World Class Facilitation...Lessons Learned from the Tape

I’ve served in a sales role at FranklinCovey, a global learning and development company, for the last five years. Because we do training, I’ve had the opportunity to do a bit of light presentation. I get on my feet and facilitate a short bit of content or walk through strategy for proposed initiatives. I enjoy facilitation but in my time at FranklinCovey, it has not been my craft so much as design, selling and program management have. 

Over the last two years, this has shifted. I’ve had the honor of leading our development of a new solution on Unconscious Bias (Shameless plug, "Unconscious Bias: Understanding Bias to Unleash Potential officially launches on April 30, 2019). As a company focused on performance improvement and dedicated to the concept of the whole person paradigm, we knew this important content was a logical addition to our course catalog.

As our Executive Vice President of Innovations, Adam Merrill so eloquently put it, “there is no idea more fundamental to human performance than how we see and treat each other as human beings.” And bias can significantly impact those exchanges. More on bias in future posts.

Back to this transition...in engaging with content, I’ve had the opportunity to do much more facilitation, delivering full day learning sessions to a variety of audiences, from executive teams to conference groups. I’ve learned quite a bit through this practice about my strengths, opportunities and how to best engage with audiences for impact.

As I work to become a world class facilitator, my biggest learning came from a rather cringe-worthy activity - watching myself on tape. As part of our development of the new Unconscious Bias program, I have been videotaped delivering 1/2 and full day programs so that the full design team can view the content in action and make the appropriate changes and updates, capture the right questions and facilitator notes and gauge the energy in the room. There are fewer experiences more humbling than watching 50 hours of yourself talking and engaging with others. It left me wanting video of myself in client meetings, with colleagues and even, engaging with my husband and kids. Watching the footage has been incredibly helpful and constructive as I work to make an impact in my facilitation and my work around bias. 

Three big ideas stand out:

1. I don’t need to have all the answers. At FranklinCovey, we talk about the need to be the guide on the side, not the sage on the stage. But audiences also want the person at the front of the room to be credible. In my effort to be credible, I was inadvertently providing all of the answers. When participants had questions or comments, I answered the questions, provided context for their comments. While I think this was appreciated, it lowered the energy in the room, limiting the interaction to a duality between me and the audience versus the complex layers of a fully dynamic and engaged room. I learned to respond to questions by throwing questions back to the audience - “I have thoughts on that but would love to hear what the group thinks.” And turning comments to the room - “Thank you for sharing that. Has anyone had a similar or opposite experience?” Credibility is important, but not at the expense of robust engagement.
2. I can’t pretend being comfortable in my own skin, I need to actually be comfortable. Watching yourself on film betrays all of your ticks and fidgets. My friend and colleague, and our Vice President of Consulting, Leena Rinne, gave me some feedback I didn’t quite understand until I watched the recordings. She said I had a tendency to rock back and forth or move quickly from one part of the room to another. If movement doesn’t have a purpose in the teach, it is distracting. We know enough about the brain to know that we can’t truly do more than one thing at a time. It’s a lot to ask an audience to listen, take notes, process and participate. We have to make that as easy for them as possible and distraction makes it harder. While I can feign confidence with the best of them, I’m uncomfortable being in the spotlight. I worry about my terrible posture so I cross my arms over my chest; I’m uncomfortable in the silence so I sort of teeter back and forth as people are thinking; and I move about the room because it makes me feel more connected to the audience. But, the tape reveals all and Leena was right; its super distracting and makes me look less credible than I am. I’m prepared, authentic and absolutely a subject matter expert on the topic. My physical presence in the room should reflect that certainty.
3. It’s not about me. It takes some ego to stand up in front of a room, to claim expertise in a subject and in facilitation and it takes almost a complete rejection of that ego to be a world class facilitator. This means caring more about participants’ stories and examples over your own, moving with the energy in the room versus what energizes you and being more interested in your audience leaving with new skills and learnings than leaving with a wonderful impression of you. 

I’ve had the opportunity to observe hundreds of facilitators, presenters and consultants over the course of my career. I’ve seen incredible storytellers and performers, really dynamic personalities and incredibly empathic deliveries. But rare is the facilitator who can help participants move from insight to action, who can really step aside for the learning to occur. I’m not there yet, but I am convinced the uncomfortable exercise of watching myself has been an invaluable tool in moving down the path. Try it!

I’d love to hear (read) your facilitation insights. Please leave me your strategies and learnings in the comments.

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I am a Global Client Partner for FranklinCovey's Government/Public Sector team where I design and deliver strategic human capitol enhancement programs to a variety of clients that includes the United Nations System, Departments of Veterans Affairs and Defense and the Legislative Branch.

I also serve as a subject matter expert and thought leader on bias. I am passionate about issues of diversity and inclusion and believe in the profound power of curiosity, empathy and courage to mitigate issues of bias at all levels.

Learn more about my perspective in this

• Faces of FranklinCovey feature: https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/new-year-faces-rylee-o-dowd/ or,
• by reading my white paper, 5 Big Ideas on Diversity and Inclusion, linked in my profile: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/pamela-fuller-mba-08ab379/