Chris Stedile
Rossland News
This past weekend, Thoughtexchange held an open house to celebrate their move into a beautiful new office just off the main drag in Rossland. All the normal food, drink and talk was found at the new location — Suite E, 1990 Columbia Ave. — but with a little Thoughtexchange twist.
“For those of you new to Thoughtexchange, we do something pretty cool,” explained co-founder and president Dave MacLeod, “which is to figure out what a group of people cares about. So for our grand opening we thought it would be cool to do a group insight game.”
The activity played out exactly how an event hosted by Thoughtexchange would have.
The crowd — made up of over 30 people — was handed a sheet of paper each and asked to fill out their idea, then shuffle about and speak with another person and discuss their thoughts. Papers were then shuffled and participants voted on whether the topic was important to them. This process repeated itself and the end results display what a group generally thinks about a subject.
So far, this process has been put to great use by Mayor Kathy Moore alongside city council and staff.
Last fall, the community was invited to a Thoughtexchange event so the city could begin to mend broken relationships and figure out what’s going well, where improvements can be made and what might be missing, with a goal to uncover the community’s shared sense of values and priorities.
Moore described the results as “overwhelming.” Over 300 people contributed nearly 1,000 unique ideas during the consultation.
The results of this event and how they shaped the coming budget were revealed earlier this month, during another Thoughtexchange session. More public input was collected at the Miners Hall that evening and the results will continue to power council’s decisions.
Moore was on hand at the open house to cut the ribbon and give her thoughts on what the company has done for Rossland so far.
“Before we have the cutting, I just want to say, that the City of Rossland is just thrilled to have a company like Thoughtexchange here amongst us. It’s a new era and we’re hoping to engage with Thoughtexchange much more and really make Rossland thrive.”
Moore and council were voted in on a strong community mandate of change and reform. The politicians of Rossland have said they are firmly committed to this idea, and are using Thoughtexchange as one medium to reach the public.
