27th Facilitator's Network Gathering

Date: 10 Jan 09, Saturday
Time: 8:30am – 1:00pm
Place: Focus Conference Room, #15-08, Sim Lim Towers, 10 Jalan Besar, Singapore 208787 (This is NOT Sim Lim Square!)

If you require directions, please log onto the following website to download the map of the venue. http://sg.pagenation.com/sin/Sim%20Lim%20Tower_103.8545_1.3037.map

Rates
(Normal registration 1 week before forum date or earlier)

Full-time tertiary students S$5.00
Others : S$10

Rates After Registration Deadline

Full-time tertiary students : S$15
Others : S$15

If you are unable to register on-line (we only entertain genuine cases of challenges encountered at website!), please email our Forum administrator - Ms. Emily Ng at emilyng_fns@yahoo.com.sg for assistance.

Fee is payable at the door. Once registered, the forum fee would be payable regardless of actual attendance. Cancellation or withdrawal is not permitted. We welcome replacement.

Agenda

8:30 am - Arrivals & Registration
9:00 am - Part 1 – Enhancing Your Image
10:30 am - Tea Break & Networking
11:00 am - Part 2 – Continue on Enhancing Your Image
12:30 pm - Special Announcements
12:40 pm - Closing Circle
1:00pm - End of Session

About the Session

Does image matter?

It most certainly does!

Research has shown that the impact we made on people we come into contact with, depends 55% on how we look and behave, 38% on how we speak and only 7% on what we say. And from the corporate point of view, company image is closely linked with the image of the people behind the company as they are often the first point of contact.

By ensuring that the staff project the right image and create a favorable first impression on clients and business associates.Image isn't just about wearing the right clothes or having impeccable manners. It's about nurturing the right attitude and mindset. It's about how we communicate and relate to others. It's a whole package that we have to work on if we want to impress people we meet and work with.

Participants Will Learn

• How to make use of their current assets so they can look good, feel great all the time
• How to dress to impress by understanding their own body shape
• About The 5 ways to make a brilliant first impression without having to spend a lot of money
• What are the image enhancers, and image destroyers

The Facilitator

Ms Jessica See is a professional Image Consultant and Coach from the Image International PTE LTD. She has conducted numerous coaching sessions including Enhancing Your Image, Personal Branding, and Business Etiquette courses at Inage International. Ms Jessica also conducts one to one coaching for her clients.

If you have enquiries, please email our Forum Administrator - Ms. Emily Ng at emilyng_fns@yahoo.com.sg

What is a quality facilitation process?

Read this Before You Buy a Facilitation Process

I have been asked many times about the quality of a facilitation process. Whether they should invest time and effort to learn it and bring it into their organisation. I understand why such a question has been asked. I have learnt that many HR practitioners have wasted large amount of time, effort and money to learn and implement a particular facilitation process only to find later, and after all the hypes, that it is too complicated to conduct and too difficult to generate the intended outcomes.

To these questions, I suggest three tests to determine the quality of a facilitation process:

• Predictability Test. Here we want to test if a facilitation process produces the outcomes as promised by those who marketed the process to us. So, if a facilitator says that the ORID approach will help the participants reach a decision on what they want to do when they are back in the office the following day, the approach must deliver this outcome at the end of the ORID session. It is important that our participants’ feedback and evaluation forms contain questions or statements that collect this type of data.

• Stability Test. A facilitation process that requires very little design intervention by the facilitator is a stable process. The more effort a facilitator needs to make modifications and adjustments to the process on-the-go usually means that the process may not be universally applicable to all types of occasions or situations as pitched by the service provider. Under such a situation, even if the outcome is predictable, the process has been manipulated and instrumented to create it, which suggests that the process is not stable at all. If we like the process, its use should be limited to its intended purpose.

• Replicability Test. In order that the process gets to permeate the organisation, it has to be localised and replicated by people in the organisation other than those who sold the process to us. However, we tend to learn the science of the process but seldom the art of using the process. In science, we learn about the stages in the process. This is easy. The tough part is the art of using it. Questions about when to move the participants forward in their conversation and how to summaries the conversation is usually not taught. These missing components are causing the difficulties HR practitioners face in conducting and generating the intended outcome from their investments. If our service provider is the only person capable of running the process, this means that the process cannot be replicated by someone else.

When a facilitation process meets these three criteria, they tend to be good processes because they are simple, direct and without the frills found in all those sophisticate processes found out there in the market. So, don’t let all those hype and marketing talk confuse you.

Here is a posting on the IAF Forum on doctoral and Masters research on group facilitation that you may be interested in:
http://www.iaf-forum.org/showthread.php?p=3615#post3615

This article was written by Anthony Mok on 22 Dec 2008.
Copyright 2008. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved.

Inter-faith or Inter-religious Facilitation

To all FFW Alumni,

Here is a message from Ms Michelle Garred, which you maybe interested in.

'Do you have a background in inter-faith or inter-religious engagement?

My colleagues in the Harmony Centre at An-Nahdhah have been working to develop a core group of inter-faith practitioners. They foresee a possible need for expert facilitation support in participatory future visioning process, or other related activities.

If you have experience in inter-faith engagement, and an interest to pursue it further, please send me a response with some brief info about your background.'

Michelle's contact information is below:

Michelle Garred
PhD Candidate
Richardson Institute for Peace Studies
Lancaster University Visiting Affiliate
Asia Research Institute
National University of Singapore
Singapore phone: +65-8151-3043.
USA voice mail: +1-360-566-2455.
Philippines SMS: +63-928-482-1635.
Skype: mgarred.

World Café

The Mechanism to Obtain Wisdom from the Crowd

Recently, I have the opportunity to organise another World Café for a group of trainers, and I like to share this process with you.

Setting the Context

A meeting was conducted a few weeks before the World Café event. In the discussion, my clients and I addressed the following matters:

• What wisdom do we want to obtain from the crowd?
  
• Who might have to the wisdom?
  
• How much of time do we want to assign to the session?

Create a Hospitable Space

To create comfort for and relatedness between the members in the crowd, a few activities were introduced prior to the World Café segment. These were:

• Participants were invited to turn up early
  
• Food and drinks were provided to energise participants
  
• Organisers mingled and introduced participants to each other
  
• Organisers also explained the purpose of the session
  
• Participant were invited to gather in a circle in the centre of the event hall
  
• Opening circle was conducted to secure the presence of mind amongst participants

Explore Questions that Matters

Knowledge will emerge and be created when the right questions are presented to the crowd.

The crowd has the capacity to find questions that are relevant to their real-life concerns and a facilitator needs to enable this capacity. In this World Café session, I had asked the crowd to write down the things that concerned them as trainers and to construct these concerns into session questions.

The stem for such questions will begin with ‘In what ways might I ……….?’ and here is an example of a complete question presented at the World Café.

It is the crowd who will have the wisdom to determine the questions that are most useful to them. I helped them make this determination by asking them to present their questions to the floor and invited each participant to view and mark those questions which they were also keen to know the answers or which they think they had answers to contribute.

Here is a video clip showing this segment of the World Café.

Encouraging Everyone’s Contribution

People will engage in deep conversation with each other when they feel that they are contributing in enlarging the knowledge and wisdom in the crowd. I have organised many World Café events and I have yet to observe a session where there were no conversation at all.

Let the members of the crowd break into their individual special interest groups and let nature take its course.

Connect Diverse Perspectives

It is important to record the knowledge and wisdom emerging ‘in the middle of the group’. A ‘shared visual space’ is created as the recording tablet for the group. Members from one group are free to ‘float’ to another group to cross-pollinate the ideas. This way, they will bring to the new table threads from the last round and interweave them with those they just joined. People who arrived with fixed positions often find that they are more open to new and different ideas when new members joined them.

Listen Together and Notice Patterns

Listeners are as important as speakers. They should listen for where the speaker is coming from, and to appreciate that their perspective, regardless for their divergence, is equally valid and they represent a part of the wisdom in the crowd.

Here are some tips about listening:

• The need to think of how to response to what was being said actually prevents one’s capacity to listen authentically
  
• Respect and treat each participant as truly wise
  
• Listen with an openness to be influenced by the speaker
  
• Listen for supporting questions, patterns, insights and emerging perspectives
  
• Listen to build on the ideas of others
  
• Listen for what is not being spoken

Share Collective Discoveries

Ask the groups to spend a few minutes to consider what has emerged in their conversation and which is most meaningful to them. Focus their attention at distilling these insights, patterns, themes and deeper questions, and provide a way to get them out to the whole room so that all members are given the opportunity to learn from this wisdom collectively.

After all insights have been shared in the room, the whole group is encouraged to take a few minutes of silent reflection to consider:

• What new things have emerged from the conversations?
  
• Do they notice patterns arising from these conversations? What are these and what do they suggest?
  
• If there was a single theme emerging from these conversations, how do we describe this theme?
  
• What do we now learnt and see as a result of these conversations?
  
• What new questions are arising as a result of these conversations?

This article was written by Anthony Mok on 25 Nov 2008.

Copyright 2008. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved.

Dynamic Facilitation Workshop

WORKSHOP DETAILS

Date: 23 Jun 09 (Tue) to 25 Jun 09 (Thu)

Time: 8.30am-5.30pm

Venue: Orchid Country Club, Singapore

WHO SHOULD ATTEND?

Facilitators, Teachers, Trainers, Supervisors, Managers, HRD & OD Professionals, Coaches, Consultants, Instructors, Mediators, Therapists, Community Leaders, Change Agents, Practitioners, Scholars, Activists, or Entrepreneurs looking to use the most advanced approaches for thinking together creatively and collaboratively and achieve win/win results.

WHY SHOULD YOU ATTEND?

Participants will learn how to help people to:

• achieve breakthroughs on difficult, emotional or "impossible" issues


• arrive at unanimous results and decisions


• empower people to new levels of capability


• build trust, respect, and the spirit of community in a group


• grow in personal creativity and capability

Dynamic Facilitation provides a transformational experience!

WHAT PEOPLE IN THE KNOW ARE SAYING

"I found a way to facilitate for monumental change. It took me to a place I never knew existed and made me wonder why I had not already been there."
Glenn Floyd, Champion International

"This is the next level of facilitation...The seminar teaches you to use your whole brain."

Barry Lubart, IBM

"A mind-expanding experience of an alternative approach to group discussion and problem-solving."

Carol Chetkovich, Professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government

WHO IS THE WORKSHOP FACILITATOR?

Jim Rough is a consultant, author, speaker and social innovator. He originated Dynamic Facilitation Skills and has been presenting public and private seminars on Dynamic Facilitation since 1990. Jim also originated the Wisdom Council, a new approach to transforming large systems of people.

For over twenty years he has been a faculty member of the Creative Problem Solving Institute in Buffalo, N.Y. He is the author of the book, "Society's Breakthrough!: Releasing the Essential Wisdom and Virtue of All the People."

WORKSHOP INVESTMENT

Early Bird Registration (by 31 Jan 09)

IAF Members S$1,290**
Non Members S$1,590

After Early Bird Deadline (after 31 Jan 09 and by 15 May 09)
S$1,790

*Overseas registrants paying by bank draft or TT, please add S$30 for bank charges in Singapore

** IAF membership is US$85/year for developing countries and US$175 for developed countries. Register for membership @ http://www.iaf-world.org/

REGISTRATION PROCESS

Online @ http://www.fns.sg

Getting them awake!

How to Keep Your Participants Attentive……..

During a Method of Instruction course that I have conducted recently, a number of participants had asked me for the approaches and ways to keep their trainees awake and attentive in the classes they conducted.

I am aware that we do not usually conduct pure form facilitation in Singapore. The more popular facilitated training, which juxtaposes the art and science of facilitation into the training process, is more popular. Trainees tend to be more interactive in class as they experience an assortment of techniques that lead them to learn in different ways.

There are several approaches facilitative trainers use to maintain the level of attention amongst trainees. The one that I am most comfortable with is the EAD approach.

Usually, I will divide the whole training programme into modules and I go on to sub-divide each module into three sections. These are:

Expound – Here, the background, definitions, concepts and principles of an idea is presented and explained

Activity – An activity or exercise is introduced to help trainees obtain a deeper appreciation of the presented idea.

Debrief – At the end of the activity, trainees are encouraged to engage in an interaction to share with each other the experiences and insights they gained from the activity, and the lessons, which are relevant to the idea, they learnt. This also serves as a way to conclude the module and creates the opener for the next module.

When the EAD approach is applied in class, trainees are unlikely to ‘switch off’ too long because they are engaged in various forms of activity that force them to stay active at various points of the training course.

I like to share with you six types of activity or exercise that you could use to achieve this objective:

Personal Bingo

Prepare the bingo card in advance of the training course and duplicate the card for all the trainees. Instruct the trainees to mingle to identify the person who knows or owns the item described in each square.

Once this person is identified, he is invited to sign off in the corresponding square. Keep moving among the trainees until all squares are filled.

Rule: First person who fills all the squares with signatures wins a prize.

Usually, I will reproduce key words to be covered or already covered in the module in the squares. I could find out the amount of knowledge out there prior to covering the module or to uncover the level of understanding of the module just covered.

Putting the Puzzle Together

Electronically cut and paste a picture on paper. Stretch it to fit a A4 size paper. Print and cut it up into smaller triangles. Place these cut outs into an envelope.

Many copies of the puzzle could be produced. Trainees, either individually or in groups, piece these puzzles together.

Rule: First person or group which completes the puzzle wins a prize.

Normally, I will extract an important page from my Powerpoint slide and cut it up to create the puzzle. You need not have to introduce the same page to all the trainees. I prefer to use several pages to give the activity its variations. I use this activity to promote recall and sharing or to prepare trainees for the next module.

I Answer You Mark

To carry out this activity, the facilitative trainer needs to develop an answer sheet that allows the trainees to record their answers to a question posed by the trainer. Trainees are to exchange and mark each other’s answer sheet.

In the above diagram, each trainee is asked to colour the section of the feet that represent a certain organ in the body. After completing the exercise, he is to exchange his answer sheet with someone else and mark it for accuracy.

Rule: The person who get all the answers right wins a prize.

Periodically, I will use this activity to introduce a module. This way, the awareness of not knowing promotes learning amongst the trainees for the concepts and principles to be covered in the module.

I Hide and You Seek

For this activity to work, preparations need to be carried out before the start of the programme on the day of the course.

Because we want to hide the items in the training venue, no trainees should be around in the training venue when we do the hiding. Things could be hidden under the table or chair. We want the trainees to find these items. So, we should not make them too difficult to find. At a certain point of time, the trainees are invited to locate these hidden items.

Rule: The last person to find the hidden item has to complete a forfeit.

I usually design an activity for a module to be taught just after the lunch break. This is a more productive way to keep the heart pumping than stretching. I will hide questions written on small slips of paper that request trainees who had retrieved them to complete some tasks that are relevant to the modules covered before lunch. This is good way to encourage recall. I use this to restart the thinking engine for modules that are broken up into two parts because of the lunch break in between.

Stand by Stations

Stand by Stations is an activity that makes trainees stand in groups by the flip chart that mark the location of the station.

Behind the ‘Station Cover Sheet’ (‘Station Four’ in the example on the right), the Facilitative Trainer places the question he wants the trainees to discuss and work on as a group. Space should be provided on this flip chart so that the trainees can record their ideas on this paper.

Rule: The groups are given a certain amount of time to complete the activity. The last group to complete is to present their ideas first.

This is a good alternative to letting the group complete the activity at their table. Trainees are forced to stand up when they interact with each other. I normally use this activity to promote debate in class over the pros and cons of using a particular concept or principle already covered in the module.

Anagram to Success

An anagram is a pair of words, phrases or sentences that are spelled with the same set of letters. For example, the following two words are spelled with the same letters: "tan" and "ant." Much more complicated anagrams are possible, and the most interesting are when the two are relevant to each other.

You need not have to crack your brain coming up with the anagrams. There are anagram finders in the Internet and I regularly use http://wordsmith.org/anagram/ to look for my anagrams. Do attempt to give clues for solving the more complicated anagrams. You could provide the first and second character for each word in the anagram.

Rule: The person who get all the answers right wins a prize.

I would use key terms, jargons, phrases, and paired words used in the module to create the anagrams. However, instead of asking trainees to create the anagram for ‘Self-Esteem’ for a motivation training course I conduct for them, I would prefer to give the trainees ‘Sets Me Feel’ and have them work out its anagram as ‘Self-Esteem’. This way, I get them to think about the words covered in the module. I usually do not present all the anagrams on a sheet of paper to the trainees. I usually introduce one anagram at a time on Powerpoint slides and they are used as opener to a module or to finish it off.

Sticky Thoughts

I learnt this energiser from Ms Agnes Chong, a colleague of mine, and she is gracious enough to agree to allow me to share this with everyone here.

To make this activity work for you, you need, in advance, to get some coloured stickers and A4 size plastic sheets for the participants. Have these distributed to them just before the activity. Next, instruct them to tape a plastic sheet behind their backs. Get their buddies to help them. Then, ask each participant to write on a coloured sticker what he or she knows about him or herself and put it one side. Encourage them to write something that is really positive. Finally, direct the participants to use the rest of the coloured stickers to write something positive about the rest of the participants in the class. When they have completed, encourage them to stick the completed stickers on the back of each participant.

Rule: Participants could share what they have uncovered which are unknown to them.

This is a good way to feel affilitated and related with the rest of the class as well as to know more about oneself, especially aspects of oneself that are known to others but unknown to him or her. This activity is best conducted with participants who are familar with each other or who have already established a rapport with each other during the duration of the training programme.

Do give these a try at your workshops.

Of course, the ultimate solution to the attention problem could only be found at the source.

That is to encourage your trainees to have a good night rest before attending the training course the next day.

This article was written by Anthony Mok on 13 Nov 2008 and 8 May 2009.
Copyright 2008 & 2009. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved.

Ice Breakers and Energisers

The Right and Wrong Ways of Using Ice Breakers and Energisers

I have attended many training courses, workshops, seminars and conferences in the course of my life, and ice-breakers and energisers never fail to appear in their programmes. Most of these were entertaining but many had fallen short of expectations because they were used for the wrong reasons.

Ice-breakers and energisers must be used intentionally. They cannot be relegated to filling up the programme, creating relatedness amongst participants, or injecting energy into a group of tired trainees.

Experienced facilitators deploy ice-breakers and energisers for more advanced purposes. They use them to:

• Collect information on the type and amount of prior knowledge already possessed by the participants,
• Create opportunities for the expansion of wisdom in the group, and
• Check for the level of learning so far attained by the participants.

This means, we should not copy ice-breakers and energisers from elsewhere and use them indiscriminately at our facilitated events. Their design and use have to meet some preset objectives, and here are 6 different types of activities facilitators could use to create outcomes that meet these higher objectives.

Jargon Game

Participants are divided into 2 groups – Group A and B. Each participant in Group A is to hold up a placard showing the definition or description of a jargon to be covered at the event. Each member in Group B is given a jargon and he is to identify and match the meaning held up by a particular member from Group A and engage in a conversation with him on the jargon and its definition.

Guess My Line

Participants are grouped into pairs. One in the pair will have a jargon pasted on his back. It is the responsibility of the other in the pair to communicate the definition and description of the jargon to him without naming the jargon itself until his partner names the jargon.

Toilet Roll Exercise

A roll of toilet paper is circulated amongst the participants at the event. They are told that this is the last roll available and each is to pull a length of paper he thinks he need for the day. When all the participants collected their paper, they are asked to use the paper to write on a topic they wish to learn or have learnt at the event. It is a requirement that they fill up the paper with words.

Throwing the Ball

Participants are seated in a circle and a ball is circulated by passing it to the sides or throwing it across. The participant holding the ball is to say what he wishes to learn or has learnt at the event. He is to pass or throw the ball to the next person. The next person has to repeat what was wished or learnt by the previous person before sharing his, and the process is repeated until all has shared.

Lining All Together

Participants are again seated in a circle. A ball of knitting thread is circulated by passing it to the sides or throwing it across. The participant holding the ball is to ask a question about the topics covered at the event which he likes answered, and he is to pass this ball to another participant who he think knows the answer. At the end of the activity, the participants are chained together by the thread.

Call My Bluff

The participants are grouped into 4’s. Each team is to create 3 multi-choice questions, each with 4 possible answers of which 1 of these is the correct answer. In rotation, each team is to present their questions to other teams. The respondent has to justify why their choice is correct. If they are, the winning team can pass one of their questions to the team asking the questions.

This article was written by Anthony Mok on 9 Nov 2008.

Copyright 2008. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved.

Group Dynamics and Facilitation

Using the Knowledge to Design the Facilitation Process

After writing about the Facilitation Star and Facilitation Competency Wheel and putting them onto my blog, several facilitators had asked me about the things they should be mindful of when putting together the facilitation process for a facilitated event.

I had suggested the need of finding out from the participants about their learning profiles. While this is a piece of good information, facilitators need to know more. Our understanding of group dynamics is useful.

What is group dynamics? This is a branch of social psychology that studies the psychodynamics of a social group.

Amongst social scientists who had studied group dynamics, Dr Bruce Tuckman's model of Team Development provides a good framework in helping us comprehend the impact of a team's growth and maturity has on the psyche and psychodynamics of its members.

According to Tuckman, he believes that one of the four stages teams have to go through before delivering high performance is the storming phase.

Watch this video clip and try answering the following questions:

• Who was leading?
• With whom were they aligning themselves with?
• Who was playing the ‘credential’ game?
• Who was competing based on his own personal agenda?
• Who had fought?
• Who had taken flight?

Some teams are stuck in the storming stage for a long time and many never pass it, which eventually cause them to be reconstituted or disbanded. As faciltiators, we must be aware of the stage the team is currently at and apply the most appropriate facilitation process to the participants we are facilitating.

I have create a set of slides on group dynamics and their impact on facilitation.

Group Dynamics and Facilitation

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: design processes)

In these slides, I have introduced a design guide, which facilitators could use to shape their thoughts when they develop their facilitation methodologies. Facilitators must attempt to discourage disruptive behaviours and conflicts brought about during the earlier stages of the team's development and towards the later stages of its growth we must be careful not to let the groupthink gets in the way.

I have also suggested the psyches team members could experience at each stage of their growth. These may be good indicators for detecting and determining the position of the team.

This article was written by Anthony Mok on 9 Nov 2008.
Copyright 2008. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved.

Invitation to the 26th FNS Forum

Dear facilitators in Singapore,

You are invited to the 26th FNS Forum and the details are as follows:

Date: 15 Nov 08 Saturday Time: 8:30am – 1:00pm
Place: Focus Conference Room,
#15-08, Sim Lim Towers, 10 Jalan Besar, Singapore 208787
(This is NOT Sim Lim Square!)

Fees:

Normal registration 1 week before forum date or earlier:

Full-time tertiary students S$5.00
Others : S$10

Late rate after registration deadline:
Full-time tertiary students : S$15
Others : S$15

Agenda:

8:30 am Arrivals & Registration

9:00 am Part 1 – Introduction to AI

10:30 am Tea Break & Networking

11:00 am Part 2 – Continue on AI

12:30 pm Special Announcements

12:40 pm Closing Circle

1:00pm End of Session

About the Session

Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is a process tool that forges a positive path for change. Deliberately starting away from a problem-solving focus and its deficit-based discourse, AI brings individuals and groups to discover their positive core; elements which are life-giving and sustaining. This positive core in turn informs and directs energy towards an affirmative topic; the focus of the change effort, which no longer is framed in 'problem' terms. About 20 years old, AI is growing in popularity as a change process. In the context of an Appreciative Inquiry of their own facilitation practice, participants at the November FNS Forum will experience for themselves AI's 4 stages of Discovery, Dream, Design and Destiny, and place themselves on a positive path for change.

The Facilitators

This session will be co-facilitated by Fiona O'Shaughnessy, Noel E K Tan and Denise Wright

Fiona O'Shaughnessy is a Singapore-based Trainer and Facilitator. Some of the client projects she has recently used Appreciative Inquiry for include: a planning meeting for the Executive Committee of a charity who wanted to review their vision and strategic thrusts; an A*Star Institute who needed to implement major organisational structural change; and a regional customer service management team who wanted to review progress at the beginning of their annual regional team meeting.

Noel Tan is a recovering idealist and philosopher. In recent months, he has used AI in such settings: with a not-for-profit group seeking to chart a change strategy to improve its core services, with an educational institution seeking integration of existing stove-pipe divisions into a larger collective identity, and with a group of middle managers in a public service organisation articulating common hopes and dreams about impending organisational change.

Denise Wright works with organizations, teams and individuals across Asia and beyond to facilitate leadership, team and organizational development and inspired, positive change. She brings a true passion for her work, a stretching and supportive solutions-focused approach and 18 years of rich Asia based global corporate experience. Her area of expertise includes Leadership Development, Team Learning & Development, Team Coaching plus Peer / Group Coaching, Career Planning and Transition, Systemic Coaching & Mentoring, Change Solutions-Leading in challenging situations, Solutions Focused Strategy and Organizational Development-building new levels of organizational purpose, vision and contribution.

Register on-line at www.fns.sg

If you are unable to register on-line please email our Forum administrator - Ms. Emily Ng at emilyng_fns@yahoo.com.sg.

Fee is payable at the door. Once registered, the forum fee would be payable regardless of actual attendance. Cancellation or withdrawal is not permitted. We welcome replacement.

If you require directions, please log onto the following website to download the map of the venue. http://sg.pagenation.com/sin/Sim%20Lim%20Tower_103.8545_1.3037.map

If you have enquiries, please email our Forum Administrator - Ms. Emily Ng at emilyng_fns@yahoo.com.sg.

SFC 2008 - Pre & Post Conference Workshops

Singapore Facilitators Conference 2008 12 & 13 Nov 08

"Rainbow of Facilitation"

BENEFITS
CREATE different experiences
ACQUIRE processes + techniques + methods + tools
USE processes + techniques + methods + tools in practical way
COMPEL people into action
STRENGTHEN relationships
PROMOTE learning + collaboration

140 Registrants so far!

Gate closes on 31 October 2008!

Please book now to secure your workshops!

Here are more details of the pre and post conference workshops:

P1 - Learning to work with complexity, seeing what we cannot see by Ms Sheila Damodaran

Have clarity of some of the tools of Learning Organization. See life examples of the tools in organizational contexts Internalizing the understanding the tools in learning to apply it themselves. Seeing the shifts in the ways one may think and seeing its impact on what does. 3-legged stool. Framework of the 60 tools. Structural Tension Model. Systems Thinking building blocks - Reinforcing / Balancing Loops. The 11 Laws of complexity. Case-study work. Introduction to the legs of Mental Models & Personal Mastery.

P2 - Creating a Rainbow of Service by Ms. Audrey Goh

"Some where over the rainbow, skies are blue, & the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true!" ~ brace yourselves for a decadent "dessert" of a session ~ sweet, sincere & service-oriented! This gourmet Asian facilitation channel will explore the different service roles we undertake ~ as service providers to internal and external customers, both @home & @work; the service-related issues, concerns & challenges that we encounter and grapple with daily; and our rainbow strategies for coping. Make time to indulge in a slice of my authentic, home-baked facilitator's P.I.E & partake in a participative, interactive & engaging gastronomic service session, seasoned with creativity, infused with metaphors and garnished with rosettes of rainbow service!

P3 - Consciously Competent Meetings for Facilitators and Leaders by Ms. Nadine Bell

Effective, collaborative meetings don't just happen. There are millions of meetings a day in which countless hours are lost, hundreds of thousands of dollars are spent and the desired results are not achieved. Consciously Competent Meetings for Facilitators and Leaders provide the tools to significantly enhance your meetings and accomplish your business objectives. Whether your meetings are same time, same place or geographically-distributed conference calls, this highly participative workshop will prepare you to employ:Constructing the Foundation- Productive planning and preparation. Materials for Building - The elements of effective, collaborative meetings. Framing the Structure - The importance of context for an effective meeting. Laying the Floors - Methods to elicit information and inspire open discussion. Creating Space - Communication tools that move the discussion forward. Installing the Power - Ways to encourage participant engagement and buy-in. Putting On the Roof - Techniques to keep the group on track and on time. Applying the Finishing Touches - The value of an effective wrap-up.

P4 - Positive Epidemic of Large Scale Transformation by Ms. Christine Whitney Sanchez

Is there such a thing as large scale transformation? What are the essential design elements for inviting transformation? How can we work on large scale transformation while keeping personal and group transformation in the foreground? This workshop will explore the heart of Large Group Facilitation and Blending the Essence of Appreciative Inquiry, World Café, Open Space Technology and Reflection Circles. Use the principles and practices of Methods for Strategic Collaboration to design facilitative processes. Tap large group facilitation best practices. Craft questions for Appreciative Inquiry, World Café, Open Space Technology and Reflection Circles. Develop a personal action plan for using large group methods.

P5 - Rain or Shine: Achieving Flow in Facilitation by Mr. Azim Pawanchik and Dr. Suraya Sulaiman

As facilitators and change leaders, we have a great responsibility to create the context and space for meaningful and fruitful conversations to happen. Today's participants are easily distracted or irritated, at times, exhibiting symptoms of ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder). With the participants already being inundated with technology, heavy workloads and stress, the task of creating flow is an uphill battle. As facilitators, we have to deal with this distraction and still ensure that there is good and engaging communication flow. Facilitating is not about being a traffic police; directing who to speak when to speak or when to stop speaking; its also not about timing everything to the final second or have everybody follow the rule. This would be a flawless session in terms execution but devoid of the heart and energy required to have a meaningful outcome. We believe that to achieve greater results, a facilitator needs to help their client or participant achieve `flow' during the sessions whereby they are fully connected and engaged in achieving the set goals.

P6 - Exceptional conversational skills and their underpinning by Alan Stewart, PhD

Conversations are not just something we do among other doings; they are our human niche, we live in a world formed through conversing. Conversations make one world or another; not only in how we relate to each other, but in how the whole lived world arises around us. The associated social experience helps to promote understanding and to destroy barriers between us. This workshop is about the skills of being a competent conversationalist, integral to the rainbow of facilitation. Is this vital to you? Appreciate how vital people skills are to success as a facilitator. Discover the attributes of a competent and effective conversationalist. Be aware that conversational skills are not `givens' – they can be learned and practiced to good effect. Recognise which elements of your own pattern you would do well to develop. Speak so that the hearer is dancing with you. Know the importance of asking the right questions before it is too late. Notice who has particular skills as a conversationalist and learn from them. Be confident in letting your true personality shine.

Download details & Register now on-line at: http://www.fns.sg

Moving from Idea Dumping to Idea Generation

Enhancing the Value of Brainstorming Sessions

A typical brainstorming session, one where session participants are asked to think and write down ideas that may be considered as solutions for a given challenge, does not usually generate breakthrough ideas. While the session produces a good volume of ideas, the ratio between usual ideas and creative ideas leans more towards those that are already largely known. This observation empirically points to the limited capability and capacity of typical brainstorming sessions in generating unique ideas.

Why such dynamics are in place? This is because most brainstorming sessions are organised as idea dumping rather than idea creation sessions. By idea dumping, participants are encouraged to recall and release ideas that they already had. This is far from doing idea creation. While we cannot discount these ‘already had’ ideas, they are still nothing more than just old ideas.

To create new ideas in these brainstorming sessions, we need to train session participants to go beyond idea dumping, and Visual Connection is one such methods.

Process

Visual Connection uses the technology of forced association to help session participants think beyond set patterns and prevent the digging of old memories for already known ideas.

There are many ways to execute the Visual Connection process. I am going to show you one approach, which I had used in a recent workshop.

Stage 1 - Choosing a Set of Visual Connection Cards

These could be pictures you had taken during your overseas trips or gleamed from the Internet.

The pictures may be from different themes and topics but they need to comply with the following rules:

Each picture needs to be focused on a specific theme or topic.

It has to be expressive; capable of conjuring emotions and thoughts.

It is always good to laminate the cards to reduce wear and tear from prolong use.

Stage 2 – Laying Out the Cards on the Table

The cards should be laid out on the table prior to the brainstorming session.

It is good practice to limit the overlapping of cards. Use a bigger table if this practice could not be achieved.

Where possible, avoid placing the cards near the window to reduce light reflecting from the laminated cards.

You may present these pictures as powerpoints as well. Just that you may not be able to display as many cards if they are presented in this manner.

Stage 3 – Inviting Session Participants to Select Cards

This is the stage where the session participants are invited to the table to view and select two to three cards that they like. It is always good to produce at least 1.5 times the number of cards to the number of attending session participants to offer them a wider choice of cards during this stage of the workshop.

Stage 4 – Using the Cards, Create a List of Sensory Perceptions

Here, session participants are asked to produce a list of words that immediately come to mind while looking at the pictures they have collected from the table.

They will be asked not to self-censure the words that are coming up and are encouraged to write down as many words as possible on their working sheets.

It is expected that each participant should be able to write about 10 to 15 words for each picture they had looked at.

Here is an example of this section of the process:

Chosen Picture


List of words

Old, Lonely, Green, White, Chair, Wood, Cold, Windy, Memory, Waiting, Calm, Contented, Thinking, Happy, Resting

Stage 5 – Introducing the Problem/Challenge Statement

It is at this stage that the problem or challenge statement is introduced. The owner of the problem/challenge could provide a short introduction on its background, and session participants could clarify. Conversations about its solutions should be refrained at this stage.

Stage 6 – Generating Ideas Using the List of Sensory Words

With the problem/challenge statement as the context, the session participants could now use the list of words generated earlier on to develop some ideas for the problem/challenge.

Each of idea could be written on a slip of paper and pasted on the wall to enable the Gallery Walk

Use another word on the list once no more ideas could be created from it.

Here is an example of how the list of words could be used:

Problem Statement

Besides imposing a surcharge of S$5.00, how else could taxis be encouraged to pick up passengers at designated taxi stands near the F1 racing arena?

Word Taken From the List

Happy

Idea Created

Give each taxi driver a F1 collectable to reward them for coming into the designated taxi stand.

Here is a slideshare on the technique.

Visual Connection - Ideation Through Word Association

View more presentations from Xiaohao .

Do give this technique a try when you are conducting a facilitated brainstorming session and good luck.

This article was written by Anthony Mok on 27 Sep 2008 and the SlideShare is added on 10 Feb 2010.

Copyright 2008 and 2010. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved.

Looking for Facilitators

All Facilitators,

Ms Beth Macdonald is looking for a facilitator who could helm a one-day change programme in Shanghai on September 19th. The materials are to be presented in Mandarin.

Those who are interested can contact Beth directly at beth@hcd.com.sg.

Good luck.

Facilitators Network Gathering

All facilitators,

The next facilitators' network gathering will be held in Sep 2008. Here are the details:

Date: 13 September 08 Saturday Time: 8:30am – 1:00pm
Place: Focus Conference Room,
#15-08, Sim Lim Towers, 10 Jalan Besar, Singapore 208787 (This is NOT Sim Lim Square!)

Registration website: http://www.fns.sg/

Fees:
Normal registration (deadline is 1 week before forum date or earlier):
Full-time tertiary students S$5.00
Others : S$10

After the registration deadline:
Full-time tertiary students : S$15
Others : S$15

Agenda:

8:30 am Arrivals & Registration

9:00 am Part 1 – Propless Games

10:30 am Tea Break & Networking

11:00 am Part 2 – Cafe Conversation on Games that work

12:30 pm Special Announcements

12:40 pm Closing Circle

1:00pm End of Session

Part 1 – Propless Games® - Have you ever been in a situation where you needed a simple ice-breaker before the start of a lesson or a quick energiser to "warm-up" the participants after lunch during a workshop, but have neither the idea nor the prop to do so. Allan will be sharing with you several propless ice-breakers, deinhibitisers, energisers and problem-solving games to help you to inject fun and excitement into your lessons, workshops and programmes.

Part 2 – In this segment, using the World Cafe approach; all participants will share their experiences in using games during workshops and the characteristics that make up a successful 'game'.

The Facilitators:

Part 1:

Allan Lee has been involved in the training and development related profession for the past 16 years. His other industry experiences include human resource management, organisational development, finance, marketing and business development. He is also currently the Associate Lecturer for the Republic Polytechnic for its Diploma in Outdoor and Adventure Learning. As a trainer, he has conducted and facilitated hundreds of courses and programmes. As a game specialist, he has written and published a game resource book called Propless Games®.

Part 2:

Prabu K Naidu is the co-founder of FNS and has 19 years of MNE experience (1980 – 1999) with Philips, AT&T and Compaq spanning diverse functions in Engineering, Materials, Project Management, TQM, HRD, Managing Change and Supply Chain Re-Engineering which set the foundation for his current ten years of training, facilitation and consulting work. Throughout these 10 years developing workshops and facilitated sessions; he has accumulated a wealth of what works and what does not when it comes to games & activities in the learning room.

If you are unable to register on-line please email our Forum administrator - Ms. Emily Ng at emilyng_fns@yahoo.com.sg Fee is payable at the door.

Once registered, the forum fee would be payable regardless of actual attendance. Cancellation or withdrawal is not permitted. We welcome replacement.

If you require directions, please log onto the following website to download the map of the venue.
http://sg.pagenation.com/sin/Sim%20Lim%20Tower_103.8545_1.3037.map

If you have enquires, please email our Forum Administrator - Ms. Emily Ng at emilyng_fns@yahoo.com.sg

Understanding the Facilitated - A Key Role of a Facilitator

As a facilitator, it is always good to find out more about the needs of your participants before you start the facilitated event. The information gathered is useful in designing the process of the workshop, creating the language of the facilitation and generating the questions-stems for the event.

I usually send out a pre-course survey to my participants and here is an extract of this survey that I use.

Learning Profile

1. Look at the words in the four red boxes in the diagram below. Please circle the box that best describes the way you learn.

Level of Emphasis

2. This 1-day workshop will cover issues related to your organisation’s vision, mission and values. Please read the three statements provided in the box below and rank them in running order according to their importance to you (the statement that is most important should be ranked 3 and least important as 1):

Learning Methodologies

3. A number of methods will be introduced to help you achieve the outcome mentioned above. Please look at the diagram below and circle your most preferred method.

Refreshments

4. We will be providing tea breaks. Our menu is provided below. Please tick off any two items you like included in the tea breaks for this workshop.

Measure of Success

5. Lastly, could you write a paragraph of not more than 30 words, in the box below, describing what you consider to be a successful facilitated session?

This article was written by Anthony Mok on 14 Aug 2008.

Copyright 2008. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved.

The Consensus Workshop Method

The Consensus Workshop Method is the second most important facilitation process for any facilitator.

The method taps into the wisdom of the group and creates common ground among participants against a backdrop of diverse opinions, values and perspectives. The consensus reached at the workshop enables the group to forward its conversation.

The workshop embeds the question that seeks multiple, agreed-upon answers. For example, “What are the challenges you faced when dealing with customers?” At the end of the process, the facilitated group will have generated and considered a number of possible answers to the question and come to an agreement on several of them.

The five-step process begins by:

Creating the Question where Answers are Needed – This is a relatively complex process which may involve the person who activated you to facilitate the workshop. In the discussions with your ‘client’, you determine the purpose of the workshop and the expected outcome.

After the discussion, I discovered my ‘client’ wants to know the top three challenges his staff is facing when interacting with its customers. He wants to use this knowledge to acquire the most appropriate customer service training programme for his company of about 100 staff.

So, the question that needs answers is “What are the challenges you faced when dealing with customers?”.

Generating Answers for the Question – Here, the staff is invited to dig into their individual knowledge pool to provide answers for the question. There are many techniques that could be deployed to increase the efficiency of answer generation among the staff.

There are also rules of engagement for this step:

• This is an individual exercise
• Enter a answer on a slip of paper
• No debating or evaluating of answers
• Quantity is more important than quality

Gallery Walk – Next, the facilitator invites the workshop participants to look at the answers that are pasted on the wall. The objective of this step is to encourage them to create more answers by building on the answers of others. So, it is a good idea to ask them to bring along with them writing instruments and slips of papers when they begin on their gallery walk.Grouping Answers into Clusters – The facilitator lead the facilitated into the next step of the process by organising the participants into small teams and inviting them to group similar answers into clusters. Depending on the available time, two teams could be formed to do this part of the exercise.

Naming the Clusters – A third team is organised and tasked to analyse the groupings to create an agreed-upon header for each of the cluster. All the clusters have been named.

Voting to Reach a Consensus – voting is a decision-making tool that enables a group to sort through a long list of answers to identify priorities. This is an individual exercise and no discussion between participants about their vote is encouraged to ensure it takes on democratic and participative path. Because the delicate nature of this final step, the facilitator needs to identify some criteria to guide the vote so that people don't vote at cross purposes. The criteria used for deciding on the vote could include one or two (no more than two to avoid making the exercise complex):

• easiest items to complete
• lowest cost items
• first items in a logical sequence
• most important items
• most innovative items
• most important to the customer

The participants could vote more than once. This is a decision of the facilitator based on the number of clusters already identified.

At the end of the process, the facilitator leads the group into a conversation on the resolve of executing the next appropriate step.

Practice makes perfect. Good luck.

This article was written by Anthony Mok on 14 Aug 2008.
Copyright 2008. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved.