knowledge-base

Facilitation

Facilitation is the process of guiding and managing group activities, discussions, or meetings to ensure effective participation, clear communication, and achievement of objectives. It involves creating an environment that encourages collaboration, creativity, and productivity among participants.

• Facilitation is about helping groups get better results.
• Groups are often less than the sum of their parts, facilitating aims to reduce that.

Training, Mentoring, Group Coaching and Facilitation

They all differ, pick the one applicable to your use case.

Training	Mentoring	Group Coaching	Process Facilitation
Content Expertise	Content Expertise	No Content Expertise	Process Expertise
External	External	Internal	Internal
Goal: Subject Understanding	Goal: Improve your competency	Goal: Change Behavior	Goal: Solve a challenge collaboratively
Hierarchical	Hierarchical	Hierarchical	Facilitative
Energetic, Patient, Speaking	Wise, experienced, generous	Encouraging, Supportive, Provocative	Unbiased, neutral, listening, safe, transparent

Source of Table

Type	Who controls what is being learned	Type of Participation	Comments
Facilitating	The Group	Facilitator + entire group	Good for collaborative learning
Teaching	Educator primarily	Mostly from educator, little from group
Lecturing	Educator solely	Solely from educator	More if a clear message/topic must be transferred

Source of Table

Effective Decisions

ED (Effective Decision) = RD (Right Decision) x CD (Commitment to the Decision)

Usually we make a (right) decisions but then must built up commitment. With a good facilitation you get commitment as the right solution is built. Therefore, more effective decisions.

Facilitation Types

• Experiential Facilitation: Facilitate experiences for people to learn by doing. Also known as adventure or outdoor education.
  • Examples: Conflict resolution, Communication, and problem solving.
• Dialogue Facilitation: Building bridges rather than walls.
  • Examples: Put strangers in a circle and talk about given topic(s) (e.g. Politics, Race, Opinions)
• General Facilitation: More like in business, run a meeting. A general batch, but skills from Experiential and Dialogue facilitation can help tremendously. Most of these notes are about this.

The Facilitator

Role

1. I create the container. The participants create the content.
2. My actions enforce their self-organization.
3. It’s their meeting. Not Mine.
4. Meetings are real work (Good facilitator required).
5. Success = a fulfilled purpose.

Notes

• When being the facilitator, you can’t focus on the content and your own opinion.
• Don’t tempt to become the project owner/manager.
• As facilitator you can/must push action item commitment.
• Fall back to the excuse “as facilitator it’s my role to ….” to allow for pushing certain things that are about the process, not the actual content!
• Evokes creativity and confidence in the group
• Honest & Transparent : I see “this” is happening, in a meta way you observe, less about the content, as facilitator you can be 100% content agnostic.
• Ground and calm
• Adaptive designer: Design a plan, but can be adaptive when necessary based on the needs.
• Clarity: Your instructions and guidance must be clear, else people will get lost.
  • F.O.G.S: Framing, Objective, Guidelines and Safety - A framework for clarity. Source
    • Framing: Situate the context. You got to change the context and make it relevant for everybody.
      • Example: Share a story that leads into the purpose or objective of whatever you’re doing.
    • Objective: Clarify/share a clear object for given activity or whole session
      • Example: “Share (personal) stories, without sharing opinions” - now a clear objective was set
    • Guidelines: Rules of engagement. Sometimes adding rules makes your gathering better.
    • Safety: Try to increase both
      • Physical: If people gonna be running around, make it safe to do so.
      • Psychological: People who run meetings often don’t mention this type of safety. A highly functional team has a high degree of psychological safety.

Do and Don’t

• Do:
  • Carefully assess needs
  • Stay neutral
  • Have a lot of tools
  • Create open trusting atmosphere and tell why everyone is there.
  • Simple & direct language
  • Conclude meetings on positive notes.
  • Clear steps
  • Clarity in general
• Don’t:
  • Be center of attention
  • Not check in with participants
  • Not listen
  • Too passive
  • Lose track of ideas
  • Put people down
  • Not take breaks
  • Not have alternative approaches to adjust
  • Let discussions go one and on

Characteristics

• Authenticity:
• Organizer
• Look-Out
• Orchestrator
• Guide
• Conflict Solver
• Active Listener
  • The way that you listen has the power to change what you say. This includes body language. The more “listening” and positive the body language (e.g. lean in) the more they will share.
• Coach

The Framework

• Before Event:
  • Determine Audience, is possible use DISC to prepare.
  • Set Agenda
  • Set objectives
  • Preparation
  • Find Venue & Invites
  • Diets & Foods
  • Deliverables from sponsors
  • Activity Planning
  • Planning
• During Event
  • Open Event:
    • Start with POWER Statement
    • Agenda (MUST)
    • Way Of Working (OPTIONAL)
      • If you are with a group that often have done this before, this might be implicit.
      • Examples:
        • “ELMO”: Enough, let’s move on. This means what it says, allow stalled conversation to move, as facilitator that’s your role.
        • Raise hand for silence
        • Open for questions
        • Be on time
        • E manners (phone gone, camera on, …)
        • No smoking breaks or else agree in advance to it.
    • Objectives (MUST)
    • Expectations (OPTIONAL)
    • Do Ice Breaker/Check In activity to get people (mentally) in the room.
  • Doing The Work:
    • Follow activities of playbook
    • Adjust activities based on the engagement and proceedings.
  • Close Event:
    • Recap the work done
    • Recap/Tackle outstanding Issues
    • Recap Action List
    • Recap Objectives
    • Recap the results
    • Review Results
    • Review used techniques
      • We did X by doing Y
    • Review group communication
      • We did X by communicating… (TODO)
    • Review facilitator responsiveness
    • Participate Expectations
    • Final Words
    • Ask Feedback
    • Short: We close, review the session, how it went, what came out and did we satisfy all relevant items?
• After Event:
  • What to document?
  • Who to brief?
  • Share the feedback.
  • Monitor action items.
  • Prepare agenda for next meeting (if applicable).
  • Debrief session if needed.
• Dysfunctional Behavior: There are various personas that have pro’s and con’s. Each persona has methods on how to deal with these. See Communication.

POWER Statement

The POWER statement is build out of 5 parts, use this to open your event strong.

• Purpose
• Outcomes & Deliverables
  • Head - Information, decisions, strategies, shared understanding
  • Heart - Connecting, buy-in, vision, Caring
  • Hand - Next steps, action log, output
• What’s in it for me?
• Energize & Engage
• Roles & Responsibilities
  • Of everyone involved (facilitator, participants)

Read this out in one statement at the beginning of an event/facilitation.

Example

• Purpose: To have more effective communication.
• Outcomes & Deliverables: Run more efficient decision processes and meetings between squads and business.
• What’s in it for me?
  • Be less frustrated
  • Become a good communicator
  • Have a better way of working
• Energize & Engage:
  • To decrease the amount of ineffective meetings
  • To have variety in how to do meetings
• Roles & Responsibilities
  • To learn, listen and come forward with ideas

Activities & Types

And event is made up of activities, there are many variations, but they all try to achieve a certain goal. We can categorize these types based on the goal they try to reach.

• Energizer: Get blood flowing and get everyone mentally in the room again.
  • Help to return the focus and energy.
  • When too many participants, split in groups, of that shortens the total time of the energizer activity (e.g. playing a game)
  • Be weary of physical energizers, make sure the room is safe and clean.
  • A check-in could ben an energizer also.
• List: List facts, known things, statements, limitations.
• Brainstorm: Collect and idea new ideas.
• Group: Group ideas that are very similar.
• Prioritize: Prioritize/group items to decided what gets attention first or not at all.
• Commit: Have participants commit to actions.

Reflection

• Description:
  • Every participant reflects on the session/workshop/event on a shared template.
  • Example questions:
    • How did I as participant contribute to the success of the workshop?
    • My key takeaways?
    • Most memorable statement made by fellow participant?
    • Did we reach our objectives
      • Visual TIP: Create one dimensional scale from “not at all” to “oh yeah” and let people drop a “dot” on the scale. So you get immediately a visual concentration.
• Why:
  • Help participants to consolidate their learnings.
• When:
  • Closing of event

Fist of 5 voting

• Description:
  • Explain Rules
    • People show scale of agreement/disagreement with the amount of fingers
    • 0…2 fingers -> Check in
    • 3…5 fingers -> move forward
    • Be aware of culture specifics here
• Why:
  • To gauge sentiment quickly
• When:
  • During event whenever a clarification is needed.

Prioritize

• Description:
  • Take any set of items (e.g action items, topics, …)
  • Group them if some are similar (affinity)
  • Now there are 2 methods to choose from:
    • Get Preference from participants
      • Voting (suggested rule: 20% of votes vs the amount of items)
      • Move some dots
    • Use Logic with Eisenhower Matrix
• Why:
  • Need to decide which topics/items to focus on (take only top 3)
  • Need to decide which topics/items to focus first on
• When:
  • During event

Check-In Exercise

• Description:
  • [Typical] Start with asking people to introduce themselves, name, role, fun fact, …
  • [Alternative] Let people share, for example “Top 3 success Factors” and “Top 3 reasons of failure” with post its on a board.
• Why:
  • Bring people in the room mentally.
  • Break ice.
• When:
  • Opening of Event

Agenda

• Description:
  • Share agenda, time slots, and stay on agenda.
  • Ask if anyone has questions
  • Always end on time, skip content if necessary.
• Why:
  • Expectation Management
  • Respect everyone’s time
• When:
  • Opening of Event

Issues - Decisions - Action

• Description:
  • A board / visual aid to track about key issues, decisions and action items raised throughout the event.
• Why:
  • Visibility of all issues, decisions and action items.
• When:
  • Introduced at opening of event.
  • Maintain it throughout event.
  • Recap at event closing.

Weather Check

• Description:
  • Pay attention to body language (distracted, …)
  • “Is there anything that keeps anyone from being mentally in the room?”
  • “Anything that keeps you from being present?”
  • When energy is low/distracted > Do an energize activity.
• Why:
  • Identify the mood of the room. “Are we stull in collaborative mood?”
• When:
  • Whenever, should check often.

Roman Voting

• Description:
  • Explain the rules
    • Thumb up: I Agree
    • Thumb horizontal: I follow the room
    • Thumb down: I disagree
  • Ask A question
• Why:
  • To determine something quickly
• When:
  • When you need a quick decision or feedback throughout the event.

Commit To Action Items

• Description:
  • Get people commit to identified action items.
  • When no response or volunteers “Hey X, which opf these 2 items you’d like to take?”
  • Gentle force is OK.
  • You are not the project manager
  • As facilitator you can be a bit pushier “As facilitator I must make sure all action items are taken”.
• Why:
  • Make sure all action items are owned and assigned.
• When:
  • Throughout or end of event

Template

• Description:
  • Group prepare statements on flip charts for x amount.
  • Groups switch flip charts to review another group’s statements for x amount.
    • Let them put “V” if they agree
    • Let them put “X” if they disagree
    • Let then put “?” if they don’t understand
  • Let the groups clarify, after clarification they should choose “V” and “X”.
  • Keep going till only disagreements are left
  • Now you have a list of disagreements, you have a list to use, or to continue discussion over them. Different deliverables are possible here.
• Why:
  • To list disagreements and filter out any agreements, which don’t require the participants time. If they agree with it, no need to waste time to it.
• When:
  • During Event

Communication

• Use positive and proactive language.
• “Yes, and…”
• Be aware of cultural differences.
• Get attention
  • Raise your hand without shouting, till everyone gets quite.
• Avoid hybrid events (part offline, part online)
• Don’t know answer to question? State honesty.
  • Either get back to them later.
  • Ask the room of anyone knows.
• Ask random people for input, to keep people on their toes.
• Create space/time for people before asking
  • “Let’s take 15 seconds of pause to help everyone come up with a question and then let them ask”. Make explicit moments give moments to digest and build courage.
  • Don’t ask if people have questions, gently nudge or “command” them to prepare a question. “Take 10 seconds and try to come up with a question”.

Dysfunctional Behavior & Personas

Dysfunctional behavior (Whispering, sidetracking, arguments, dominant behavior). A good facilitator can navigate this by doing: Conscious Prevention, Early Detection, Clean Resolution

Persona: Late Comer Larry

• Typical Quotes:
  • Sorry I’m late… you know how it is to have back to back meetings
• DISC Style: All
• Strengths:
  • Creates opportunity to have the conversation about timeliness with the whole team/group.
• Weaknesses:
  • Derails meetings (everything gets repeated)
  • Sets a tone of “this is not important” or disrespect by coming in late.
• How To Deal:
  • …todo

Persona: Electronics Eddie

• Typical Quotes:
  • Nothing will be SAID… he will be on his cell phone texting the whole time.
• DISC Style: All
• Strengths:
  • It’s a clear sign that process or content is not engaging this person (may be the wrong person for the meeting)
• Weaknesses:
  • Disengaged behavior might spread
• How To Deal:
  • …todo

Persona: Spotlight Sam

• Typical Quotes:
  • I/Me/in my experience
• DISC Style: Influence
• Strengths:
  • Willing to talk/share to get things started
  • May provide energy with stories
• Weaknesses:
  • Likes to be heard, so may repeat ideas already states
  • May prevent others from speaking
• How To Deal:
  • Driven By: Knowledge
  • Handled By: Make them into an expert, you say they are the expert in the room and at a particular point of time they will be asked to present their knowledge. Give them a framework when they can’t show off, without interrupting your flow.

Persona: Tangent Tom

• Typical Quotes:
  • This one time…
  • What about THIS (very minimally related tangential topic to what we are talking about)
• DISC Style: Influence
• Strengths:
  • May provide a burst of (unrelated) energy when things are getting dull.
• Weaknesses:
  • Pulls focus of the meeting away from the states purpose or objective.
• How To Deal:
  • …todo

Persona: Passive Aggressive Polly

• Typical Quotes:
  • You don’t know what she’s thinking. Until she says it to someone else outside the meeting.
• DISC Style: Steadiness
• Strengths:
  • Wants to maintain harmony (in the meeting)
  • Does not get in the way of ideas being moved forward (in the meeting)
• Weaknesses:
  • Doesn’t share displeasures with the group, talks about it outside the meeting with other people
• How To Deal:
  • …todo

Persona: Silent Sara

• Typical Quotes:
  • I don’t want to upset anybody (thought, not said)
• DISC Style: Steadiness
• Strengths:
  • Doesn’t compete for air time or restate ideas we’ve already heard.
  • Brings politeness to the space
• Weaknesses:
  • Unwilling to share her piece of the puzzle/insight because it may cause conflict
  • May be shy, introverted
• How To Deal:
  • Driven By: Instructions
  • Handled By: Be specific, give examples and clear outlines of that they need to do.

Persona: Snarky Sandra

• Typical Quotes:
  • Like they want THAT kind of creativity/honesty/feedback
• DISC Style: Steadiness/Conscientiousness
• Strengths:
  • May be the proverbial “canary in the coal mine” stating something the group is not ready to hear/discuss yet.
• Weaknesses:
  • May feel like a personal attack to whomever is speaking
  • Could shut down the space/topic
• How To Deal:
  • …todo

Persona: Analytical Anil

• Typical Quotes:
  • We need more data
  • We simply don’t know enough to decide this right now.
• DISC Style: Conscientiousness
• Strengths:
  • Provides accuracy & details
  • Keeps the group from going off a cliff they don’t see.
• Weaknesses:
  • Analysis Paralysis
  • May overgeneralize to the point of people losing interest all together.
• How To Deal:
  • Driven By: Safety
  • Handled By: Make them feel safe, by outlining what the outcomes the decision at hand will have. Give them the context that the decision is made, and what for. Give them all the information they should know to feel safe to make a decision. Give Them Reassurance!

Persona: Cautious Connie

• Typical Quotes:
  • This is too risky
  • Maybe we should wait this out & see what happens
• DISC Style: Conscientiousness
• Strengths:
  • Has safety & quality as top priorities
  • Keeps the group from going off a cliff they don’t see.
• Weaknesses:
  • Risk averse, may loose opportunities for growth by waiting too long.
• How To Deal:
  • Driven By: Safety
  • Handled By: Make them feel safe, by outlining what the outcomes the decision at hand will have. Give them the context that the decision is made, and what for. Give them all the information they should know to feel safe to make a decision. Give Them Reassurance!

Persona: Negative Ned

• Typical Quotes:
  • This will never work
  • We tried this before & it didn’t work then… it’s not gonna work now
• DISC Style: Conscientiousness/Dominance
• Strengths:
  • Keeps the group grounded in reality of impediments to success.
• Weaknesses:
  • Shoots down potentially good ideas before they are fully formed.
• How To Deal:
  • Driven By: Resistance
  • Handled By: Allow them to get rid of their negative opinions, ask for their opinions proactively. Then bounce back to them “What would you do or suggest”? Try to make them an expert.

Persona: Work-a-holic Warren

• Typical Quotes:
  • I’ve got more important things to do
  • This meeting is a waste of my time… I have real projects that need my attention
• DISC Style: Dominance
• Strengths:
  • Brings awareness tha the current process/topic may not be adding value.
• Weaknesses:
  • Disengagement may spread to others (who will soon be getting out their laptops)
  • Voice will be left out of the conversation if he is doing other work
• How To Deal:
  • …todo

Persona: Dominating Don

• Typical Quotes:
  • ELMO!
  • Are we done yet?
  • When will we move to action?
• DISC Style: Dominance
• Strengths:
  • Keeps the ball moving forward;
  • moves teams from talking about it into action!
• Weaknesses:
  • Can shut down a space with potentially overbearing energy.
• How To Deal:
  • Handled by: They need to feel important
  • Give an important task, so the task gives them an outlet. Giving them an opportunity to present themselves.

People who dominate conversation

• Flip The Role: Pretext your question with a request for the busy talkers to hold of. People who talk a lot know they talk a lot.
  • Example: “Hey, if you’re typically one of the first people to speak, please hold back and wait to be one of the last (or 3th) to speak, is is possible might not get a chance to speak this time, but I’d love to hear some of the voices that not always get heard.”
  • This is less directed towards individuals (e.g. hey Mark, I didn’t hear you yet.)
• Creating Space: Create more space/silence for those who are a bit more hesitant to speak, to get their chance.
  • To avoid awkward silence to create productive silence. Build on top of the “Flip The Role” , by also pretexting, that you want a specific time window before anyone answers, so every can think for a moment.
  • Example: “Hey, if you’re typically one of the first people to speak, please hold back and wait to be one of the last (or 3th) to speak, is is possible might not get a chance to speak this time, but I’d love to hear some of the voices that not always get heard. I am going to ask this question, and then pause in total silence for 5 seconds to wait for everyone to think of their own response before we share.”
  • Even if the 5 seconds pass, let them take the time.
• Change the mechanics: Domination could be because of the people, but because of the structure of the meeting.
  • Split out into groups to have discussions (breakout sessions) and then report back what you heard other people in your group say (not what you said).
• Steering into the curve: Address the elephant in the room, address this privately first. This is more closer to “last resort” if others don’t work.
  • Pull person aside: What I’d love you to do, I love all your contributions and I am recognizing your contributions are heavier than others and I’d like to make space for voices. Can you aim to bear through this awkward silence to give space to other people to share. They won’t be surprised about it or new about it that they’re dominant about it.
  • You can do it publicly but risky: “I can notice we are playing white guy ping-pong, can we step back for a moment and make space for other voices (example from a meeting where it happened the most heavy voices were white, including the facilitator)”
• YouTube Video: Deal with dominant people in conversation

Tools & Equipment

• Pens
• Post-its
• Flip Charts
• Projector
• Miro
• Software
• Playbooks/runbooks

Playbook

• Playbook/runbook
• Necessary for each event.
• Clear agenda, duration of each section, expectations of facilitation, expectations of the participants, materials needed.
• Example
  • State Purpose
  • State Outcome
  • State all steps, each step has
    • a number for easy reference
    • Time length (start/stop times optionally)
    • Activity description
    • Materials required

Parking Lot

• Technique for difficult participants
• A placeholder for issues or questions that might need to be dealt with, but at a later point in the session/meeting/workshop.
• You can either address all of the items at a specific time, or else in 1:1’s (e.g. during lunch) but make CLEAR when you will address these.
• Even if you know these questions will be answered over the workshop, write it down, let them feel heard and appreciated.
• Goal:
  • Avoid the workshop derailing and explode in discussion.
  • Let people feel heard.
  • It allows them to let go what’s in their head, so they can relax more.
• Examples
  • “This is not something we will deal/address now, but I have a section at the end for rapid fire questions and such, what I will do is add this to the parking lot so we can pick it up at the end.”
  • “I Understand where you are coming from, I have a lot of things to say about that, if you don’t mind trusting the process, I will get back to that (putting that in the parking lot)”.

YouTube Video: Parking Lot Method

Visualization Techniques

… See hard copy papers

General Topics

Failure Reasons

Reasons a facilitation/event can fail.

• People don’t come prepared or don’t do homework (only 30% does it).
• People don’t engage.
• Wrong people in the room.
• Participants hogging all the time.
• Cultural differences and mistakes.

People Who Are Late

• Fill them in during break, respect others time.

DISC

Allows to identify different personalities. If you are able to locate/place your participants, it will be easier to tailor your messaging accordingly.

Remote Workshops

• Be even more clear on purpose, actions and agenda
• Time in 1 Hour blocks in 4 steps
  • Short theory
  • Discussion/exercise
  • Presentation/reflection
  • Break
• 10min break/hour
• Break out groups max 4 people to keep engagement + accountability
• Encourage to keep video on. Not just politeness, but also more engaging.
• Distribute air time among participants.
• Randomly ask different participants questions to keep em on their toes.
• Emphasize start and end
  • Check in question to have everyone focus on the event
  • Have enough wrap-up time

Meeting Formats

Lean Coffee

1. raw a simple Kanban board with three columns : Todo, In Progress and Done. This board will help the participants visualize the progress during the discussion.
2. After a quick introduction allow 5 minutes to the participants to individually brainstrom topic ideas. Ask everyone to write a post-it note for each topic they want to discuss.
3. Everyone takes turn and quicky pitch his ideas: What topics they want to discuss and why. Each topic ideas is added to the TODO column on the board. You have an overview of all the topics the individuals want to talk about.
4. Each participant is granted two votes. Voting twice for the same item is permitted. Everyone gather around the board and put a dot on their two favorites topics.
5. Add all votes and priorize/order the topics on the board: the most voted item will be discussed first. If there’s a lot of ideas on the board some items probably did not received any votes: you will not discuss those topics during the session. This is a great way to avoid boring discussion: you only talk about what is interesting to the group.
6. Once you have a prioritized list of the topics you want to discuss, you can move the top item into the In Progress column.
7. Set a timer to 5 minutes and you’re now ready to discuss the topic.
8. Discuss the topic until the time is out !
9. Have a silent roman vote: thumb up if you want to continue the discussion, thumb down if you want to move to the next topic. If you have a majority of thumbs up : reset the timer and continue the discussion. If you have a majority of thumbs down: move the topic to the Done column and move to the next topic !
10. At the end of the session take time to elicit key take-aways: what did we learn ? What actions can we take ?*

Source

Personal Ideas

• Use the business idea testing experiments to make a list of potential facilitation events.
• How can we use the wisdom of writing clearly, structuring thoughts and the thought process for facilitation events?
  • A small assignment where we ask people to write and think for themselves before joining? Think about how this lady with math, asking students to write first 5 min on how they would go about solving something a math problem that was information incomplete (“how would you try to solve this, if i were to give more information”).
• Quote from WAC

  [T]alk is important for sharing, clarifying, and distributing knowledge among peers, while asking questions, hypothesizing, explaining, and formulating ideas together are all important mechanisms during peer discussions. Analytical writing is an important tool for transforming rudimentary ideas into knowledge that is more coherent and structured. Furthermore, talk combined with writing appears to enhance the retention of science learning over time. (566)

• Can we use Blooms Taxonomy for facilitating ?
• Use the Coaching Habit questions as inspiration of what you try to get from an activity (Acitvity Types).
• For some people, you can use a small kan ban as a visual facilitation tool.

Resources

• YouTube Channel: Chad Littlefield
• YouTube Channel: Facilitating XYZ
• YouTube Channel: AJ&Smart
• YouTube Channel: Adriana Girdler (Project Management))
• YouTube Channel: workshop.work (Podcast on Workshop Facilitation)
• YouTube Channel: North Star Facilitators
• Book: Pocket Guide to Facilitating Human Connection - Touches on Experiential Facilitation
• Book: Ask Powerful questions - Touches on Dialogue Facilitation
• YouTube Video: How To Think Faster
• YouTube Video: Deal with dominant people in conversation
• Training: The Effective Facilitator
• YouTube Video: Process Facilitation Explained