil online collaboration center with GEO. Calling it a “campaign room”, GEO began weekly cycles of engagement with the group of 20 leaders on three continents. The approach proved highly effective and achieved precise planning and rapid, aligned implementation for this far-flung group.

The positive results, with significant shared understanding as a by-product, enabled GEO and CoVision to have a model for high-level thinking and planning with key members who are dispersed across the globe. This model has since proven extremely effective in a wide variety of organizations.

In February of 2004, Nike brought together representatives of all stakeholder groups in a 3+ year corporate social responsibility initiative (CSR) which was commenced after the company was stung years before with charges of employing sweatshop labor. CoVision was brought in by David Sibbet of The Grove Consultants International to augment the Grove team’s excellent graphic facilitation methodology.

Attendees included plant managers, labor union organizers, Nike executives and managers, Business for Social Responsibility, and a variety of organizations specializing in CSR processes. The ability to make anonymous entries into the WebCouncil system allowed the group to achieve mutual understanding and basic alignment on the difficult issues and choices.

All agreed that the Forum was extremely successful and a watershed event in Nike's journey toward maximized corporate social responsibility. [The consulting team – The Grove, BSR, and CoVision – was so pleased with our combined effectiveness in this effort that we designed and now offer a generic version: “The Multi-Stakeholder Engagement Process”. Call for details.]