Meeting Facilitation

Using a facilitator is usually a good idea if you want to keep a meeting focused and productive. Can meetings be effective without a facilitator? Of course, many meetings take place every day without a designated facilitator.

However, the perils of meeting without a facilitator are many, and often lead to a high level of frustration among participants. The dangers include drifting from the agenda, lack of participation, running overtime and many more. Effective facilitators have honed skills and traits.

For meetings with higher stakes, you may want to engage the services of a professional facilitator. Such meetings might include retreats, idea generation sessions, strategic planning, problem-solving meetings, and teambuilding. A professional facilitator can also help your group get "unstuck" -- to identify and focus on key issues, make decisions and move forward. Perhaps the number one reason people hire professional facilitators is the objectivity and "distance" they bring.

One of the biggest traps is for the group's leader or senior person to assume the role of facilitator. This is an invitation for a dysfunctional meeting. Why? It is virtually impossible for the leader to be neutral on content issues, which is a prime requisite for an effective facilitator. When group leaders facilitate their own meetings, they often cross the line into control and advocacy for their point(s) of view. In turn, this will shut down participation from others. Separating the leader and facilitator roles will help ensure that at least one person is focused on group process issues, e.g., staying on agenda and keeping people involved.

We've been providing facilitators for strategic planning sessions and corporate retreats since 1995.

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