Facilitator Café Handouts

Each café handout is priced at $10. Cafe's are provided in downloadable PDF format. If you would like to purchase more than one at a time, please email info@northstarfacilitators.com.

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100 Great Questions
Need help in making more meaningful conversation or creating great facilitated group discussions? This handout contains 15 tips to maximize the effectiveness of asking questions. In addition, the 100 plus questions are organized into handy topic areas we use every day.

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Assessing Client Needs
As a facilitator, you can’t create results unless you have a clear picture of their situation and the underlying issues. This handout will give you a process to help you understand the group participants, assess their needs and clarify desired outcomes so you can create truly powerful workshops.

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Client Follow Up
Who loses when you don’t follow-up with a group with which you have worked closely for hours, days or weeks? Everyone! The follow-up phase of facilitation is often neglected yet easy to implement if you know what to do. This café will outline why, when, with whom and how you follow-up.

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Collaborative Organizations
A relatively recent trend in the last two decades has been for organizations to restructure themselves into distinct teams and expect them to work interactively both within the team and between teams. As facilitators, we often help: “get everyone on the same page”; align individuals with the organizational mission or work more effectively together. Learn what collaborative organizations look like, what conditions must be present in organizations for collaboration, what leadership styles foster collaboration?

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Complex Facilitation
Imagine that you have been asked to design and facilitate a challenging workshop or event. Where do you even begin? This handout presents five steps to design a "no fail" event. Steps include: complexity checklist to evaluate how complex your event is with your client; the four life cycle phases of an event; the FACETS of Success; list of generic tools; and a template to map out your preliminary design with appropriate activities, tools and processes.

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Consensus and Decision
Every decision essentially has three parts to it. In this handout, we’ll learn what these three parts are and describe the overall process of decision-making and offer a framework to describe and understand the process based on Sam Kaner et al’s work and the OneSmartWorld system. We also offer a modified version of Kaner’s decision-making “gradients of agreement” scale (a facilitator’s tool!) which can be used to help a group decide what levels of agreement they are having for important decisions that need to be made by larger group.

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Cultural Competency
Cultural competency is an individual’s or organization’s capacity, skills, attitudes and behavior to deal fairly and compassionately with the non-dominant culture – i.e., anyone who is different from us. Why start the journey to be culturally competent? What are the steps to start? This handout is packed with information that will help you lead a group in the development process.

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Documenting Groups Work
Often people fail to document the work they do in a way that energizes the group to action after a facilitation event. In this handout, we discuss the importance of documenting accurately, when and what to document, and a detailed summary list of what to be sure to include in your documented events. Also included is a sample document of a group that crafted its core values and beliefs.

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Easy Graphic Facilitation
80% of the brain’s processing is handled visually so people tend to retain visual information longer than information presented most other ways. That is why graphic facilitation is helpful to a group. You don't have to be an artist to draw great graphics. These simple tips and samples will show you how to use easy graphics to powerfully motivate a group.

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Effective Consensus Building
The importance of consensus for facilitators cannot be overstated. If you don’t know what it is and how to get there, you will not be able to serve most groups. This handout briefly outlines four consensus making techniques that range from simple to complex that can be used to help a group attain consensus.

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Energize Groups Using Play
In facilitated workshops, appropriate toys, games and play activities help bring participants to a positive emotional state – an essential requirement for learning, creative thinking and idea-generation. It can also diffuse tension and increase group members’ sense of discovery, participation, and involvement. Find out all you need to know about introducing play into your groups and four unique group energizers.

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Engage Group Learning
Each of us is unique in the way we learn and retain information. Accelerated learning is a system of tools and techniques designed to help learners of all ages access more of their brain’s thinking potential. This handout briefly describes the latest brain research on learning. The intent is to help you work more skillfully with other’s learning preferences and engage participants more effectively.

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Facilitator Neutrality
Neutrality is sometimes called the MOST important skill and quality that a facilitator can have. Not displaying neutrality can damage a group’s ability to function well together in the future and is worse than any other mistake you can make. What is neutrality? Why is it crucially important? How do you practice it? This handout has the answers.

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Facilitator Presence
The mindful and aware facilitator cultivates qualities of being present at every moment with the group. This is a quality we need to continually work on because if we get caught in our own issues or ego, we cannot fully serve the group. In this handout we explore what are the qualities of presence and three tools for cultivating perresence.

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Facilitator Toolbox
What are the basic supplies and props you should take on the road with you? How do you store and transport all these supplies? Where are the best locations to purchase these items? This handout answers these questions and contains an itemized supply check list you can use for every workshop you facilitate.

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Getting to the Root of the Issue
Root cause analysis is any technique that helps a group identify the underlying causes of surface issues. It is not about solving isolated issues but really digging deeper to get at the root cause of symptoms. This handout provides two ways to help a group work through challenging issues successfully.

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Group Decision Making
Decision making in groups can be a daunting task. This handout outlines some core principles to keep in mind when helping groups make decisions and offers step by step instructions (including why, when, supplies needed and how) for two techniques called the Decision Grid and Multi-or Dot-Voting.

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Groups in Conflict
Participants and groups’ behaviors may seem “difficult” when their needs are not being met or their values are being threatened. In this handout, we explore the Non-Violent Communication (NVC) model, developed by Dr. Marshall Rosenberg, to develop skilful language when dealing with annoying or irritating behaviors in groups and ten tips to ensure difficult participants don’t undermine your ability to help the group.

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Group Problem Solving
One way to assist groups with a problem or challenging topic is by using Dr. De Bono’s quick, highly structured “Six Thinking Hats” technique. It helps a group think creatively and sequentially, and avoids argumentative thinking modes or debating. Learn how to use this technique through an overview of the Six Hats thinking styles, when and how to use it, and example exercises.

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Herrmann Brain Diversity Game
The Herrmann Brain Diversity Game helps groups learn what brain dominance is, what each individual’s learning style is and how to appreciate, work and communicate with other’s unique styles. In this handout, we give you step by step instructions to use this team building and capabity building tool with all group sizes.

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IAF Facilitator Ethics and Values
Sometimes as facilitators we face challenging situations where we are not sure what to do. We sense a conflict but if we do not have a very thoughtful written code to measure up against, we can do harm. This handout not only contains the IAF code of ethics but will help you reflect on what your values are and how they change when you take on the role of facilitator.

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Integrating Learning with Story, Song and Symbol
There’s a process in a workshop I use developed by the Institute of Cultural Affairs for assisting groups to team-build or integrate their work. It’s called the Story, Song, Symbol Workshop. This handout explains what this technique is, how to use it, and why it’s such a valuable tool.

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Large Group Facilitation
Few organizations escape the pressures of needing to adapt to new technology, new mandates, decreased funding, market changes and more. They need to find ways to align and engage large numbers of people around a common, effective strategic focus. And they realize that it is not helpful to expect top management to have all the answers. While large group facilitation is a challenging task, this handout will share some of the processes and details we have found helpful to execute very successful large group events. We also offer starting points and examples of templates for facilitator guides, small group instructions and an example case study.

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Mind Mapping for Brainstorming
This technique is very useful as an organizing, brainstorming and decision-making tool for both individuals and group work by using color, key words, and images to summarize, sort, and retain information on any topic. It allows the thinking mind to be flexible and make associations between different ideas and aids long term memory retention. Learn how to use this powerful graphic technique for your own personal use or upcoming group work.

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Plotting a Group's History
This is a great tool developed by the Institute of Cultural Affairs (ICA) to assist complex decision-making or precede strategic planning. This technique will often bring the breakthrough a group needs. They realize they have weathered difficult decisions and/or events before and have enormous experience to undertake the change needed ahead. Here is the most common way I use this technique.

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Reconciling Differences
As leaders and facilitators, we often find two groups or individuals who appear to be in complete opposition to each others’ ideas. When one side is not able to hear the other and digs deeper to defend a point of view, this might be called entrenched thinking. In this handout we will explore a few examples of differences as they apply to groups who are presenting entrenched thinking. The model is called “circles of reconciliation” by Trompenear and Hampden-Turner. Then we will apply the model to relevant personal or professional situations of our own.

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Secrets of Strategic Planning
A good strategic plan acts as a compass. It helps an organization focus on its goals for the future and how to achieve them. In times of chaos and change, a coherent strategic plan helps team members decide what actions to take and know why they are taking them. Learn the what, why, when, who and how of strategic planning. Also included are two tools that will help assess what is really important to your group in SP and a simple, short way to help a group develop its mission and purpose statement.

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Six Great Visioning Tools
A vision gives a practical vision of a desired future. When a group collaborates in creating a common shared vision and referring to it constantly after the process, they are more likely to reach their goals effortlessly. Find out in this café how you as the facilitator can implement six visioning tools that will help ensure your group’s vision will be fulfilled.

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Starting a Facilitation Business
One of the first competencies required by the International Association of Facilitators (IAF) for professional facilitator certification is called “Create Collaborative Client Relationships”. The consistent ability to do this is THE key to building a successful facilitation practice. Other aspects of building a facilitation business include: knowing the price your market will bear, gaining continuous confidence and experience in a number of core facilitation tools and concepts, having organized and accessible files and bookkeeping records, and maintaining and nourishing your “personal spirit” on a regular basis. This café handout will briefly explore each of the items listed above.

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Stellar Meetings
How do you handle aggressive people in a meeting? Should participants be able to alter an agenda? Should you start with or without attendees that are consistently late? These frequently asked questions and more are answered in this handout. It also includes 10 important facilitator tips to enhance meeting outcomes and make every meeting stellar!

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Trust & Mistrust
We have all experienced the pain of losing trust in someone. Once trust is lost, it is dreadfully hard to regain it. Often, we are called upon as facilitators to assist leaders, other individuals and organizations to rebuild this trust. This handout discusses the steps to reduce mistrust and build trust, the three main types of trust, and the four core characteristics of transformative trust.

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Working with Group Spirit
The work of the facilitator is indeed sacred and creative. So how can we help lift the spirit of others when we are working with them? 20 core principles are addressed in this cafe to answer this question as well as to provoke contemplation for other group process practitioners and help you see the connection between your personal life and working with groups professionally.

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