Are you running workshop and facilitating meetings?
Well, in this video, I'm going to give you the top five facilitation skills that are
going to make you an amazing facilitator.
And if you stay tuned to the end of this video, I'm going to give you something really special
so that you can facilitate your projects and not just be amazing at facilitating your meetings.
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Now, if you're excited about learning some expert level facilitation skills, so that
you can have awesome outcomes, like this video, and let's get to it.
Create an inclusive environment.
I cannot tell you how critical this particular facilitation skill is and how many times I've
participated in meetings where the facilitator did not have an inclusive environment.
So it's really important that all your participants feel like they're part of one team when they're
in any workshop or meeting, and that they're all there together in order really to do the
same thing.
Achieve whatever goal that your meeting or workshop is all about.
So how can you really create an inclusive environment?
Well, there's a couple of ways.
I think the first and foremost is icebreaker activities are a great way to do it.
Check out my videos on icebreaker activities.
I've tons of a lot of fun ones, both live and virtual, but that's really important because
that just kind of lightens the mood.
And it's really great when you have people who don't really know each other.
Another thing when it comes to inclusive environment is to ensure that you're really monitoring
participation.
You want to make sure everybody is participating.
One of the key things that I do in order to help facilitate this, is when I have exercises
that I want my participants to perform in.
I actually make every individual do the exercise first.
Kind of like the first kick at the can, and then I put them in breakout rooms, so they
actually all come prepared with their own ideas and they have something to talk about
versus going into the group, and maybe only one or two people being the more dominant
ones are controlling the conversation.
That's a nice way to ensure an inclusive environment.
Another thing which is also on participation is see who the quiet ones are.
You're going to have to draw them out, and a really nice way is maybe to ask a group
consensus from everyone.
That may be a raise of hands, show of hands, how everyone is feeling.
Or sometimes I have like these little popsicle sticks with a yes and no in the background.
And this way everyone can participate, particularly the quiet ones.
And last but not least a very important one.
Sometimes you need to kick out management from the meeting.
Absolutely.
This one becomes important because if you're looking for inclusiveness amongst the participants,
sometimes when you have management in the meeting, they're going to be very quiet, just
generally speaking, and they're not really going to speak up.
They're not going to give you honest answers because they're afraid politically of management
being in there.
So there are a lot of times when I have rules.
I'm sorry, management, you are not allowed.
And as well as the facilitator really important, just because you don't allow management in
there, please do not tell them everything that everybody said.
Really make sure that what is said here stays in here.
Actively listen.
The key to communication actually is all about how well do you listen, and as a facilitator,
this becomes really important.
Why?
Because people are apt to communicate more if they find that they're listened to.
So this becomes a real big part of facilitation.
So how can you do active listening?
Well, first and foremost, a no brainer is you want to have eye contact with people.
You want to know and let them know that you're actually looking at them and listening to
them.
Another one is having receptive body language.
If I'm crossing my arms and kind of not really paying attention and sideways.
I've talked about body language before.
It becomes really important because then I can right from your body language, see that
you're not interested in what I'm saying.
And that's the last thing you want to do in a workshop or meeting when you're facilitating.
You want to make everybody feel inclusive.
Remember that first tip.
Now as well, you have to be neutral and non-judgemental.
It's really important as a facilitator.
This session is about you achieving a goal.
Who cares about your opinion?
That's why you have people in the room so that you can grab their opinion, collect what's
needed in order to really achieve the goal of the session.
So you have to be neutral, have no judgment when it comes to what people say.
And respect every opinion because you'll be amazed.
Sometimes the person who's dissenting in the room, sometimes can have the idea that we
build off of that becomes a solution.
And what becomes really important is be a parrot.
I want you to repeat back to people what they've said.
So if someone was saying something and here's an example.
So Susie was talking about her concerns she had, maybe a couple of points and then she
finished.
And then this is what you would say, just to make sure that she knows that you were
actively listening.
"Susie, thank you so much for your points.
I really appreciate it.
What I want to do is I just want to sum up what you said so that I know clearly the points
that you're trying to let us know, and you want to add to this particular idea.
So tell me at any point, if I didn't understand this correctly.
So you would like to have ABC and ensure that XYZ is implementing the program.
Did I hear you correctly on that?"
And then she has a choice of saying yes or no, and of course correcting you if you didn't
get it right.
And then at that point you can say, "Thank you, Susie.
I'm just now going to capture it on my flip chart paper, capture it on the computer, have
my assistant capture it," however you're going to do it.
But now that is so important for active listening, because people feel like they're being heard
and you captured their information correctly.
Be prepared.
For some of you, you may be going, Adriana, that's a no brainer.
But I'm letting you know, it's unfortunately not a no brainer because I don't know how
many times I've gone into meetings, not as a facilitator, as a participant and people
just weren't prepared.
I don't understand why you wouldn't have prepared.
So simple things like what's the purpose, goal and agenda items.
That becomes critical for facilitation skills.
You really want to ensure you set things up right.
The work is in the preparation.
Executing it actually in my opinion is really easy.
It's the preparatory work that you do that is going to be critical.
So have those agendas, understand what the goal is.
Ensure you invited the right people.
This is why the purpose, the goals and the agenda become really important because it
allows you to know, do you have the right people in the room?
Now you also want to take a look at pre-read and pre-work.
So I find for a lot of my creative brainstorming sessions where we're really trying to get
answers, then I really need to do some pre-read and pre-work.
So what could that be?
So if I want them to just get acquainted with something, I may just give pre-read something
I set up, so that walking into the meeting, they actually know what's going on.
I may even give them a video on something if there's like a concept that I want them
to be aware of.
But more important, I actually like the pre-work.
So I will create a simple exercise probably to really baseline what we're trying to do
and just get everyone on that same page, and I'll have it due a few days before so that
I can compile it.
And then when we walk into the session, we're actually building off of something that everyone
worked on, validating it, which allows me to jump right into exercises.
So that becomes really, really important.
And last but not least when it comes to being prepared is make sure you have all your tools
available.
Now, if you're in a live session, I actually have my famous blue suitcase, which I actually
have all my stuff in there.
Markers, post-it notes, Sharpies, you name it, I got it.
Just in case that we're in a room, I have everything at my fingertips and I can pull
it out.
I even have my games and for those who need physical touch for thinking, I have Play-Doh,
toys, you name it.
I have everything.
Now for virtual meetings, obviously I don't have a suitcase to roll out at a live meeting.
It's a little bit different.
I create a SharePoint site and that SharePoint site is a central location that is all prepared.
So we all are going into the same place, and it really ensures that everything is smooth.
So be prepared.
I can't tell you how critical that skill set is.
Manage time and guidelines.
So as a facilitator, I always tell people, I'm also your timekeeper.
So I'm always trying to make sure we are on track, staying on time because I have jam
packed my sessions.
Every minute and moment counts, so we want to keep people on track.
Now what helps me a lot on my guidelines is that I have specific meeting rules, workshop
rules, guidelines.
I'll be honest, I'm more of a rule gal, where I'm saying, this is what we have to do, but
there's simple things like ensure that you participate fully, be on time when you're
returning from breaks.
If it's a live session, I'll actually say phones and computers off.
And if it's a virtual session, I'll say video on.
So these are just some of the things that I need from those participants to ensure that
we are all on the same page, same level playing field.
Now you can check out this video over here because I actually have a video totally dedicated
on meeting rules that you can check out and get some ideas from.
But this becomes really important because it's not just about the objective and goals.
It's how you're getting there, and you really have to keep track of time.
Master the wrap up.
Okay, you've done your due diligence.
You're prepared.
You're the timekeeper.
You have everything orchestrated perfectly.
Don't get lazy and forget about the most final and probably critical because you're going
to have actions happening outside of this particular session you came together, which
is the wrap-up.
Ensure that at the end, you really do book some time to talk about all agreements.
What everyone has decided to do.
Any action items, due dates, responsibilities.
I always like to end things off, particularly in a workshop, next steps.
Here's what you can expect is going to happen when you walk out of this room.
I think that's really important because it lets people know it's not over just yet.
We just got together to get the information.
But now probably the real heavy lifting, particularly in projects, is after those meetings because
now people have action items that they have to execute and do.
So you may really want to consider having someone who is like an assistant who can help
you and capture all that information as it's going on.
So that all it is, it's a very simple review.
Wrap it up.
Ensure with all your documentation, you send it off right away to the business owner, project
manager, whomever it is that you're facilitating for.
And really ensure that you even get some evaluation and feedback.
How did you do?
A very simple technique is you can give everybody two colored sticky notes and say, okay, tell
me what really worked well?
What would be improved upon?
And then with those color sticky notes, blue can be sadness.
So yellow can be sunshine, what you really liked.
And then they can just put it up on the wall.
But there's also some great electronic forms too, like Microsoft forms, even Google has
something similar too, and I know there's tons out there that you can use and send off
to people.
Just remember if you do those electronic forms, the key is to send it off immediately, or
even get everybody to spend five minutes at the end of the session to do it.
Because if people don't do it right away, the rate of return is very, very low.
So just letting you know.
Now that you have some key facilitation skills under your belt, it is time to know how to
take these facilitation skills to the next level, and that could very well be you facilitating
a project meeting.
I can't tell you how important these things are.
So I would like for you to go in the link below and grab this, it is free.
It is chock filled with tons of information on how to ensure what you're doing from a
project perspective, or even very transferable to any sort of meeting activity or even work
activity on how to ensure you're successful at what you do.
So I really highly recommend you grab this from the link below.
On that note, I am so glad that you stayed to the end.
If you could please like this video, share it with everybody that you know, and let me
know in the comments below.
Do you have any facilitation skills that you would add to this list?
Thanks.
Bye.