Facilitation: 12 Principles of Process Facilitation - Principle 12: Personal Mastery

Hi,

This is the final part of of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

To facilitate others, a facilitator shall first facilitate him/herself from a Personal Group to a Personal Team.

1. Do you understand your own Purposes of being a facilitator?

2. Are you putting your own personal issues out of the ways of your clients?

3. Do you take enough care of yourself to make yourself fit for the role of being a facilitator?

4. Do you facilitate your own problem-solving?

5. Have you ensured your own ideas & opinions are being heard by yourself?

Facilitating yourself first before facilitating others!

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

Facilitation: 12 Principles of Process Facilitation - Principle 11: Purpose of Facilitation

Hi,

Here is Part 11 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

Facilitation is about making things easier and faster for a group of people. But what makes things easier and faster?

The core question is what is the main difference between a "group" and a "team"?

People use these 2 terms interchangeably, but they are totally different things. We always talk about "team-building", but we seldom heard of "group-building".

In a group, members work together but independently towards different hidden goals. However in a team, members work inter-dependently towards mutually agreed goals.

The productivity of a team is caused by Synergy. Synergy can only be created when people working together physically and mentally for the same goals. Facilitation is turning a "group" into a temporary "team" during the session.

Facilitation helps making the internal processes of individual members explicit so that everyone knows, understands and finally agrees on externalized means and ends of the "group". Then, a "team" is formed.

No team-building exercise or activity can be effective. They can be a "team" when "playing" the exercises. But when returning to work setting, "team" turns back into "group". Only when members getting used to working together physically and mentally can really build teams.

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

Facilitation: 12 Principles of Process Facilitation - Principle 10: Closing

Hi,

This is Part 10 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

The goal of facilitation is to make things easier and faster. During the session, a facilitator promotes the easiness and speed of discussion, ideas generation, conflicts resolution and finally decisions making. However, nothing will happen if the decisions made were not enforced.

The function of Closing is to ensure all decisions are being put into action.

3 core items must be reviewed at this point:

1. Are all the Objectives being accomplished?

2. Are all Outstanding Items being discussed?

3. Are all Actions agreed being assigned?

Closing is always a new opening, an opening for all the works to be actually done!

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

12 Principles of Process Facilitation: Principle 9 - Decision Making

Hi,

This is Part 9 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

The ultimate goal of Facilitation is to produce Synergy. Synergy exists only when everybody agrees and decides to act in the same direction.

Conflicts Resolution encourages agreement and paves the path for consensus. Consented Decision leads to Synergy!

The bigger the group, the less decisive it is!

When more people participates, difference in opinions causes confusion and chaos. At the end, it either turns up to be discussion without decision, or the majority is following the decisions of those who speak loudest or those with greatest authority!

2 mechanisms are needed for effective Consented Decisions - a Discussion Mechanism and a Decision Mechanism.

Any systematic analytical tool can be a good Discussion Mechanism, from a simple Cost & Benefits Analysis, Scenario Analysis, Fish-Bone Analysis to a very complex Weighted Ranking Analysis. These tools allow an orderly and comprehensive input of ideas from all the participants so that everyone is being heard.

An effective Decision Mechanism is something that agreed by all participants. People co-operates better during and after the process when they agree with the process before starting.

Don't mix up the 2 mechanisms. People might not agree with the option which scores highest during the Discussion. Explicit and formalize the decision making process with a Decision Mechanism so that everyone knows it is their own decision!

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

12 Principles of Process Facilitation: Principle 8 - Conflicts Resolution

Hi,

Here comes Part 8 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

The core role of a facilitator is a Facilitator of Arguments!

People has different points of view, opinions and ideas. These can conflict with each others. It is just a matter of either voicing out the conflicts or not.

If it is not voiced out, nothing can happen.

Both quarrelling and argument is surfacing of the conflicts. Quarrelling is the conflict between people while argument is the conflict between ideas. Facilitators promote rational arguments. Participants talk about both their opinions and the reasons behind.

Rational Argument enhances mutual understanding, ideas generation and eventually conflicts resolution. People understands the rationale behind others' conflicting opinions, and thus provides more ground for generating new ideas which can accomodate everybody's concerns.

We promote, or even foster argument in meetings.

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

12 Principles of Process Facilitation - Principle 7: Energizing

Hi,

This is Part 7 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

Energy exists in any kind of meetings. This is the collective total of the energy levels of all the participants. There are negative and positive energy inside a group. Energy can be physical, mental and psychological. Physcial Energy is about the activation level of the body. Mental Energy is the activation level of the mind. Psychological Energy is the attitude of the participants.

The higher is the total energy level, the greater is the participation. Therefore, we can promote participation by enhancing the energy of the group.

Being a facilitator, we monitor the energy level at all times. Once it fall to a lower than active level, we kick in with rechargers to re-energize the group.

Anything that re-energize can be a recharger. From some simple stretching exercises to telling a joke to taking a break. Have a list of rechargers in mind so that you can use them whenever needed.

However, the most reliable source of energy is the facilitator her/himself. If you remain active all the way, you are radiating your energy to all participants.

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

Facilitation: 12 Principles of Process Facilitation - Principle 6: Full Participation

Hi,

This is Part 6 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

One of the core duties of a Facilitator is to encourage participation. Why participation is so important?

It is simply because More Participation, More Ideas can be Generated.

Only when people thinks there is Fairness and Everybody is of Similar Degree of Participation, they will then actively participate.

Being fair, they must have the right to say anything that is relevant and somebody will respond to what they have said.

It is also fair when everybody participate at a similar degree. Nobody dominates and nobody does nothing.

It is full participation that turns a "Group" into a "Team".

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

Facilitation: 12 Principles of Process Facilitation - Principle 5: Recording

Hi,

Here comes Part 5 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

Facilitators record almost every ideas generated by the participants. It is a very tiring job. Why do they do so?

The purpose of recording is never recording!

Recording is never the core task of a facilitator. Facilitators' task is to make thing easier and faster for the participants during the process. If recording is just for recording, it is something after the process!

Recording is for Ideas Generation!

The ideas written down out there continuously stimulate the minds of the participants to generate even more ideas. The ideas recorded also present to every participants the flow of their thoughts and keep everybody on track.

So, don't record for recording!

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

Facilitation: 12 Principles of Process Facilitation - Principle 4: Ideas Generation

Hi,

This is Part 4 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

Today, every company wants more ideas from their people, but people are reluctant to give away their ideas.

The secret to ideas generation is "people needs ideas to trigger off more ideas!"

The more ideas are being thrown out, the more ideas are going to be thrown out.

Then, what triggers off the first few ideas will be crucial to any ideas generating session. When people are involved, they will talk about their points of view, which then stimulate others' thinking.

So, you first step to generate ideas is not generating ideas, but to get your people's participation. Do anything to make them involved and then request for their points of view about the subject. Then ideas will be coming.

Accept simple or even stupid ideas, particularly at the very beginning. These ideas stimulate generation of more ideas!

How to get your people participating? Let's discuss in Principle 6: Full Participation later.

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

Facilitation: 12 Principles of Process Facilitation - Principle 3: Questioning

Hi,

This is Part 3 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

I stopped writing this series for a while and decided to complete the whole series within these 2 months. This series is an introduction to the 12 principles of facilitation taught in our Associate Facilitator Designation Program.

Our topic today is about Questioning. In facilitating any meeting or activity, questioning is the explicit part of facilitation. Facilitators use questions to generate ideas, getting opinion or gathering information.

The right questions are more than just the question itself. It is about asking the Right Question, at the Right Moment to the Right Person(s). The best question but asked at the wrong moment and to the wrong person can produce nothing.

What is the Right Question? It depends on what is really needed at that particular moment!

If information is needed, you ask questions for gathering facts, feelings or desires. If clarification is needed, you ask probing questions. If participants are too shy, you can consider some naive questions. When you are encountering some sensitive issues, indirect questions can be most appropriate. When something is wrong about the process of meeting, some meta-process questions might be helpful. If you need to draw participants' attention, rhetorical questions could be your choice.

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

Facilitation: 12 Principles of Process Facilitation - Principle 2: Opening

Hi,

This is Part 2 of the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

Opening is how we start facilitating a session. A good start is a good session!

A good session is a session where participants involved and participated actively. To ensure maximum participation, everybody must understand why they meet and what are expected from them. The greatest assumption is that they already know the reasons and the expectations!

So, as a facilitator, you must help your participants to answer 3 questions:

1. Why they meet?
2. What are going to be discussed?
3. How will the discussion be done?

Don't start anything before these questions are fully answered.

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel

Facilitation: 12 Principles of Process Facilitation (plus Principle 1: Preparation)

Hi,

Facilitation is making the process easier and faster.

To make learning facilitation and doing facilitation easier and faster, I designed the 12 Principles of Process Facilitation.

You an apply facilitation in any process in your organization, no matter it is a meeting, or a brainstorming, conflicts resolution, idea-generation or decision-making session.

I will discuss very briefly (to make it easier and faster!) each of the 12 Principles here and in subsequent articles. Here comes the first principle, Preparation: Creating Base of Successful Facilitation.

Facilitation needs a concrete base to start. Preparation is the key. Preparation happens before the sessions. The most important part is Contracting.

Contracting is not signing of the agreement. It is about both the Facilitator and the Client knowing "what" are going to and need to be happened.

Apart from the "what", ensure both parties understand the "where", "when", "who" and some "how" in order to accomplish the "why" of the process.

Keith
Explore, Exceed & Excel