Facilitation Skills in Business and in Life

I use my facilitation skills in all I do, teaching, facilitating, working with others, and even when I ran my restaurant.? I found that groups are more productive when facilitating.? My staff at the restaurant was a highly stable and collaborative restaurant staff, something unusual in the industry, because my facilitation skills enabled me to an effective servant leader.

Why should facilitator skills be of interest to everyone?? In learning facilitator skills, we learn:

• How to understand and work with a diverse group of people.
• How to allow someone else to “be in charge” when needed.
• How to get others to come together, step through a thought process, and accomplish something.
• How to get up in front of people and speak with confidence.
• How to engage people so that everyone gets involved.
• How to move a group of people towards consensus.?????

Understand and work with a diverse group of people.??

Learning to understand and accept people who are diverse is essential. ?I’ve had the opportunity to deal with people from all over the globe, from different backgrounds, with different views and values, and the differences are exciting, interesting, and challenging.? When we accept others and listen to what they have to say, we stop judging.? As a Facilitator, you learn how to actively listen, and you learn more as a result.? You listen before you decide and you don’t look at situations as having only one solution.

Allow someone else to “be in charge”.?

Learning to back off, letting others be in charge, requires trust.? As a Facilitator, you learn the value of the group – the wisdom of others – to enable others to do the work.? Working with a group, as a leader or manager, I’ve learned that dictating is not the answer.? Sometimes (many times) it is better to let others be in charge.? It lets others know that you trust their abilities.? That’s one of the most difficult lessons for a Leader to learn.? It’s surprising and humbling when you find that others can actually do a better job at something than you can.? We are always greater as a whole than the sum of the parts.??

Get others to come together, step through a thought process, and accomplish something - i.e., be an effective Servant Leader.??

People need a thought process – “how are we to do this?”? In preparing for workshops, Facilitators study processes and learn “how to” design a process that enables a group of people to accomplish something.? Understanding basic processes and how to develop processes gives you direction and is helpful and useful to follow in business and in life.??

Get up in front of people and speak with confidence.??

Public speaking is the number one fear (over and above the fear of dying!).? Facilitators learn techniques to manage their fear so that they can do what is needed to accomplish something.? Practicing being in front of people and interacting with them, helps you feel less pressure to “perform.”? By the way, you never overcome the fear – you simply learn to manage it.??

Engage people so that everyone gets involved.?

In groups, do a few people dominate the discussion or solutions?? Are those who don’t participate too shy?? Are their ideas less valuable?? Better ideas come when everyone is involved.? Facilitators learn how to involve everyone.? Whether it’s an exercise or a probing question, getting everyone involved increases the quality of the discussion and the quality of solutions.??

Move a group of people towards consensus.??

Consensus is a great concept but people need to learn how to get there. Whenever I’m working with a group, I know that I have to get everyone to participate (diverge), disagree (struggle), and then move to consensus (converge).? I use this thought process in any capacity.? It helps ensure that everyone is included and all ideas are heard so that we can reach consensus.

So, why learn Facilitator skills?? Facilitator skills are helpful and useful in everything you do.? They are a set of behavioral skills that happen at the personal, organizational, and societal levels.

About Gary Rush, IAF CPF | Master

I Don’t Just Provide Instruction… ?In my FoCuSeD? Facilitation classes , I provide you with content and then we discuss, practice, and relate it to your work and life. ?You bring your concerns, your past experiences, and your questions. ?I share my 40 + years of accomplishments and mistakes, so we learn from each other making the class a personal development experiential session. ?I keep my classes small so that I have time to devote to you. ?The assigned topics you facilitate relate to real life making learning relevant. ?I want you to continue learning and developing your new skills, so I provide you with my over 600-page reference manual that reinforces what I teach, and you learn.? In short, you get my energy, passion, and experiences inspiring you to immediately apply your new skills. My FoCuSeD? Facilitator Academy is an IAF Endorsed? Comprehensive Programme. ?I offer my FoCuSeD?Facilitation classes both publicly and privately, in-person or remote via Zoom.? I want everyone to succeed... ?Check out my Train-the-Trainer Program | Gary Rush Facilitation that teaches you to teach my Holistic Structured Facilitation? Technique.