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What’s Good Facilitation? A facilitator… • Acts more like a referee than a player • Provides leadership or invites thinking without taking the reins • Offers methods for groups/individuals to develop their own answers • Helps members define and reach their own (clear) goals • Remains neutral, nonjudgmental --Ingrid Bens (2005) An effective facilitator . . . • Implements procedures to help a group reach their goal. • Manages the energy, focus, and communications of the group. • Invites thinking through creating a safe place for reflection, planning, problem solving, brainstorming, collaboration, etc. • Stays neutral on the content and focuses on the process elements. • Listens actively to understand, using attentive body language and eye contact. • Asks questions to test assumptions, invite participation, and probe for additional information. • Paraphrases to make sure members know they’re being heard and to clarify key ideas. • Summarizes periodically to check for understanding, revive a stalled discussion or to bring a group to consensus and wrap it up. • Ends with final reflections or next steps. Facilitator Functions: A facilitator simultaneously balances support, cognitive challenge, and professional vision for a group or colleague to promote their professional growth. We offer Support by establishing rapport, providing a non-judgmental sounding board, paraphrasing, providing information and resources, offering organization and structures that support thinking. We Challenge cognitively by asking questions, considering possibilities, analyzing values and beliefs. We facilitate professional Vision by developing clear goals and promoting exemplars and ideals. Support without challenge and vision offers only comfort but no growth. Challenge and vision without support can lead to anxiety and frustration. Support and challenge without Vision can leave us wandering, looking at the ground beneath us but not the road ahead. --Lipton & Wellman (2003) Page 6 “Effective Facilitation” WSASCD Conference, October 15, 2010
Best/Worst Facilitator Practices Some of the best things that facilitators can do include: • Assess the needs of the members • Create an open and trusting atmosphere • Help people understand why they are there • View yourself as servant of the group’s needs • Make participants the center of attention • Speak in simple and direct language • Encourage everyone to participate • Stay neutral • Display energy and appropriate levels of assertiveness • Treat all participants as equals • Protect participants and ideas from attack • Stay flexible and ready to change direction if necessary • Take public notes that reflect what participants mean • Listen intently to understand what’s being said • Help the group communicate • Paraphrase • Periodically summarize related ideas • Know how to use a wide range of discussion tools • Provide feedback so the group can assess their progress and make adjustments • Teach and empower others to facilitate • End each gathering with clear next steps • Insure that members feel ownership for agreed-to actions • End on a positive and optimistic note Some of the worst things that facilitators can do include: • Remain oblivious to what the group thinks or needs • Fail to listen carefully to what’s being said • Lose track of key ideas • Take notes that change the meaning of what is said • Try to be the center of attention • Get defensive • Get into personality battles • Put people down • Ignore or avoid conflict • Let a few people dominate • Never check how it’s going • Be overly passive on process • Push ahead on an irrelevant agenda • Have no alternative approaches • Let discussions get badly sidetracked • Let discussions ramble without proper closure • Be oblivious about when to stop • Be insensitive to cultural diversity issues • Use inappropriate humor “Effective Facilitation” WSASCD Conference, October 15, 2010 --Ingrid Bens (2005) Page 7
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Page 13 and 14: Reflecting on the roadblocks that y

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