Meeting Types

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The following are the four recommended meeting types for local stakeholder and thematic working sessions, in the spirit of Talanoa:

  1. Town Hall Meeting — Open Plenary / Moderated Discussion
  2. Short Meeting — Working Session: Priorities
  3. Detailed Meeting — Working Session: Vision
  4. Full-Day Meeting — Working Session: Pathways

All suggested meeting types included in this toolkit center on a moderated discussion process, with varying structural details. The goal of moderators should not be to control the conversation or pre-empt stakeholders’ original inputs, but rather to facilitate a more robust discussion by drawing connections, marking key ideas for follow-up and working to include all who wish to speak.

The end result should be a coherent list of values, ideas, challenge areas, and desired outcomes, that come together to form a useful, concise, authentic report from a group of stakeholders to a specific policy process or to leaders in a specific field.

Outcomes can include, but need not be limited to:

  • A report outlining your vision for long-term climate resilience.
  • Policy recommendations for local official action.
  • Stakeholder feedback (from local government and/or the wider community) to regional or national officials.
  • Outline of new partnerships in line with the aims of SDG17 and/or local public-private partnerships standards
  • Commitments of local action to overall ambition of national climate action plans.

This Toolkit includes — after the Full-Day Meeting outline, below — a list of materials that could be of use to meeting organizers.

Town Hall Meeting

Open Plenary / Moderated Discussion

The Town Hall Meeting format is intended to be open and inclusive. The aim is to bring together citizens, decision-makers, and other relevant stakeholders. Such gatherings can be part of the official business of a local government or an institution, or they can be informal meetings.

There is no pre-determined time-frame. Our guidance would be that timing should be whatever is appropriate to convening a useful, substantive, open exchange of ideas, and to covering the 8 basic elements of the Standard Meeting Agenda at the top of the page.

A traditional Town Hall Meeting features one or more stakeholder-conveners or public officials, who take input on major decisions from people in the community. For Talanoa-style town halls, and in the case of meetings focused on Resilience Intel themes, we recommend that a multi-stakeholder group act as moderating co-conveners. Such a multi-stakeholder group might include: one or two public officials, one or two community or stakeholder representatives, and potentially experts or innovators in a relevant field. A moderator should be assigned to facilitate the meeting.

An example of a Talanoa-style Town Hall Meeting might be:

  1. Review the three guiding Talanoa Dialogue questions: Where are we? Where to we want to go? How do we get there? (10-15 minutes)
  2. Discussion of participants’ values and local concerns (10-15 minutes)
  3. Develop a shared vision of where participants want to be in 20 years (30 minutes)
  4. In discussion between decision-makers and stakeholders, back-cast 20-year, 10-year, 5-year, and 2-year (getting started) goals (20-45 minutes)
  5. Summary debate — outline key action targets, policy goals, narrative details for outcome document (20 minutes)
  6. After Session: Circulate draft outcome report for feedback
  7. After Feedback: Finalize report to share with policy-makers and/or Engage4Climate, as outlined in our Outcome Report Guidance

Short Meeting

Working Session — Priorities

A short Talanoa working session should focus on Priorities — goals, local concerns, and major areas of interest for participating stakeholders.

We recommend the short priorities-focused meeting last 60 to 90 minutes. To do this, we also recommend the standard meeting agenda be modified according to time constraints and the aim of achieving serious, substantive outcomes.

An example of a short Talanoa stakeholder meeting might be:

  1. Introduction to Talanoa process (3 minutes)
  2. Discussion of participants’ values and local concerns (10-15 minutes)
  3. Form Working Groups around affinities / priorities (3 minutes)
  4. Working Groups outline where they want to be in 20 years (20 minutes)
  5. Working Groups back-cast 20-year, 10-year, 5-year, and 2-year (2020) goals (20-45 minutes)
  6. Reports from Working Groups to the full Working Session (4-10 minutes)
  7. After Session: Draft Working Session report (outline around WG notes)
  8. After Feedback: Finalize report to share with policy-makers and/or Engage4Climate, as outlined in our Outcome Report Guidance

Detailed Meeting

Working Session — Vision

A detailed Talanoa working session should focus on the group’s shared or varied Vision for a smart climate future — goals, local concerns, major areas of interest for participating stakeholders, and critical action steps decision-makers can take.

We recommend the detailed vision-focused meeting last 2 to 3 hours. We also recommend the standard meeting agenda be modified according to time constraints and the aim of achieving serious, substantive outcomes.

An example of a three-hour Talanoa stakeholder meeting might be:

  1. Introduction to Talanoa process (5 minutes)
  2. Discussion of participants’ values and local concerns (20 minutes)
  3. Form Working Groups around affinities / priorities (5 minutes)
  4. Working Groups outline where they want to be in 20 years (20 minutes)
  5. Working Groups back-cast 20-year, 10-year, 5-year, and 2-year (2020) goals (40-60 minutes)
  6. Break time (10 minutes)
  7. Reports from Working Groups to the full Working Session (20 minutes)
  8. Draft Working Session report — outline around WG notes, with further discussion among all participants (40 minutes)
  9. After Session: Circulate draft outcome report for feedback
  10. After Feedback: Finalize report to share with policy-makers and/or Engage4Climate, as outlined in our Outcome Report Guidance

Full-Day Meeting

Working Session — Pathways

A full-day Talanoa-style working session should focus on Pathways for accelerated Paris Agreement implementation — goals, local concerns, major areas of interest for participating stakeholders, and action steps decision-makers can take.

We recommend the full-day pathways-focused meeting last 5 to 8 hours. We also recommend the standard meeting agenda be modified according to the longer meeting time and the opportunity for multiple detailed segments to the day.

An example of a full-day Talanoa stakeholder meeting might be:

  1. Opening plenary session — speaker(s), panel discussion, and/or multimedia (60 minutes)
  2. Presentation of major issues at stake in the official UN climate negotiations (60 minutes)
  3. Break for coffee (15 minutes)
  4. Thematic workshops featuring experts, stakeholders, public officials, and/or practitioners (60 minutes)
  5. Lunch break — with option for thematic discussion tables (60 minutes)
  6. Working Groups outline where they want to be in 20 years (30 minutes)
  7. Working Groups back-cast 20-year, 10-year, 5-year, and 2-year (2020) goals (60 minutes)
  8. Break for coffee (15 minutes)
  9. Reports from Working Groups to the full Working Session — including preparations for Closing Plenary (45 minutes)
  10. Closing Plenary — outlining narrative themes based on Working Group reports (15 minutes)
  11. After Session: Draft outcome report; circulate for feedback
  12. After Feedback: Finalize report to share with policy-makers and/or Engage4Climate, as outlined in our Outcome Report Guidance

Materials for Managing the Working Session

In support of the principle that all people are climate stakeholders, the CCEN will assist any Working Session leaders who request background or meeting materials with one or more of the following, as applicable:

  1. A brief Process Glossary — to help make sense of the UNFCCC process
  2. Worksheets for individual contributions to the Working Session report
  3. Worksheets for Joint Reports from issue-focused Working Groups formed during the Working Session
  4. Worksheets for formulating a draft Talanoa-style 2-page brief
  5. Blueprint for Non-Party Stakeholder contributions to the UNFCCC process
  6. Recommended responsibilities for designated Focal Point (for follow-up)
  7. Information about emerging Engage4Climate stakeholder workstreams
  8. Information about volunteer opportunities, following up for further action after your event

Background Briefs