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I want to close today's proceedings with a reference to cookies. Donkey cookies and elephant cookies were left at your tables and served as your place cards today. This was not an accidental seating chart, but an expression of hope. The hope that we have done more here today than simply tell you about budgets and websites and correspondence management systems. The hope that perhaps working relationships that began here today will continue to grow and blossom.

Imagine you're a Legislative Correspondent on Capitol Hill. Your Correspondence Management System is overflowing with identical form messages from multiple campaigns. Although you're still new to your job, you doubt that hundreds of people conspired to send the exact same message to your office. You suspect that an advocacy organization is behind it, but it's unclear which one it is. You may even wonder if the senders were aware that they sent email to your office.

Too long. Too much talking. Unfocused. Unproductive. Hill staffers, like many other workers, are far from enthusiastic about meetings. However, on Friday May 20, 2016, organizational consultant Merianne Liteman proved to House senior staff that this doesn't necessarily need to be the case.

The refrain that "Congress is broken" has been repeated so often in recent years that reporting the opposite would make for a much more controversial statement. It is a 'truth' that long ago lodged itself into the body of common knowledge, and is one that can now be invoked unquestioned. Yet this is a simplistic assessment and, like in any complex situation, the truth is much more nuanced. Americans don't get the full picture of Congress, nor do they often get to hear ideas for genuinely making the institution more effective.