News Archive

The late-workshop slump

I got some constructive feedback on a recent four-hour “Building Extension’s Public Value” workshop that I taught here at the University of Minnesota for NELD. While the evaluations were largely positive, I also heard that some participants grew weary toward the end of the workshop and even “checked out” during the later small group exercises. One participant wrote on the evaluation form, “Content was very good, but a very long time sitting with no activity.”


It’s all in the timing


The unreachable stakeholder?

Last week I presented a mini public value workshop as part of University of Minnesota Extension’s Fall Program Conference. When I suggested that public value messages should address the specific concerns of individual stakeholders, a question came up that I have heard several times before. Are there some stakeholders who will never be receptive to our messages about public funding for Extension programs? No matter how hard we try, are some stakeholders simply unreachable?


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