Facilitate: "to make easy or easier" −− New Oxford Dictionary of English
(the act of assisting or making easier progress or improvement of something.)
"Facilitators guide people as they plan, problem-solve and learn. It is a vastly dynamic endeavor. Teachers, administrators, trainers, and presenters may all act as facilitators at various times, in various settings."
— Hot Tips for Facilitators, by Rob Abernathy and Mark Reardon,
Zephyr Press, 2003, p.1.
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Frequent activities of a facilitator include:
1. Helping a group make decisions, such as structure and process for the meeting.
2. Be a gatekeeper to insure of those decisions are followed.
3. Keep the meeting focused on one item at a time until decisions are reached.
4. Regulate the flow of discussion, engaging the quiet and limiting those who want to talk more.
5. Clarify and summarize points, test for consensus and formalize decisions.
6. Help the group deal with conflict and difference of opinion.
Frequent tools used by facilitators include:(not all inclusive)
1. Brainstorming
2. Go-arounds.
3. Small-group discussion.
4. Focus Storming
5. Intervention
6. Language skills
7. Relationships Assessment
8. Strength Assessment
9. Task and Team enablement
10. Communication and Relationship
11. Story Boards
12. Building a real thing
13. Powerful questions
14. Problem Solving
15. Story Telling
Take opportunities to achieve long lasting results!!!
| FIVE Stages of Group Development: (by Bruce Tuckerman)
Stage 1: Forming - Getting together because of a desire to be accepted by others, and to avoid controversy, conflict or threat. Particapants are viewed as stramgers.
Stage 2: Storming - The group struggles with their humanness, wanting to avoid conflict, but getting it anyway. Participants are viewed as possible partners, but with a kind of "us" vs "them" feel.
Stage 3: Norming - The group, having dealt with the struggle of stage 2, moves on toward accepting the others in the group. Participants are viewed as team members and team realizes that it can accomplish something.
Stage 4: Performing - Those groups that move through the first 3, may move on to accomplishing their chosen tasks. Participants view each other as partners in on open, trusting atmosphere with flexibility. Hierarchy is of little importanct.
Stage 5: Adjourning - The group may and likely will dissolve at some point, hopefully having accomplished their purpose or task. (Tuckman added this 10 years after the first four)
A Facilitator can enable a group to move through these stages, accomplish their mission and dissolve gracefully, having learned and come to appreciate the others in the group. Essentially, a facilitator helps a group come together, work together and disband together, all the while accomplishing something. Another picture is to see FORMING as poite, but untrusting, STORMING as evaluating personal security, NORMING as valuing others and their different viewpoints and PERFORMING as being flexible through trust.
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| Coach Charles Powell, MCC |
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| I have had over 40 years experience in working with all kinds of groups, various sizes and diverse purposes. Presently, I do almost all my coaching over the phone, but have done person to person and face to face meetings for many years. I am an accomplished public speaker and presenter. I facilitate easily and considerately, always with the others needs in mind. if you are looking for someone to facilitate a meeting for your company, please contact me.
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