About the Institute
Our mission is to contribute to the making of better social worlds by reflecting on current patterns of communication and building better ones. We know that the skills necessary for making better social worlds are unevenly distributed and often in shortest supply when needed most. We are dedicated to improving this situation by promoting abilities, skills, and ways of being that enable us to act compassionately, mindfully, and wisely into the complex worlds in which we live.
The Institute’s goal is best expressed as learning together how to develop and share a cosmopolitan sensibility regarding our communication practices. This cosmopolitan sensibility can be expressed in several ways, including the idea that we remain profoundly curious about, and open to, the many ways of being human, seeing each way as one reality among many, and appreciating that all are constructed in different ongoing patterns of communicating.
In all of these efforts, the goal is to shift our taken-for-granted view of communication (as a simple tool for exchanging ideas and information) to a more complex understanding of the creative power of communication. In practical terms, these shifts are facilitated using tools and models inspired and informed by the Theory of the Coordinated Management of Meaning (CMM).
The Institute itself represents a diverse community of individuals, groups and organizations who use the Coordinated Management of Meaning (CMM) theory to inform and enhance their work. We engage with, and learn from one another, through a variety of online and in-person forums. Individual scholars and practitioners, educators and thought leaders, and institutional advocates comprise the core of the Institute’s supporters. However, the Institute’s programs and events are open to everyone.
As the institutional home and on-going keeper of CMM’s living history, the Institute partners with people, organizations and projects that represent significant, relevant, and applicable ways to institutionalize better patterns of communication.
The public benefit 501(c)3 Institute provides:
- Opportunities for collaboration, research, and teaching, including our joint graduate student fellowship program with Columbia University and joint conferences held with like-minded organisations such as the UK Association for Family Therapy
- Professional development programs for emerging and established CMM practitioners, including our annual CMMi Fellowship program
- Development and implementation of demonstration projects, showing how we can make better social worlds, especially demonstrated in our long-term CosmoKidz and Cosmopolis projects
- Worldwide networking and information sharing most notably conducted through our Learning Exchanges and occasional webinars
- Fresh insights about CMM’s capacity to transform contemporary social issues and covered in the CMMi Press publication program
- Advocacy for the continued improvement of personal and public communication in all walks of life, through our publications, our sponsored projects and our networking
- Support for the continued development of CMM as a practical theory and as a way of being in the world
The Board of Stewards
The Institute is overseen by an international Board of Stewards. The members of the board voluntarily contribute their time and expertise to fulfilling the vision of the Institute. At various times, the members take on specific responsibilities for particular projects and activities that suit their passions and their time available. The current responsibilities include:
| Barton Buechner, PhD | CMMi Fellows, CMMI Secretary |
| Beth Fisher-Yoshida, PhD | CMMi Fellows, AC4 Fellows, CMMi Editorial Collective |
| Marit Eikaas Haavimb, MABPSS | CosmoKidz |
| Arthur Jensen, PhD | Cosmopolis-2045, CMMi Editorial Collective |
| Barbara McKay, D.Psych | CMMi Press Editorial Collective, UK/AFT Liaison |
| Sergej van Middendorp, PhD | CMMI Treasurer, Fielding Graduate University & Institute for Global Integral Competence Liaison |
| Kimberly Pearce, MA | Cofounder, President, CosmoKidz |
| Robyn Penman, PhD | Honorary Life Associate, Cosmopolis, CMMi Press Editor, Newsletter Editor |
| Susan Steen, PhD | CMMi Editorial Collective |
| Daniel Walters | CosmoKidz |
| Don Waisanen, PhD | CosmoTeenz Teen Fellows Project, Cosmopolis-2045 |
| Ilene Wasserman, PhD | CMMi Fellows, CMMi Editorial Collective |
Institute Staff
| Abbie VanMeter | Executive Director of Collaborative Innovations |
| Vin Jensen | Web & Graphic Design, Technical Support |
Latest news about the CMM Institute
Offering a new vision with “What if…?”
Offering a new vision with “What if…?”
We really do have a crying need for a more human and humane response to the many challenges currently experienced in our social world. Robyn Penman’s substack series, “What if…?” offers a response to this need, driven by a profound sense of our responsibility to others as the primary ethic. Her latest posts have focused on issues of social justice and the social change process, offering a new vision based on a radical relationality. Help keep these ideas inspired from CMM and a communication perspective alive and in discussion by subscribing.
A Legacy Fund for Marit Eikaas Haavimb
A Legacy Fund for Marit Eikaas Haavimb
Marit Eikaas Haavimb was central to our ongoing vision of the Cosmo line of educational activities. Start with very young children and teach them how to have thoughtful, meaningful, and relationship-centered conversations. Then normalize these kinds of conversations and ways of being with others, so these children will grow up equipped to work together. That kernel of a vision has led to an entire line of educational conversational activities. In honor of her contribution and to ensure her legacy will live on, we have created a fund in Marit’s name. We invite your support.
Register Now—Co-Creating Social Worlds Symposium
Register Now—Co-Creating Social Worlds Symposium
We are excited to join our friends at the Taos Institute for their first in-person event since the pandemic. This event will be held in New York City, USA, on February 27 & 28, 2026. It will be a vibrant gathering for changemakers, scholars-practitioners, therapists, healers, artists, educators, or the curious—anyone seeking to make change through dialogue, collaboration, and relational practices in times of division. Join us to reimagine our personal, public, and political lives!
Quarterly report from Abbie VanMeter
Quarterly report from Abbie VanMeter
Join Abbie VanMeter as she reflects on the previous three months at the CMM Institute and looks forward to all the exciting goings-on of our near future as well!
Register now for Upcoming Webinar!
Register now for Upcoming Webinar!
Join John Burnham and Barbara McKay to explore CMM as a “conversational scaffold” with therapeutic potential in “Creating Magic Moments: Embodying CMM as a Practical Theory and a Theory for Practice.”
Celebrating 15 years
Celebrating 15 years
Take a walk down memory lane with CMM Institute President, Kim Pearce. In her letter to our CMM community she describes some of the highlights of how the CMM Institute has spent it’s time and resources these past years to help advance personal and social evolution.
Checkout CMM at the Relating Systems Thinking and Design Conference!
Check out CMM at the Relating Systems Thinking and Design Conference!
The CMM Institute is taking over a day at the RSD Conference to explore the relationship between a communication perspective and systems thinking and design this October.
What if…? A new series of ideas for a better social world
What if…? A new series of ideas for a better social world
Robyn Penman has started a new publication, What if…?, on Substack. This new series of posts is her response to the almost overwhelming problems in our social world that challenge any genuine sense of justice or of democracy. To offer new possibilities, Robyn draws on CMM theory and social constructionism, asking “what if…? we did things differently”. She writes about how we can make sense of, and act into, our social world so that we can collectively make a more just and more democratic society—one that we actually want to live in. Please read and support the publication by subscribing (free).
Quarterly Report from Abbie VanMeter
Quarterly Report from Abbie VanMeter
Join Abbie VanMeter as she reflects on the previous three months at the CMM Institute and looks forward to all the exciting goings-on of our near future as well!
A dedication to the enduring memory of Marit Eikaas Haavimb
A dedication to the enduring memory of Marit Eikaas Haavimb
Marit Eikaas Haavimb, the heart and soul of the CMM Institute, passed away 6 months ago. She is still sorely missed. Ilene Wasserman and Stewards from the Institute have prepared a dedication to Marit to honor her extraordinary contribution to all we value and hold dear at the Institute.