International Association of Facilitators
1999 Annual Meeting
Williamsburg, Virginia, USA
January 14-17, 1999
Thread# 6: Professional and Self Development
Glenn Kiser
Kiser Consulting Services
18806 Boundary Oaks Court
Davidson, NC 28036
Ph/fx: 704-896-8264
Email: Kiser1@mindspring.com
When current behaviors no longer achieve the desired result, individuals and groups frequently seek the assistance of a facilitator. Whether helping an executive team create a strategic plan, guiding a group through a team building process, or assisting individuals in the resolution of conflict, facilitators are there to do one thing – help the client get "unstuck". Approaching the work in a systematic manner helps the facilitator ensure efficient achievement of desired results. From the development of specific skills and abilities to the effective utilization of those abilities in the intervention, facilitators need to have in mind a clear model that keeps them grounded yet enables creative approaches to intervention challenges. Through clarity of purpose, clearly defined desired results, intervention at a level that maximizes efficiency of effort and a systematic process, facilitators can enable clients to eliminate barriers, achieve extraordinary results and become more self-sufficient.
Has this ever happened to you: you’re busily working around the house and you walk from one room to another only to pause in bewilderment as you struggle to remember why you needed to go into that room? Your mind was preoccupied with the task at hand and somewhere between the first room and the second room you lost your sense of purpose. The same thing happens to individuals, team and organizations. They get so busy doing that they forget why they are doing it. Take weekly staff meetings, for example. If you surveyed the participants in any weekly meeting, I wonder how many different interpretations you might get of the purpose for the meeting. Unless the group has explicitly addressed the issue, the potential exists for members to be working at cross-purposes, come to the meeting unprepared and otherwise waste their valuable time and energy. One of the fundamental and most powerful of facilitator interventions is to spend adequate time and energy helping the person or group articulate a clear purpose.
The facilitator must also have in mind a clear understanding of his/her own purpose. Limiting one’s raison d’être to that of "making it easier for the group" misses the larger opportunity. The effective facilitator sees his/her role one of both helping the group become "unstuck" and helping the group become more able to "unstick" itself. Making it easier for the group may, in fact, prevent the group from learning needed knowledge and skills. At the completion of a truly effective facilitation, the individual or group will be more capable of handling similar issues in the future.
Thinking back to our hypothetical weekly staff meeting, I often wonder how many in the group can tell whether or not the meeting is achieving the desired result. I sometimes wonder if the meeting leader even knows. In addition to being a bit fuzzy on the purpose for what they are doing, many individuals, teams and organizations are even less clear on the true desired outcome. The second fundamental for facilitators is the recognition that clarity of desired result is crucial to the effectiveness of the individual or group. Clarification of the client’s desired result provides both a means of measuring progress and a tool for re-focusing the group in the unlikely (!) event that the members stray from the task.
Facilitators, too, must be clear on the desired result and evaluate each intervention for its ability to help the client progress toward the objective. For example, a facilitator may be well versed in the use of a particular personality instrument and be tempted to build it into the intervention design. An honest assessment of the motivation behind the use of the instrument may reveal that it is more for the facilitator’s enjoyment than as an efficient means of helping the client succeed. The question for the facilitator is this: "Does this intervention efficiently and effectively move us closer to the desired objective?"
Where and when the facilitator intervenes is at least as important as what the facilitator does. For instance, a team leader may request training in conflict management skills for her entire team when, in fact, only two members of the group are involved in some sort of conflict. Rather than address the issue at the personal level with those involved, the leader chooses to take a more indirect, and potentially ineffective, approach. The most efficient and effective intervention would occur directly with those involved in the conflict.
A personal example may serve to further clarify the issue. Being slightly masochistic, I frequently attempt to play golf. After investing large sums of money in golf books, golf magazines, golf videos and countless gadgets "guaranteed" to lower my score, I took a lesson from a professional instructor. Having the pro watch my feeble attempts to hit the ball and provide me with immediate feedback quickly put me on the path to more enjoyment if not lower scores.
The point is this: the most efficient, effective approach to change takes place on a personal level in the present state. Facilitators must be alert to every opportunity to address client behavior in the here-and-now, where small changes can produce dramatic results.
Facilitation is a systematic process of intervention into the on-going activities of an individual, group or organization that is unable to achieve objectives with its present level of knowledge, skills and abilities. Effective facilitation enables the client to remove current barriers to effectiveness and also equips the client with the capability to effectively deal with similar barriers in the future. The facilitation process may be divided into the following phases: initial contact, clarifying results and contracting, analysis and design, facilitation and evaluation of results.
It’s sometimes helpful to think of the initial contact phase as the hoops you make people jump through to do business with you. Don’t think you make people jump through hoops? Let’s start at the beginning: how do people find you? Can they easily locate your name, telephone number and/or e-mail address? To how many different people do they get to explain their situation before they finally get to you? If they leave a message, what’s the average length of time before you call them back? In your haste to call the client back, do you take the time to do a little bit of research on the organization? When you do talk to the client, do they have your undivided attention or are you flipping through the mail as you "listen"? Do you work to build rapport as you gain understanding of the situation?
Your initial contact process should reflect your overall approach to facilitation. If you promise the client effective, efficient help, that’s the impression the person should receive from this phase of the process.
In some cases, this step may be all the facilitation you need to do. The process of helping the other party identify the true desired objective may illuminate the causes of a problem and allow for the exploration of alternative actions. Once the end result is clear, some people and groups have the necessary resources to change to more effective behaviors. Getting to this point, however, can require that a facilitator use every listening, questioning, probing, clarifying and reframing skill that he/she possesses.
Reaching an understanding of the true desired result sets the stage for establishing effective measures. It is here that the parties agree upon the indicators of successful facilitation and how the data will be obtained.
This is the step where you can set free all of that right-brained creativity that has been impatiently suffering through the first phases. There is, however, one requirement. Every activity, instrument, group discussion or other intervention must be evaluated to determine whether or not it contributes to the desired outcome. From room set-up to meals to the timing of breaks, each element of the facilitation should, in some way, help move the individual or group closer to the agreed upon results. Facilitators must understand their own biases to ensure that interventions are done for the benefit of the other party rather than for the enjoyment of the facilitator.
All of the research and planning comes together as the facilitator uses his/her skills and abilities to help the other party achieve the objectives. In many cases, the facilitator may be required to throw out the carefully designed intervention strategy as some unforeseen issue takes precedence. This is what keeps facilitation interesting and, at times, frightening. No matter how much you may wish it so, individuals and groups rarely work toward objectives in a strictly linear fashion. The more the facilitator can learn to "go with the flow", and the more knowledgeable and skillful he/she becomes, the greater the chance of really contributing to the success of the other party.
If the facilitator did an effective job of identifying the objective and results, part of the evaluation process is already done. The individual or group should find it relatively easy to measure the success of the intervention.
Another aspect of evaluation has to do with the efficiency and effectiveness of the facilitator. Were the results achieved with a minimum of wasted effort? Was every opportunity taken to maximize the results? Feedback from the client is the most effective method of measuring efficiency and effectiveness.
There is both art and science in effective facilitation. Through the use of a systematic process, the facilitator ensures that each intervention is consistent with desired results. By focusing on purpose and result, and intervening at a level that maximizes the momentum for change, the facilitator ensures both efficiency and effectiveness. Once these elements are in place, the facilitator is able to set free the artist to the ultimate benefit of the other party.
Glenn Kiser
Speaker, author and consultant Glenn Kiser has more than 20 years experience in the field of organizational improvement. His skills in leadership development, customer service, facilitation and strategic planning have increased the effectiveness of such varied clients as Duke Power, Lance, First Union, Coca-Cola, Discovery Place Museum, Proctor & Gamble and Interstate Johnson Lane. In addition to his consulting work, Glenn serves as Dean of Corporate Leadership Development for The William States Lee Leadership Institute, a 501 c-3 non-profit organization in Charlotte, NC. He also facilitates a bereaved parent group for Kinder-Mourn, a non-profit organization that assists parents who are dealing with the death of a child. Glenn has presented at conferences sponsored by the International Quality and Productivity Center, The Association of Quality and Productivity, and The Conference Board. His articles have appeared in Training Magazine, Training and Development Journal, Supervision Magazine and the Business Journal newspapers. His most recent book, Masterful Facilitation: Becoming a catalyst for meaningful change, was published by the American Management Association in June 1998. Glenn obtained both his BA in Business Administration and his MA in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from the University of North Carolina-Charlotte. He is a member of the International Association for Facilitators (IAF), the Organization Development Network (ODN) and the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD). A native of Charlotte, NC, Glenn now lives in Davidson, NC with his wife, Patsy and his son, Mike.