How often do you meet? Do you meet in person or virtually? How do you know? One of the most challenging aspects related to leading partnerships and coalitions is determining an appropriate meeting schedule. You want to keep your members engaged and working together well. You don’t want to overburden yourself or your members by […]
Effective Meetings: The Schedule Read More »
We have spent the last 15 weeks on facilitation and are transitioning for the next four weeks to “effective meetings”. Facilitation and effective meetings are very linked. As a matter of fact, in order to have an effective meeting, you must have effective facilitation. However, facilitation alone will not make your meeting effective. This week
Effective meetings: The purpose Read More »
As I mentioned last week, every group has dominators and quiet voices. As important as it is to pull out quiet voices, it’s also very important to address the dominators with grace. They are dominators for a reason. They may be particularly passionate about a topic, highly extroverted, very engaged and wanting to contribute or
Facilitation: Addressing dominators with grace Read More »
Every group has dominators as well quiet voices, and as a facilitator, it is important for you to find ways to pull out quiet voices. This isn’t always easy! There may be power dynamics (position, gender, race, education and more), new members who aren’t yet comfortable sharing their perspective, introverted members who would rather not
Facilitation: Pulling out quiet voices Read More »
Facilitating groups can be extremely rewarding but they can also be extremely exhausting. One of the situations that makes facilitation particularly exhausting is when there is a lack of trust among group members. This may be trust among just a couple of group members between one another or it may be a lack of trust
Facilitation: Lack of trust Read More »
Most of us do not enjoy conflict. Some of us try to avoid it entirely and others try to pretend it doesn’t exist. Some will address it aggressively while others attempt to figure out a way to address it without causing more conflict. If we facilitate groups long enough, there will be conflict and it’s
Facilitation: Group that has underlying conflict Read More »
You may have a newly formed group or a group that has been meeting for a while that includes a mix of participants who know each other well and other members that are brand new and don’t yet know anyone. As a facilitator, it can be particularly challenging to meet the needs of everyone in
Facilitation: Group with both new and experienced members Read More »
If you are facilitating a group that has been meeting for a while, you may have some group members who are continuing to be engaged and enthusiastic about the work while other group members have lost interest and moved on to other priorities. You may have achieved some tremendous successes and are trying to figure
Facilitation: Group that has been meeting for a while Read More »
Facilitating a newly formed group has unique challenges and opportunities that need to be considered. In a newly formed group, you need to consider that the group members may not know one another and may have very different perspectives on the topic or purpose of the group. It’s really important to assess and build relationships
Facilitation: A newly formed group Read More »