This two day program is designed to equip participants with skills in managing groups and project teams, leading meetings and group problem solving and decision making sessions. It is also designed for sales, customer service and IT professionals who are looking for tools for effectively engaging customers in the collaborative planning process.Throughout the two days there is opportunity for each participant to practice their skills and get individualized feedback and coaching on their performance. There is an option of supplementing this with video feedback. Topics include:
- What does a facilitator do?
- The power of effectively setting expectations with groups.
- How groups and teams behave: what the facilitator can expect.
- Behaviours of a facilitator: what helps and what hinders group involvement.
- The basic facilitation skills - questioning, listening, maintaining neutrality.
- Roles of the facilitator: how neutral does the facilitator have to be?
- Group decision making: What kind of decision methods are available?
- Building and testing agreements- ensuring decisions are "real".
- How to design and lead a problem solving or decision making session.
- Facilitator tools: brainstorming, multivoting, ranking techniques.
- Conflict intervention techniques and managing difficult behaviours at meetings.
The program has become the accredited GE Canada course for facilitation skills. It has been successfully delivered in a wide variety of organizational settings including FAG Bearings, the Ontario Government, Bombardier Inc., Maple Leaf Foods, Camco, Noranda Inc. Sears-Roebuck, among others.
