by Facilitation Expert | Mar 22, 2012 | Leadership Skills, Managing Conflict
A leopard cannot change their spots. In the same vein, you are never going to convert quiet people into extroverts who continuously contribute and dominate your meeting. There are, however, a few simple steps for you to increase the velocity and depth of contributions from quiet people, both in person and online.
Quiet people, when they are paid professional adults, still have a duty (fiduciary responsibility). That means, if they have pertinent content that should be considered, meetings are NOT an opportunity for them to speak up. Rather, meetings are an obligation for them to earn their pay, to contribute. Well-paid professional adults must add value when possible. Meeting participation is part of the job, their duty.
Interview Your Participants, Especially Quiet People
It is so important, especially with quiet people, to establish a connection before the meeting. When you speak with participants in advance, transfer ownership of the meeting deliverable by establishing or re-confirming the importance of their contribution. Emphasize the various roles in a workshop, especially the protection provided to participants by the facilitator. Establishing one-on-one connections has become increasingly critical with online sessions. People who have been isolated seek connections, even quiet people.
No Secret, Yet Underused: Break-out Sessions
Using break-out sessions gives everyone permission to speak freely. As they assemble in smaller teams, participants are more comfortable having a conversation with fewer people. They are uncomfortable when they need to speak up in front of a larger group. Quiet people discover that they are not a “lone” voice, thus giving them increased confidence to speak on behalf of “our team,” when otherwise they might remain quiet. Of the numerous virtual tools, Zoom makes it easy to assign, creatively rename, and then manage Breakouts.
Non-verbal Solicitation Helps Quiet People Contribute
Increasing Meeting Input from Quiet People
Actively seek and beseech the input of quiet people with open hands and eye contact. With virtual meetings gently use their name only if you have previously agreed that they can say ‘pass’ when they feel ‘put on the spot.’ Let quiet people know in advance that you understand their meek nature. In-person, use your eyes and hands to solicit input, especially at critical and appropriate moments when you expect their contribution, as a subject matter expert.
Approach all participants when appropriate with non-verbal signals to encourage their participation. Ensure them in advance, with absolute confidence, that you will protect them by separating their message from the source. We care about WHAT and not WHO. Emphasize that the facilitator protects the people first and then secures participants’ input because the content gathered serves the people, not the other way around.
Reinforce During Breaks
Constantly remind quiet people (in private) that their input is important and valued. Reinforce your role as protector and remind them if they have avoided making a contribution when, perhaps, they should have spoken. Ask all of your participants if there is anything else that you can do, as the facilitator, to make it easier for them to provide input. In virtual sessions, you may send a private chat to quiet people reminding or prompting them to provide their input.
Other Procedures for Soliciting Quiet People
Consider other procedures when all else fails. Instead of a spoken round-robin, ask everyone to write down their ideas through an anonymous poll. If live and in person, use Post-It notes or other paper they can write on without disclosing the source. Therefore, they can contribute their ideas anonymously.
Finally, consider asking a confederate (i.e., another participant) to incite participation by specifically referring to the quiet person, stating that they “would like to hear ‘Meek’s opinion’.” Please add your discoveries and comments below for the benefit of others.
An elevated level of meeting participation in meetings indicates the likelihood of a great meeting. What else encourages participation? Here are some additional meeting participation tips worth reviewing.
Nobody wants more meetings. They want results. Presumably, the results they seek will have an impact on the quality of their lives. If the session leader can quantify the impact of the meeting on the personal wallets in the room, participation is guaranteed to increase. We find the following to rank among the most elevated items for inciting high levels of meeting participation and collaboration.
Knowing One Another
Biographic sketches of other meeting members can inspire empathy and understanding. With online meetings, include photographs that show the face behind the voice. If you provide supplemental reading material, customize a cover letter for each participant highlighting the pages or sections upon which they should focus. Thus suggesting they do not give equal attention to everything in the handout. Prompt each subject matter expert in advance with the questions that will be raised during the meeting most pertinent to them or their role. Ask them to focus on those questions since you will turn to them for the first response when the question is raised.
If the session leader and the participants show up prepared, the chances of meeting participation are highly amplified.
Beginning (aka Preparation) Phase
Learn to transfer meeting results and ownership to participants before the meeting starts. Optimally, participants should review the purpose, scope, and objectives (i.e., deliverables) before the meeting begins. Participants ought to confirm that they understand and find them acceptable. Or provide their input to change something before the meeting begins. Review the agenda and tools with participants to ensure that they find the approach sound. Always hold participants responsible for meeting output.
Meeting Participation
Include a glossary or lexicon in the pre-read or handout so that individuals can refer back to the operational definitions of terms as challenges arise. People frequently find themselves in violent agreement with each other. Ensure that all the participants agree on the terms used in the purpose, scope, and objectives statements. Typically, the glossary should be maintained by the project team, project management office, program office, or strategic center of excellence. Teams normally don’t argue about the difference between a vendor and a contractor or a bill and an invoice. Unless the definitions are part of the deliverable, they should be determined in advance.
When meetings or workshops support projects, the participants need to know and understand the purpose and objectives of the project, the reason for the project (i.e., program goals), and the goals and objectives of the mandating organization (i.e., the strategic plan of the business unit and/ or enterprise). Optimally, the meeting room should have large, visible copies of the enterprise’s mission, values, and vision. Handout material should include more detailed objectives and key results.
The Middle (aka During the Meeting) Phase
As with quiet people discussed above, everybody responds well to the following:
- Breakout Sessions
- Non-verbal Solicitation
- Reinforcement
Ending (aka Review and Wrap) Agenda Step
While meeting participation concludes with the wrap-up or close of each meeting, ownership needs to extend to the reasons for holding the meeting in the first place.
Review Results
Encouraging Participation — The Wrap
As session leader (i.e., frequently referred to as facilitator), conduct a thorough review of the agreed upon outputs. Simply focus on the final items of agreement, and not necessarily the rationale behind them. Ensure that everyone supports the outputs since this is their last chance to speak up. They need to now agree to support the outputs, even if not their favorite, in the hallways and meeting rooms after they leave. As professionals, you have every reason to expect them to either walk the talk or speak up. It’s not your responsibility to reach down their throat and pull it out of them. Ensure that they will both support the output, and not lose any sleep over it.
Refrigerator
Assign relevant items captured, beyond the scope of the meeting. North Americans frequently refer to this category as the ‘Parking Lot.’ We do NOT ask, “Who will be responsible for this (i.e., open item)?” Rather, ask “Who will take the point of communication and report back to this group on the status of this (i.e., open item)?” Again, if no one steps up, assign it as an ‘open issue’ and escalate it back to the executive sponsor or their equivalent.
Communications Plan
Ensure that your participants now sensibly and similarly communicate with others the results of the meeting. Make sure it sounds like they were in the same meeting together. Build consensus around “If you encounter your superior at lunch, and they ask you for an update, what will you tell them we accomplished in this meeting?” Secondarily, consider other stakeholders that may be affected by the meeting outputs. If you encounter a stakeholder in the hallway, and they ask you for an update, what will you tell them was accomplished in this meeting? Do not underestimate the value of this activity. Groups that claim to have consensus may discover based on their interpretation that significant differences remain. The best time to resolve these differences is right now before the meeting adjourns.
Self-Assessment
Ask them how you did and obtain their ownership over the fact that their input can help make you a better session leader. To allow for anonymity, ask them to jot down in separate Post-it Notes, at least one aspect they liked and one aspect they would have changed for the meeting. Have them mount their notes using Plus/ Delta as they exit the meeting, either using easel(s) or whiteboard to label your titles.
The term ‘facilitate’ means to ‘make easy’ and if you embrace the suggestions above, you will see meeting participation increase substantially. More importantly, you will have properly begun the transfer of ownership and responsibility from the solo session leader to the group or team, as it should be.
In a world where everyone can engage in decisions that affect them
______
Lead the Change—One Meeting at a Time
Are you ready to transform how decisions are made, problems are solved, and alignment is built in your organization?
True meeting leadership goes beyond setting an agenda. It requires a facilitator who can navigate complexity, balance voices, and drive toward outcomes with clarity and consensus. Our Professional Meeting Leadership Workshop and facilitation training equips you to do just that—blending human-centric methods with structured analytical tools to foster rigor, inclusivity, and results that stick.
- Practice live.
- Get expert feedback.
- Build confidence that lasts.
Whether your meetings suffer from unclear objectives, disengaged participants, or decision fatigue, this workshop will help you identify the root causes, apply proven facilitation techniques, and emerge as the leader every team needs.
Take the first step today—transform your meetings and magnify your impact.
👉 Click here to reserve your seat now.
#facilitationtraining #meetingdesign
Because every meeting should be a catalyst for change—not just another calendar event.
______
With Bookmarks no longer a feature in WordPress, we provide the following for your benefit and reference.
______
Terrence Metz, president of MG RUSH Facilitation Training, was just 22-years-old and working as a Sales Engineer at Honeywell when he recognized a widespread problem—most meetings were ineffective and poorly led, wasting both time and company resources. However, he also observed meetings that worked. What set them apart? A well-prepared leader who structured the session to ensure participants contributed meaningfully and achieved clear outcomes.
Throughout his career, Metz, who earned an MBA from Kellogg (Northwestern University) experienced and also trained in various facilitation techniques. In 2004, he purchased MG RUSH where he shifted his focus toward improving established meeting designs and building a curriculum that would teach others how to lead, facilitate, and structure meetings that drive results. His expertise in training world-class facilitators led to the 2020 publication of Meetings That Get Results: A Guide to Building Better Meetings, a comprehensive resource on effectively building consensus.
Grounded in the principle that “nobody is smarter than everybody,” the book details the why, what, and how of building consensus when making decisions, planning, and solving problems. Along with a Participant’s Guide and supplemental workshops, it supports learning from foundational awareness to professional certification.
Metz’s first book, Change or Die: A Business Process Improvement Manual, tackled the challenges of process optimization. His upcoming book, Catalyst: Facilitating Innovation, focuses on meetings and workshops that don’t simply end when time runs out but conclude with actionable next steps and clear assignments—ensuring progress beyond discussions and ideas.
by Facilitation Expert | Feb 23, 2012 | Meeting Tools
To facilitate innovation for products or processes provides a significant life force and has become a strategic priority for most companies and organizations.
An IBM poll of fifteen hundred CEOs identified creativity as the number one “leadership competency” of the future. A new and remarkable discovery is that the ability to facilitate innovation and innovative ideas is not merely a function of the mind, but it is also a function of behaviors.
Product Innovation, a Mindset that Generates Profit
The Harvard Business Press book “The Innovator’s DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators” provides compelling ways to stir product innovation. The work of authors Jeffrey Dyer, Hal Gregersen, and Clayton Christensen emerged from an eight-year collaborative study to uncover the origins of innovation. They were less concerned with the companies’ strategies and focused on understanding the people responsible for turning creativity into value propositions.
Five skills surfaced from their investigation including one cognitive (i.e., genetic) talent and four acquired behaviors. The cognitive skill is called “associational thinking” or the ability to make connections across seemingly unrelated fields, problems, or ideas. The other four skills are learned (i.e., behavioral) and include:
- Experimenting
- Networking
- Observing
- Questioning
Facilitate Innovation for Products or Processes
To our regular readers, perhaps not surprisingly, the required behaviors are virtually identical to the core skills of our professionally trained MGRUSH facilitators. The researchers discovered that innovators are much more likely to question, observe, network, and experiment than typical executives. They also discovered that innovative companies are always (ALWAYS) led by innovative leaders.
“ . . . Innovative people systematically engage in questioning, observing, networking, and experimenting behaviors to spark new ideas. Similarly, innovative organizations systematically develop processes that encourage questioning, observing, networking, and experimenting by new employees.”
How to Facilitate Innovation
In their discussion of innovative failures, the authors discovered that people did not ask all the right questions . . . thus they emphasize the value of the discovery skill. In other words, we must be willing to challenge our people to think clearly. According to the authors, the behavioral focus found in our facilitative leadership training could pay for the training in a matter of weeks.
Their book also provides details on how to calculate an innovation premium for companies; i.e., the proportion of a company’s market value that cannot be accounted for from cash flows of current products or markets. Investors take note. This factor alone could pay for the time you took to read this blog, many times over. The innovation advantage found in our curriculum can be converted into a premium for your organizational value by building the code (i.e., DNA) for innovation directly into your people, methods, and guiding philosophies—beginning with a facilitative and collaborative culture.
Encouraging and developing ideas is the easiest of the three activities required to operate the tool called “Brainstorming.” The other two activities include analysis and convergence (or, decision). Whether you use an easel or a spreadsheet, Post-it® notes, or illustrated drawings, the first principle of brainstorming, as intended by Alex Osborne, is to encourage capturing lots of ideas without constraint or judgment. Most novice facilitators become the first person in the meeting to violate this principle by asking for a definition or further explanation, such as “Tell us more about _____.” Facilitate innovation by . . .
Regardless of HOW you gather ideas, embrace the first principle we call “Ideation.” First, to facilitate innovation, begin by embracing a discrete set of ground rules during the ideation activity.
Ideation Ground Rules
- No discussion
Facilitate Innovation: Get Out of the Box
- Fast pacing, high-energy
- All ideas allowed
- Be creative—experiment
- Build on the ideas of others
- Suspend judgment, evaluation, and criticism
- Passion is good
- Accept the views of others
- Stay focused on the topic
- Everyone participates
- No word-smithing
- When in doubt, leave it in
- The ideation step is informal
- 5-Minute Limit Rule (i.e., ELMO doll — Enough, Let’s Move On)
What to Expect When You Facilitate Innovation
In our experience, having used all of these rules at one time or another, the first four (shown in bold font) consistently add value. For example, a few of the ideation rules suggest that someone has made a remark (e.g., No word-smithing). If the facilitator carefully polices the very first ground-rule (i.e., No discussion), then it obviates the need for some of the other ground rules. When you facilitate ideation, always stress the first two especially.
The ELMO rule is also not necessary if the activity is closely policed. How long can a group maintain “high energy”? If the group is working with high energy at the five-minute mark, do you really want to shut them down? It is likely that energy will begin to die down in the next few minutes anyway, so if closely monitored, the formal rule is not necessary. Typically the facilitator should expect to wind down the ideation activity within six to eight minutes anyway. Larger groups may keep up high energy for ten to twelve minutes, but it is most unlikely that any group will maintain true “high energy” for fifteen to twenty minutes when you facilitate ideation. Of course, you can always change their perspectives.
Once the ideation activity is complete, the real work begins. What are you going to do with the list? The first challenge is normally about definition and what something specifically means. Then comes the hard part, analysis. What are you going to do with that list?
______
Don’t ruin your career by hosting bad meetings. Sign up for a workshop or send this to someone who should. MGRUSH workshops focus on meeting design and practice. Each person practices tools, methods, and activities every day during the week. Therefore, while some call this immersion, we call it the road to building high-value facilitation skills.
- Yes, You Can Brainstorm Without Groupthink (blogs.hbr.org)
- 5 Idea Generators (& Idea Killers) (inc.com)
- Can Innovation Be a Structured Repeatable Process? (customerthink.com)
Terrence Metz, president of MG RUSH Facilitation Training, was just 22-years-old and working as a Sales Engineer at Honeywell when he recognized a widespread problem—most meetings were ineffective and poorly led, wasting both time and company resources. However, he also observed meetings that worked. What set them apart? A well-prepared leader who structured the session to ensure participants contributed meaningfully and achieved clear outcomes.
Throughout his career, Metz, who earned an MBA from Kellogg (Northwestern University) experienced and also trained in various facilitation techniques. In 2004, he purchased MG RUSH where he shifted his focus toward improving established meeting designs and building a curriculum that would teach others how to lead, facilitate, and structure meetings that drive results. His expertise in training world-class facilitators led to the 2020 publication of Meetings That Get Results: A Guide to Building Better Meetings, a comprehensive resource on effectively building consensus.
Grounded in the principle that “nobody is smarter than everybody,” the book details the why, what, and how of building consensus when making decisions, planning, and solving problems. Along with a Participant’s Guide and supplemental workshops, it supports learning from foundational awareness to professional certification.
Metz’s first book, Change or Die: A Business Process Improvement Manual, tackled the challenges of process optimization. His upcoming book, Catalyst: Facilitating Innovation, focuses on meetings and workshops that don’t simply end when time runs out but conclude with actionable next steps and clear assignments—ensuring progress beyond discussions and ideas.
by Facilitation Expert | Feb 16, 2012 | Problem Solving
The term “brainstorming” is technically a gerund, a verb that wants to be a noun. A gerund implies more than one step or activity. Osborne’s original Applied Imagination, also known as Brainstorming, relies on separate Ideation and Analysis activities. Here’s how to facilitate brainstorming effectively.
To facilitate brainstorming properly use ideation rules and analysis tools. When done poorly, brainstorming leaves a bad taste in peoples’ mouths. Optimally, brainstorming includes three discrete activities:
- List (also known as diverge or ideate)
- Analyze (the hardest of the three activities and frequently omitted)
- Decide (also known as converge or document)
A facilitator or session leader must be conscious of where the group is and upon which activity the group should focus. Many people are confident in their facilitation skills because they can stand at an easel and capture ideas (or provide instructions and gather Post-it Notes®). Those same leaders then turn to their participants. They ask them to create categories, or worse, ask what they would like to do with the list. This type of leadership is NOT facilitation and does NOT make it easier for the group to make an informed decision.
Besides non-narrative methods of capturing participant input, consider the following ideation options when gathering narrative input from your participants.
With narrative brainstorming, first, remember to enforce the rules of ideation when diverging. Prevent discussion while you are capturing their ideas. At the end of ideation, consider one last round robin for final contributions, allowing participants to say “pass” if they have nothing to add.
Ideation Ground Rules for Narrative Brainstorming
Keep in mind that the term “listing” may be more appropriate if you are collecting a known set of information. True ideation derives all future possibilities—anything goes. Beginning with the traditional, facilitator-led question-and-answer approach; consider the following to improve ideation:
Ideation Options to Consider for Narrative Brainstorming
- Facilitator-led questions—Keep in mind that you can use a support scribe(s) but if so, remind them of the importance of neutrality and capturing complete verbatim inputs.
- Pass the pen or marker—again having prepared the easel title/ banner, have participants walk up to the easel in the order of an assigned round-robin sequence to document their contribution(s). This approach is wise after lunch or when participants’ energy is low because it gets participants up and moving around. Help them with their penmanship or clarity if necessary.
- Pass the sheet or card—particularly appropriate if time is short, the group is large, or you have any questions requiring input (distribute a writing pad or index card for each question). Write the question or title on individual large cards or sturdy-stock pieces of paper and either sitting or standing have the participants pass them around until each person has had the opportunity to make a contribution to each question. This approach helps reduce redundant answers since participants see what prior people have written.
- Post-it Notes—Continue to use easels with sheet titles for posting the notes. Have individuals mount one idea per note. Allow as many notes as they want. Post them on the appropriate easel whose title/ question matches their answer. If there is more than one question, you can color coordinate the easel title/ banner with the Post-it note colors.
- Round-robin—again having prepared the easel title/ banner, and perhaps in consort with a scribe(s), create an assigned order by which the participants one at a time offer content, permitting any of them to say “pass” at any time.
Possible Time-boxing
Consider time boxing the ideation step if necessary, typically in the five to ten-minute range. Remember, the hard part is the analysis that occurs next. However, when you enforce High Energy and No Discussion, you will rarely extend beyond six to eight minutes on one question.
Analysis Drives Convergence
Brainstorming Requires Ideation AND Analysis
The difficult part of brainstorming, and frequently facilitating, is knowing what to do with the list—how to lead the group through analysis that is insightful. There is no “silver bullet” for the ill-prepared. Determine appropriate analysis methods before the meeting, with an alternative method in mind as a contingency or backup plan. Many of our other articles on Best Practices are about HOW TO analyze input.
For example, there are numerous ways to help groups prioritize, from the simple through the complicated to the complex. Purchasing stationery may be simple. Yet designing machinery (e.g., jet airplanes) is complicated. Creating artificial intelligence (think IBM’s Watson playing Jeopardy) and machine learning are truly complex. Each has a different and appropriate method for analysis and prioritization.
For example, one might use PowerBalls for a simple decision. To drive consensus around a complicated decision, something more robust is required such as a quantitative Scorecard approach that separates criteria into different types such as binary (i.e., Yes/ No), scalable (more is better), and fuzzy (subjective). Alternatively, qualitative Perceptual Maps may suit some groups better. MG RUSH’s proprietary quantitative SWOT analysis provides a hardy and robust tool.
We post responses based on our body of knowledge (BoK) supported by decades of experience leading groups to make higher-quality decisions. Therefore, Osborne’s Brainstorming tool comprises three discrete activities; diverge, analyze, and converge.
In a world where everyone can engage in decisions that affect them
______
Lead the Change—One Meeting at a Time
Are you ready to transform how decisions are made, problems are solved, and alignment is built in your organization?
True meeting leadership goes beyond setting an agenda. It requires a facilitator who can navigate complexity, balance voices, and drive toward outcomes with clarity and consensus. Our Professional Meeting Leadership Workshop and facilitation training equips you to do just that—blending human-centric methods with structured analytical tools to foster rigor, inclusivity, and results that stick.
- Practice live.
- Get expert feedback.
- Build confidence that lasts.
Whether your meetings suffer from unclear objectives, disengaged participants, or decision fatigue, this workshop will help you identify the root causes, apply proven facilitation techniques, and emerge as the leader every team needs.
Take the first step today—transform your meetings and magnify your impact.
👉 Click here to reserve your seat now.
#facilitationtraining #meetingdesign
Because every meeting should be a catalyst for change—not just another calendar event.
______
With Bookmarks no longer a feature in WordPress, we provide the following for your benefit and reference.
______
Terrence Metz, president of MG RUSH Facilitation Training, was just 22-years-old and working as a Sales Engineer at Honeywell when he recognized a widespread problem—most meetings were ineffective and poorly led, wasting both time and company resources. However, he also observed meetings that worked. What set them apart? A well-prepared leader who structured the session to ensure participants contributed meaningfully and achieved clear outcomes.
Throughout his career, Metz, who earned an MBA from Kellogg (Northwestern University) experienced and also trained in various facilitation techniques. In 2004, he purchased MG RUSH where he shifted his focus toward improving established meeting designs and building a curriculum that would teach others how to lead, facilitate, and structure meetings that drive results. His expertise in training world-class facilitators led to the 2020 publication of Meetings That Get Results: A Guide to Building Better Meetings, a comprehensive resource on effectively building consensus.
Grounded in the principle that “nobody is smarter than everybody,” the book details the why, what, and how of building consensus when making decisions, planning, and solving problems. Along with a Participant’s Guide and supplemental workshops, it supports learning from foundational awareness to professional certification.
Metz’s first book, Change or Die: A Business Process Improvement Manual, tackled the challenges of process optimization. His upcoming book, Catalyst: Facilitating Innovation, focuses on meetings and workshops that don’t simply end when time runs out but conclude with actionable next steps and clear assignments—ensuring progress beyond discussions and ideas.
by Facilitation Expert | Feb 2, 2012 | Communication Skills
One of the toughest tasks of a facilitator is to relinquish judgment and fully seek the intent behind the terms used in meetings. Therefore, facilitate meaning, not words. Structured workshops support the information revolution (as opposed to the 20th-century industrial revolution). Therefore, remind participants that their words provide instruments supporting the meaning being conveyed.
Facilitate Meaning, Not Words
The term ‘in-formation’ implies a sense of journey, rather than destination. Participants supporting in-formation technology discover that deliverables are transitory. The question is not whether a guiding principle or assumption will change, only when it changes—or perhaps more accurately, how quickly the change will occur since change is continuous. Therefore it behooves us to fully understand and facilitate the meaning behind the words being used.
FACILITATE MEANING AND INTENT, NOT WORDS
Meeting participants most frequently express and extract meaning from the world of words, which I refer to as “narrative.” Five common techniques, including narrative, express intent and meaning:
- Narrative
- Nonverbal
- Illustrative
- Iconic (symbols)
- Numeric
1. NARRATIVE
Oral and written (narrative) rhetoric relies on words, the primary means of communicating in meetings. However, non-narrative methods may be equally effective and sometimes preferred, especially when explaining complex topics and issues.
2. NONVERBAL
Substantial information during meetings transfers through body signals, openness (or closeness), shifting eyebrows, frowns of disapproval grins of approval, and the like. Hand gestures help explain the passion and intensity behind some meeting participants’ claims, along with cadence, tone, and other para-verbal traits.
3. ILLUSTRATIVE
Drawings, illustrations, and pictures reflect intent and meaning and are particularly effective in explaining complex relationships. Pictures of birds provide a much clearer understanding of birds than using words alone. Likewise, process flow and value stream diagrams may provide quick overviews more effectively and efficiently than verbal explanations.
4. ICONIC (OR SYMBOLIC)
Icons and symbols extend intent and meaning. Many icons are now universally acceptable and leapfrog the challenges associated with language challenges. Street signs, restroom symbols, and public transportation indicators do not leave much room for confusion or misunderstanding (take the stop sign, for example).
5. NUMERIC
Scorecards, spreadsheets, and other weighted ranking systems should be familiar. Additionally, I built my Quantitative TO-WS Analysis to describe the Current Situation numerically, thus avoiding some of the emotion and passion that can bog people down in searching for the right words. By using numbers instead of words, participants strive to understand in addition to trying to be understood.
OTHER TECHNIQUES
Dance, movies, music, storytelling, and other formats also communicate intent and meaning. Most of us, however, rarely employ other formats for expressing our intent when we are working with business groups.
Therefore, always be willing to challenge participants to make their thinking visible.
“Great minds like a think.”
Strive to help your speaker or participants to more fully explain the meaning behind the terms they use. Words rarely capture all of the intended meaning. However, additional challenge and facilitation improves robust understanding, making it easier to build valid and sustaining consensus.
Whether you are most familiar with the “Five Whys” or the inquisitive five-year-old, ask for proof, evidence, examples, and options to fortify participants’ thinking and their supporting arguments. Challenge adjectives and adverbs, such as ‘quick’ or ‘quality’. Ask about their meaning and intent. An excellent follow-up question is “What is the unit of measurement for insert adjective or adverb______?”
Many languages serve to build consensus, not simply English. True and valid consensus is not only an English term(s), rather it is also the meaning the participants intend to convey. The elusive nature of meaning was captured by Hafez (aka Hafiz) when he penned centuries ago:
If you think that the Truth can be known
From words,
If you think that the Sun and the Ocean
Can pass through that tiny opening called the mouth.
O someone should start laughing!
Someone should start wildly laughing—
Now!
______
Don’t ruin your career by hosting bad meetings. Sign up for a workshop or send this to someone who should. MGRUSH workshops focus on meeting design and practice. Each person practices tools, methods, and activities every day during the week. Therefore, while some call this immersion, we call it the road to building high-value facilitation skills.
Terrence Metz, president of MG RUSH Facilitation Training, was just 22-years-old and working as a Sales Engineer at Honeywell when he recognized a widespread problem—most meetings were ineffective and poorly led, wasting both time and company resources. However, he also observed meetings that worked. What set them apart? A well-prepared leader who structured the session to ensure participants contributed meaningfully and achieved clear outcomes.
Throughout his career, Metz, who earned an MBA from Kellogg (Northwestern University) experienced and also trained in various facilitation techniques. In 2004, he purchased MG RUSH where he shifted his focus toward improving established meeting designs and building a curriculum that would teach others how to lead, facilitate, and structure meetings that drive results. His expertise in training world-class facilitators led to the 2020 publication of Meetings That Get Results: A Guide to Building Better Meetings, a comprehensive resource on effectively building consensus.
Grounded in the principle that “nobody is smarter than everybody,” the book details the why, what, and how of building consensus when making decisions, planning, and solving problems. Along with a Participant’s Guide and supplemental workshops, it supports learning from foundational awareness to professional certification.
Metz’s first book, Change or Die: A Business Process Improvement Manual, tackled the challenges of process optimization. His upcoming book, Catalyst: Facilitating Innovation, focuses on meetings and workshops that don’t simply end when time runs out but conclude with actionable next steps and clear assignments—ensuring progress beyond discussions and ideas.
by Facilitation Expert | Dec 1, 2011 | Leadership Skills
One of the biggest challenges with facilitation is to build consensus about a future state. Therefore, in a light-hearted sense as we approach the holiday season, here are some bad predictions that likely garnered some respect along the way—albeit short-lived.
Get Out of the Box
- An ancient bad prediction: “Inventions have long since reached their limit, and I see no hope for further developments.” Roman engineer Julius Sextus Frontinus, AD 10.
- “That’s an amazing invention, but who would ever want to use one of them?” President Rutherford B. Hayes to Alexander Graham Bell, 1876.
- “It doesn’t matter what he does, he will never amount to anything.” Albert Einstein’s teacher to his father, 1895.
- “I have anticipated [radio’s] complete disappearance — confident that the unfortunate people, who must now subdue themselves to ‘listening-in’ will soon find a better pastime for their leisure.” H.G. Wells, The Way the World is Going, 1925.
- “The problem with television is that the people must sit and keep their eyes glued on a screen; the average American family hasn’t time for it.” The New York Times, after a prototype television was demonstrated at the 1939 World’s Fair.
- “It would appear we have reached the limits of what it is possible to achieve with computer technology, although one should be careful with such statements; they tend to sound pretty silly in five years.” Computer scientist John von Neumann, 1949.
- “Man will never reach the moon, regardless of all future scientific advances.” Radio pioneer Lee De Forest, 1957.
- “Despite the trend to compactness and lower costs, it is unlikely everyone will have his own computer any time soon.” Reporter Stanley Penn, The Wall Street Journal, 1966.
- “But what is [the microchip] good for?” Engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM, 1968.
- “I predict the Internet…will go spectacularly supernova and in 1996 catastrophically collapse.” Bob Metcalfe, InfoWorld, 1995
Origin of Bad Predictions
In conclusion, these were first compiled by Laura Lee and published in The Futurist, September-October 2000. Finally, for structured facilitation support, see your FAST Facilitator Reference Manual or attend a FAST Professional Facilitative Leadership training session offered around the world (see http://www.mgrush.com/ for a current schedule).
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Don’t ruin your career by hosting bad meetings. Sign up for a workshop or send this to someone who should. MGRUSH workshops focus on meeting design and practice. Each person practices tools, methods, and activities every day during the week. Therefore, while some call this immersion, we call it the road to building high-value facilitation skills.
- George Dyson’s history of the computer: Turing’s Cathedral (boingboing.net)
- Turing’s Cathedral by George Dyson (guardian.co.uk)
- Quantum Theory: von Neumann vs. Dirac (plato.stanford.edu)
- 5 Traits That Set Great Leaders Apart From The Pack (Cornerstone University)
Terrence Metz, president of MG RUSH Facilitation Training, was just 22-years-old and working as a Sales Engineer at Honeywell when he recognized a widespread problem—most meetings were ineffective and poorly led, wasting both time and company resources. However, he also observed meetings that worked. What set them apart? A well-prepared leader who structured the session to ensure participants contributed meaningfully and achieved clear outcomes.
Throughout his career, Metz, who earned an MBA from Kellogg (Northwestern University) experienced and also trained in various facilitation techniques. In 2004, he purchased MG RUSH where he shifted his focus toward improving established meeting designs and building a curriculum that would teach others how to lead, facilitate, and structure meetings that drive results. His expertise in training world-class facilitators led to the 2020 publication of Meetings That Get Results: A Guide to Building Better Meetings, a comprehensive resource on effectively building consensus.
Grounded in the principle that “nobody is smarter than everybody,” the book details the why, what, and how of building consensus when making decisions, planning, and solving problems. Along with a Participant’s Guide and supplemental workshops, it supports learning from foundational awareness to professional certification.
Metz’s first book, Change or Die: A Business Process Improvement Manual, tackled the challenges of process optimization. His upcoming book, Catalyst: Facilitating Innovation, focuses on meetings and workshops that don’t simply end when time runs out but conclude with actionable next steps and clear assignments—ensuring progress beyond discussions and ideas.
