2 Skills to Listen Like a Facilitator
A facilitator's job is to pull knowledge out of the people in the room, rather than pushing content. This means setting aside our tendencies to give advice or solve problems and simply listen. In this blog, we discuss how this is done using two simple techniques: paraphrasing and asking questions.
Reframing Team Decision-Making: Collaborative Decisions Made Easy
Most teams know how to have a successful brainstorming session. Coming up with ideas usually isn’t the challenge; it’s how to decide what to do with the ideas where they get stuck. In this blog, we break down different types of decisions and different collaboration methods that can help you make the right choice.
Chaos to Clarity: 4 Ways of Grouping Ideas
Navigating through a sea of sticky note ideas can feel like trying to organize confetti after a New Year’s bash. In this blog, we break down four methods for grouping ideas and demonstrate how to turn those groups into actionable themes and insights you can use after your brainstorming session.
Looking Back to Move Forward: Future Search as a Meeting Arc
We have to come to terms with the past before we can agree on current realities. Future Search is a strategic planning and group facilitation process designed to help organizations and communities address complex issues and create a shared vision for the future.
How Visual Tools Helped Create a New Vision and Roadmap
Strategic planning meetings require techniques that ensure all voices can be heard and all ideas can be mapped so that the right decisions can be made using these ideas. In this meeting story, we break down how we did this in collaboration with the Mid-Atlantic Facilitator Network.
Meetings that “Move”: Using Movement to Increase Productivity
Movement promotes higher brain function, better behavior and lower stress. Adding movement to meetings allows people to perform well under pressure, make better decisions and work better with others. Here are a few of our favorite energizers you can use to get your team or participants moving.
How a Community-Driven Meeting Led to Results in Houston
An article published in June 2022 in The New York Times celebrates the city of Houston for doing “twice as well as the rest of the country at reducing homelessness over the previous decade,” according to a 2020 federal report. How did they do it? The answer is intentional and consistent collaboration, starting with whole-systems intervention.
6 Tips to Un-Suck Your Meetings
We’ve all attended our share of meetings and trainings that suck. It can feel like a waste of time and energy. Despite what you might think, these sessions are not pointless; they just aren’t being planned well or maybe even planned at all. Planning a meeting that doesn’t suck is easy with just a few preparation steps and basic facilitation skills.
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