Terrence Metz, CSM, PSPO, CSPF, is the Managing Director of MG RUSH Facilitation Training and Coaching, the acknowledged leader in structured facilitation training. His FAST Monthly Facilitation blog features over 300 articles on facilitation skills and tools aimed at helping others lead faster, more productive meetings and workshops that yield higher quality decisions. His clients include Agilists, Scrum teams, program and project managers, senior officers, and the business analyst community among numerous private and public companies and global corporations. As an undergraduate of Northwestern University (Evanston, IL) and MBA graduate from NWU’s Kellogg School of Management, his professional experience has focused on process improvement and product development. He continually aspires to make it easier for others to succeed.
Using the principles of Facilitative Leadership, even novice facilitators will succeed if they can: Draw line of sight from the meeting deliverable to the quality of life of the meeting participants. Know where they are going and how to lead. Provide compelling evidence that the meeting will impact the wallet size of participants. Prove WHY the meeting…
Staying relevant and compelling when you facilitate multiple generations presents significant challenges. Problems develop when meetings include different mindsets, communication styles, and personal preferences. Scheduling, work patterns, and technology intensify friction. Teams are ever-changing and often cross time zones and cultural boundaries. A servile attitude provides you with the simple secret when you facilitate multiple…
“Creating Products that Customers Love” strikes us as highly poignant, as much of the world heads toward a holiday season with much gift-giving. Roman Pickler’s book, “Agile Product Management with Scrum” provides the single best book, barely over 100 pages, to understand the role of Product Owner. Some claim it remains one of the seven…
Our students have clamored for a quick-reference checklist of the most important facilitation Do’s and Don’ts. In response, we bring you the brief, yet powerful, list below (alpha-sorted by the highlighted term or phrase). Please note that the highlighted facilitation do’s and don’ts are linked to articles that provide additional examples, evidence, and supporting rationale.…
The Business Model Canvas was created by Alexander Osterwalder, of Strategyzer® and provides a one-page primer and template that offers a basic methodology. Questions and points of view are detailed below.[1] Especially intended to support the MG RUSH Business Analyst community, please modify each and all of the following to support your situation. Business Model…
Structured meetings and workshops positively impact organizations and stakeholders—even permeating cultures. Here are a few straightforward benefits for facilitation training that support structured meetings. Business wisdom demands the application of knowledge, stuff that is ‘in−formation’ (not static). Compound dynamism of information with the challenge of organizing a group of people, where nobody is smarter than…
What is a Design Sprint? Created at Google Ventures, a Design Sprint represents a methodology that helps teams complete a five-day workshop for building and testing some problem-solving product or solution (prototype). A prototype might include a product on a screen, on paper, a service, a physical space, or an object. Created by Google Venture’s…
A professional facilitator handles several types of assignments, from planning through design. However, most facilitators must also provide a method for securing the deliverable. Although a different role, the ‘methodologist’ responsibilities make up the most important part of preparing for many meetings. How will you lead the group successfully from the Introduction through the Wrap? When…
Have you ever heard someone say in a meeting “I don’t know why we’re doing this project in the first place?” Odds are, the meeting is being held to advance the project, not re-validate it. The person asking the question has now imposed their agenda on the group. They have forced scope creep [1]. Whenever…
The Agile mindset demands frequent, if not constant, interaction among its project stakeholders. Perhaps more so with Scrum, than other frameworks. From Daily Scrum activities to Sprint Retrospective events held every one to four weeks, having a formal facilitator or being a facilitative participant adds tremendous value to successful Sprints. So, who facilitates Scrum events…