Essential Facilitation^®

Core Skills for Agreement Building

Chances are, the more responsible you are for organizational or community outcomes, the more meetings you will need to facilitate and the more agreements you will need to build. Facilitation is critical to success whenever a decision involves several people. Essential Facilitation provides a solid framework and proven techniques for resolving conflict, creating buy-in, and building lasting agreementsskills as valuable in every day life as they are in organizational settings.

Benefits for Participants

In this three-day facilitation intensive, you will learn the essential strategies and skills for helping groups solve problems, resolve conflict, and build agreement. Led by expert practitioners, this workshop will provide you with a solid foundation of facilitation theory and practice for immediate use.

After completing this workshop, you will be able to:

• Keep discussions on track

• Design results-focused agendas, group processes, and implementation plans

• Design and conduct planning sessions and team meetings

• Use collaborative problem solving tools to make decisions more easily

• Leverage diverse points of view and communication styles

• Share ideas, responsibility, and success in a way that values everyones contribution

• Use win-win thinking to resolve conflicts

• Model behaviors that help others improve group interaction.

With an average participant-to-trainer ratio of 10:1, you will receive considerable attention. You will be videotaped while facilitating groups and receive both group and individual feedback and coaching. This approach produces immediate gains in skills and awareness. We tailor the course to the participants, creating the opportunity for novice and advanced facilitators to improve their skills.

Benefits for Your Organization

Effective facilitators unlock the power of the individual and show groups how to reach their desired goals. When leaders model skillful facilitation, they put their commitment to participation and collaboration into practice. As facilitation skills improve throughout an organization or community, everyone involved becomes more creative and productive, and is better able to seize opportunities for dramatic improvements in how work is done in order to achieve more ambitious results.

Workshop Topics

• The Interaction Method

• Meeting Planning and Agenda Design

• Listening as an Ally

• Resolving Conflict

• Tools for Building Understanding and Agreement

• Mastering the Strategic Moment

• Facilitative Behaviors

• Collaborative Problem Solving