Facilitation Made Easy

Most workshops and meetings will achieve more in less time if they are facilitated professionally. This book gives an introduction to the essential skills needed when running a facilitated workshop.

Most workshops and meetings will achieve more in less time if they are facilitated professionally. This book gives an introduction to the essential skills needed when running a facilitated workshop.

The facilitator's task of opening up discussion, getting ideas into the open and setting broad future direction is essential if a group is to reach consensus on a particular outcome and it is now one of the key techniques used in meetings and workshops. Facilitation Made Easy provides a practical introduction to the essential skills needed and will help readers develop a facilitation style that is unbiased and enables control without being overpowering. With detailed examples, proven tips for success, checklists and a self assessment guide to help readers test their own personal approach to facilitation, the book will help readers to: Understand the facilitator's role Develop the ideal structure for workshops and meetings Control agendas and help to focus the outcome of meetings Deal with difficulties. This third edition also includes a new chapter on facilitating virtual meetings, explaining the mechanics of virtual teams, the pros and cons of virtual meetings, use of technology and tips on setting up, facilitating and participating in virtual meetings

As a facilitator, you hold the amazing power to make a meeting or a retreat energizing and productive--or dry and demoralizing. Most of us have clear memories of attending painfully unproductive meetings; so how do you create memorable, engaging sessions that solve problems and move organizations forward? This book will serve as your trusted guide in stepping up to the plate and facilitating a room full of people--who, as you know, typically are just "thrilled" to be there. You will find everything you need to make it a great day--including pre-planning steps, agenda designs, how to get people talking, managing difficult participants, facilitation dos and don'ts, and how to finish strong. Mary Tomlinson shares her own personal stories and keys to her success from 18 years at Disney and 13 years in her own company--facilitating a variety of challenges and people groups. Her humorous examples and insights along the way will inform anyone needing to facilitate a meeting ensuring success while avoiding potholes! Facilitating is not for the weak of heart--but with the right tools, you too can be a Pro!

This practical guide details ten key principles that will profoundly change the way you think about, organize, and lead the meetings that matter most. Rather than trying to change anyone's behavior, Weisbord and Janoff show you how to change the conditions under which people interact. By doing less, you help others do more. With examples from around the world, and practical tips and exercises in every chapter, Don't Just Do Something, Stand There! gives you many new techniques for helping people discover common ground, make productive use of dissension, and take responsibility for action.

Making progress on complex, problematic situations requires a new approach to working together: transformative facilitation, a structured and creative process for removing the obstacles to fluid forward movement. It is becoming less straightforward for people to move forward together. They face increasing complexity and decreasing control. They need to work with more people from across more divides. In such situations, the most common ways of advancing—some people telling others what to do, or everyone just doing what they think they need to—aren't adequate. One better way is through facilitating. But the most common approaches to facilitating—bossy vertical directing from above or collegial horizontal accompanying from alongside—aren't adequate. They often leave the participants frustrated and yearning for breakthrough. This book describes a new approach: transformative facilitation. It doesn't choose either the bossy vertical or the collegial horizontal approach: it cycles back and forth between them. Rather than forcing or cajoling, the facilitator removes the obstacles that stand in the way of people contributing and connecting equitably. It enables people to bring their whole selves to the process. This book is for anyone who helps people work together to transform their situation, be it a professional facilitator, manager, consultant, coach, chairperson, organizer, mediator, stakeholder, or friend. It offers a broad and bold vision of the contribution that facilitation can make to helping people collaborate to make progress.