Facilitation

Our usual meeting structures don’t support the vulnerable, messy change demanded of this moment. We need to be better listeners. We need to ask better questions.

Facilitation enhances meetings of all kinds, builds bridges, and helps envision future projects and ways of being together.

Facilitation means to make something easier or more likely to happen. As a facilitator, I play many roles, all toward those ends. I hold the space, keep an eye on the clock, stay attuned to everyone’s vibe, and serve as a gentle referee when people forget the ground rules.

It’s easy to minimize or disregard what a facilitator can bring to an organization. Facilitation can …

  • help a team clarify roles and purpose — often useful during periods of rapid growth or when there has been a lot of turnover.

  • bridge gaps between groups that have different agendas or ways of understanding an issue — often useful when forming new collaborations or addressing perceived “turf wars.”

  • provide structure and maintain a through line during complex planning sessions — often useful for systems-level work.

  • offer new interpretations of your structure or mission — often useful when you’re in a rut.

Good facilitation opens up possibilities and makes previously invisible connections visible.

“We urgently need to bring to our communities the limitless capacity to love, serve, and create for and with each other.” - Grace Lee Boggs

Facilitation takes many different shapes. It can include storytelling in circles, embodying an issue by making a physical shape, creating worst case scenarios worthy of a Hollywood disater film, and listening. A lot of listening.

After conversation(s) about your needs and goals, I craft a facilitated experience that will move your organization’s process forward. No matter the form that takes, I always bring the following:

  • creation of a safe and open space in which ideas can emerge

  • breaking down hierarchy so that all voices are heard and equally relevant

  • activities that are playful & humanizing to help us bring our entire selves to the table

  • frequent checking in to ensure we’re going in a useful direction; I’m not afraid to drop the script if a new approach is needed.

Examples of my facilitation work:

ONE

  • Client: Three teams of scholars

  • Issue: How to find common ground across disciplines and projects toward a shared community- and narrative-based framework.

  • Sessions: Over the course of four 2-hour meetings, we used storytelling, drawing, and clay modeling to learn about each other’s work and identify overlapping areas.

TWO

  • Client: Coalition of nonprofits

  • Issue: The group of 30+ members from various organizations hadn’t met since before the pandemic. They needed to reconnect and establish a three-year agenda.

  • Sessions: During a morning-long session and three shorter followups, we used writing prompts and paired sharing, exercises that encourage BIG thinking; and physically moving in the space to indicate preferences.

  • Outcome: The group identified three main purposes for its work; self-organized into working groups; and identified short- and long-term goals.

THREE

  • Client: The James Gang, an umbrella nonprofit of other nonprofits

  • Issue: For its 20th birthday, the James Gang wanted to capture its history across its numerous iterations.

  • Sessions: For three hours, we held a fishbowl format with a center circle for talking and outer rings for listening; people had a chance to tap into the inner circle when we reached the era during which they participated with the organization.

  • Outcomes: Everyone had a chance to participate in the inner circle and share memories. The organization’s complex history was captured and shared.