Facilitation, Facilitation, Facilitation…!

"Facilitation Uncovered" - 20th March 2012

The word “facilitation” is coming up more and more at work these days. My senior manager first mentioned it to me in a one-to-one meeting at least a year ago, as it was something he could see me doing in the future, to help our research teams get more out of their project and brainstorming meetings. Now, as I get more involved in Knowledge Management at work, it is being mentioned again, as facilitated events such as Peer Assists and Peer Reviews are a key part of the “learning before, whilst and after” cycle.

So, when I saw an evening event called “Facilitation Uncovered” being advertised by SLA Europe, I jumped at it, and booked straight away. The session was run by Linda Cockburn, a freelance facilitator and trainer with more than 10 years’ experience, including several years at the BBC. There were eleven of us in the group, allowing for plenty of interaction and discussion.

Linda’s task was a tough one, given that she only had one hour to instil in us the essentials of facilitation! A quick round of introductions led to our first learning point – Linda had used the opportunity to create a rough map of the room with our names indicating our seating positions, and recommended that a facilitator repeats each name three times, to help it stick and enable them to use names throughout the session.

We were split into three small groups for an exercise in which we each had to think of two or three questions starting with, “As a facilitator, how do I….?” Each group used Post-its to add their questions to a flip-chart, and where possible similar questions were grouped together. I was quite surprised at the lack of overlap in our group; most of the questions were different, reflecting our different work circumstances, priorities, and concerns.

Each group summarised their questions, and Linda addressed the main ones, providing answers and solutions. This activity in itself provided another learning point – it’s really helpful to keep checking back with group members that you have correctly understood the point they are making.

We then heard Linda’s Essentials of Facilitation, covering:

Planning

• Be clear about the outcome – then you can design a session which works towards it.
• Draw up a timetable – in sections, including activities, outcomes, timings, resources
• Prepare yourself – eg. Arrive early to set up, wear a watch, make a confident start

Lead the Process

• Generate an atmosphere of trust and safety
• Be the host – welcome people, make introductions
• Set the scene (ABCD) – gain their Attention, put over the Benefits, set out your Credentials, give the session Direction
• Set out ground rules – if you feel these are necessary

Know your role

• Maintain the distinction between the role of facilitator, and the group. You cannot be both, it just won’t work.

Linda then suggested a good way of structuring a meeting, which involved splitting it into three timed sections:

• Divergent Thinking – where different opinions are welcomed and discussed
• Convergent Thinking – where consensus begins to emerge and “what is important” is defined
• End Point – conclusions, action points to be taken forward

I found this a particularly useful concept, and will be using this in my own situation.

One of the participants asked about a situation where two people, or two factions, were completely opposed, and how to deal with that. We had quite a discussion on the subject, and various suggestions emerged:

• Speak directly to those disagreeing – “is this going the way you want it to?” – get them to take some responsibility for the outcome
• Bring in other people – perhaps those who haven’t spoken for a while – and see if what they have to say helps the situation
• Agree a timeframe for dealing with the dispute, or take it outside the session
• If you can anticipate that there may be such problems in a meeting, try to plan for it

Overall I found the session really useful, and made some good contacts too. I have no doubt I will be returning to Linda's tips and pointers in the future.

Giant strides on Leap Day

29^th February 2012 proved to be quite a big day for me. Not only was it the first presentation I’ve had to give in quite a while, but the purpose of the presentation was to introduce the principles and concept of Knowledge Management to our Research team leaders, with a view to introducing KM over the next few months.

Some people take presentation and public speaking in their stride – I’m very envious of this ability! Over my nearly thirty-year career, I’ve had to get up and talk to people from time to time, and for me, it doesn’t seem to get any easier. No matter how thoroughly I prepare, I’m always nervous on the day. On this occasion, the self-imposed pressure was increased by the feeling that I had this one chance to get my message across – I’d introduced the principles of KM to my senior manager before Christmas, and he was keen to spread the word further. This is an opportunity for me to raise my profile at work, and work more closely with the Research team and others across the company.

So, how did I approach the task in hand? I read blogs on public speaking and presentations, and attended a seminar on presentation skills. I went to a talk on “Confidence in the Workplace”, and read presenter Kate Atkin’s book , “The Confident Manager”. I also drew lessons from the recent NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) course I’d attended. On the practical side, I worked hard to make my presentation relevant and interesting, flagging up the benefits of KM early on and reiterating them at the end. I’m afraid I DID use bullet points on quite a few slides, but not many on each one, and I definitely did not read them out!!

One of the blog posts I’d found very interesting and useful was Bethan Ruddock’s post on using scripted presentations. I really identified with this from Bethan’s post: 

“I’d love to be able to talk off the cuff, come up with apt and informative points based on minimal notes, but I can’t. No matter how many times I practice, if I don’t know exactly what I’m going to say next, I go all of a flutter, and end up saying nothing but ‘umm… errr… umm’.”

This is exactly my problem, and for a long time I toyed with the idea of doing my presentation from a script. In the end, I didn’t, but having written a script really helped me to get into my head some of the phrases and terminology I wanted to use. I rehearsed using my script several times, then decided it wasn’t going to work for me (partly because I knew the presentation would take place in a small room, sitting around a table, and it would be so obvious if the script was in front of me!!). I tried rehearsing with nothing at all, and was pleasantly surprised to find that, as long as the slides were in visible, the words were coming. Not always fluently, but I thought I should be able to get by. There were a few key phrases I wanted to be sure to have at my fingertips, so I wrote those out to refer to, in case I needed them.

The big day arrived, and I woke up with the familiar knot in my stomach. Actually I was quite pleased with myself for getting this far without one – in the past I’ve started to feel nervous earlier than that! The presentation was booked for 3 pm, so I had to get through the rest of the day, and get some productive work done, before it started.

Finally, there we were, in the meeting room; I was introduced, I opened my mouth and the words came out. Sometimes not exactly as I would have wanted them to, but no-one left because of it! The slides worked, and I only referred to my notes once. I’d forgotten at the start to invite questions and interruptions at any time, and when I did so part-way through, I got one straight away, and dealt with it with no problems.

There was a useful discussion when I’d finished, and we agreed that I would meet individually with each of the attendees as a next step, to find out what their individual concerns and issues are, with respect to Knowledge Management within the team.

What did I learn from the experience?

• No matter how well I prepare for presentations, I may have to accept the fact that I will always feel nervous beforehand. Two people I’ve spoken to since have said this is a good thing! I tried hard to identify what exactly I was nervous about, and still haven’t been able to answer that fully. So – recognise it, accept it and move on!
• Once I’d started, it was easier to relax and enjoy it. I’ve noticed this before, too, and it’s something to remember when I’m feeling nervous beforehand. From my NLP reading, I’m convinced that because I’ve got into a pattern of thinking “I hate doing presentations and always feel nervous and get tongue-tied”, this is my automatic response whenever I’m asked to give a presentation. Pretty much a self-fulfilling prophecy!
• One of the tips I picked up from the seminar I attended on giving presentations was to do with breathing. It’s obvious really, but if you don’t breathe properly, the lack of oxygen to the brain can impede clear thinking. I made a real effort to take some deep breaths before I started, and took my time to breathe when I could feel myself gabbling a bit!
• There’s not much I would have changed about how things went, but I will ensure next time that I mention at the start that questions and interruptions are fine (if that’s the case).
• If nothing else – this went well and was a good confidence booster for next time!

Useful links:

Bethan Ruddock’s post on presenting, mentioned above (and links within it): http://bethaninfoprof.wordpress.com/2011/05/16/presenting/

 

Excellent blog on presentations/public speaking:

http://andnowpresenting.typepad.com/professionally_speaking/

 

 Kate Atkin’s book:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Confident-Manager-Confidence-Communication-Successful/dp/1906316155