“Imagining and Envisioning the Future of KFTC” culminates in a “Summer Concert”

We've been reporting on a cornerstone of KFTC’s Organizational Change Initiative: the Imagining and Envisioning the Future of KFTC conversation series.

This series of structured conversations with over one hundred KFTC members was only one part of KFTC’s ongoing commitment to transformation – alongside an Interest Based Bargaining process to negotiate a staff union contract, which finished up in late May; an Executive Leadership Transition as Executive Director Burt Lauderdale exits his role next month, and work to center equity and racial justice inside KFTC and in our organizing. 

Imagining and Envisioning the Future of KFTC was significant, however, because it was a process specifically designed to help KFTC develop a shared vision of who we as an organization want to be, and how we want to get there.  

Designed and facilitated by organizational change consultants Pamela Chiang and Tony Bennae Richard, the visioning series consisted of a series of immersive sessions held over Zoom from February to June. During the March and April “Jam Session” weekend gatherings, participants aligned around a shared vision for a future KFTC – a “Vivid Description” of the organization in 2031 – and an animating goal that can help us get there – affectionately named a “Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal” by Pamela and Tony. 

A smaller set of six KFTC members then worked together throughout May to distill down the description and goal of both Jam Sessions, into one cohesive final product. All-star members Kathy Bullock, Tiff Duncan, Greta Elenbaas, Lisa Garrison-Ragsdale, Ebony O’Rea, and Alan Smith spent 15+ hours together practicing what Pamela and Tony call “amalgamated thinking” to synthesize together a single description and goal from the March and April Jam Sessions, test them for resonance with participants, and then refine them into final drafts to reflect feedback:

2031 Goal:

Guided by Black, Indigenous, People of Color and impacted communities, recruit, equip, and activate a network of 100,000 members and partners across all 120 counties to dismantle racism and all systems of oppression, to develop a robust democracy and transform the future of Kentucky. 

2031 Description:

Kentuckians For The Commonwealth is a collective light, leading the way to a thriving, joyful, intergenerational, multi-cultural society where people are free from oppression and where equity, health care, and racial, economic and environmental justice exist for everyone. We are a beloved community where all people are connected and affirmed through healthy relationships, dedicated to achieving mutual liberation.

Imagining and Envisioning participants then came together during the June “Summer Concert” Weekend Gathering to affirm these finalized description and goal, and to brainstorm different cross-cutting “breakthrough strategies” that KFTC could take on over the next 12 to 24 months, to get us closer to our audacious goal for 2031.  

The KFTC Steering Committee will further distill down these breakthrough strategies and identify next steps that will get us closer to the 2031 goal. While the visioning sessions have come to an end, the actual work of implementation – of committing to these personal and system-wide strategies for change, and putting them into practice – is just beginning, and will take all of us.