Get Lynne's new brochure

 

 

 

 

 

Read the Whitepaper on "10 Challenges of Leading Today's Workforce and what to do about them"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Listen to Lynne Cazaly's interviews on Spotify

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

New Book coming soon

Clever Skills

How to use your greatest human capabilities for the unfolding future 

 

 

 

AS PUBLISHED IN

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Award winning & Best selling

10 x author

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What people say...

 

 

I acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which I live - the Yalukit-Willam - and pay my respects to their elders past, present and emerging. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Entries in facilitation skills (18)

Friday
Dec202019

It’s not just a meeting

It’s an opportunity for consultation, collaboration, co-design. For information sharing, attitude adjusting and belief shifting. It’s an opportunity to make the workplace safer to speak up.

It’s an opportunity to have a conversation not a presentation. To turn the data show off, to pass on the PowerPoint deck and instead engage, ask questions.

It’s an opportunity to hear what would improve their experience as an employee, contractor or team member, colleague, customer, user or client. How you could support them more, better, differently.

It’s an opportunity to bring people together, not p*ss people off.

A meeting is a place and space where you can do work together, collectively. But when most meetings are poorly run, boring and unproductive, it’s up to you the leader, to get the development you need to make better work of every one of the meetings you lead.

Learn the subtle, nuanced, yet complex skills of facilitation. They’ll be so glad you did.

Sunday
Sep222019

Continue to cause damage - or decide you’ll make a difference

I’ve been posting this week on how being a leader who has contemporary facilitation skills is a huge advantage in today's workplace.

The time we waste in dull/boring/ineffective meetings should be enough of an incentive to make change!

Massive productivity gains are made when leaders know how to lead engaging, inspiring and productive meetings that get work done AND protect people’s self esteem so they stay engaged.

You can change culture by changing how you run meetings, workshops, consultations and conversations.

But damage is done to people in meetings when they're treated poorly, ignored, interrupted, excluded, forgotten, shut down.

It’s not on them to ‘speak up’; it’s on you to extend your leadership capability to include people, elicit information and contributions, helping to make work easier.

Facilitation is a life skill to be developed, not a simple skill to read a few articles about.

Do you commit to putting facilitation on your professional development agenda?

The difference you'll make will be immeasurable; the damage to people otherwise could be extreme. 

Sunday
Sep222019

The clichés of average facilitation 

Despite all the advice on how to lead better meetings, we still see many behaviours and clichés that stop, block and slow group progress.

By using a cliché or common saying we might be trying to make things happen quicker.

But some clichés cause problems. They can kill collaboration, smash diversity and slow up progress. Usually the reverse of what we’re aiming to do!

Here are 10 workshop & meeting clichés I see and hear way too often:

1. Would you take the notes please (insert woman's name)

2. I hear what you’re saying but...

3. Let’s car park it

4. Let’s take it offline

5. What do others think?

6. We need to move on

7. Are we all in agreement then?

I know I promised 10 clichés but there are only 8 because...

8. We've run out of time! Leader as Facilitator: whether it's a leadership position, title, role or responsibility, or a mindset and way of working, leaders have incredible opportunities to build engagement, gather diverse views and get important work done via facilitation.

Avoid clichés. Keep conversations going, building engagement - be anti-cliché.

Wednesday
Sep182019

We’ve all experienced ‘average' facilitation 

Facilitation: someone at the front of room, leading a meeting/workshop, helping make things easier. (Whether it's the right definition or not isn't what this is about.)

My point is: there's an abysmal standard of facilitation in workplaces today.

You might think it’s not ‘that bad' or workshops you’ve attended have been mostly ok.

Not so quick. Know that facilitation is something you learn: like making an omelette, riding a horse, flying a kite. You’re not born with facilitation skills, you learn. It's not long at work before we experience average facilitation.

Think of all the sh*tful meetings you’ve been in.

Meetings that:

😖ran over time

🤯were dull and disengaging

😠achieved few outcomes

🤢were dominated by a few/same voices

😱were unsafe or awkward ... the list goes on.

Bad workplace meetings contribute to bad workplaces and working environments. They're time wasting, energy-draining, enthusiasm-robbing ... feeding cynicism, negativity and disengagement.

Yuk!

If you're a leader or want to be, it starts with you at every meeting.

You can learn contemporary facilitation skills. Then you won't lead sh*tful meetings. 

Wednesday
Sep182019

'The consultant’s facilitation skills were average' 

I heard this comment from a big company ... reporting on a big consulting firm’s management consultant... and how average their facilitation skills had been at a significant workshop event.

The fee that consulting firm charged for their services DID NOT MEET the value or expectation of the calibre of facilitation skills that were required.

And it was one of the BIG consulting firms.

You’d think - or assume - that the facilitation capabilities of management consultants would be contemporary, collaborative, impactful. They're always leading meetings and workshops as part of company transformations and consulting engagements.

But nope. It was average. Most average.

Time on your feet does not equal quality. Most of us think we're better at facilitating meetings and workshops than we are. It's like driving. Most of us think we're above average drivers. We're not. Some of us suck. We think we’re good but we’re average. Most average.