Effective Meetings

Creating Group Guidelines for Terrific Teamwork

Getting teamwork off to a solid start is critical to the success of the project and to the team. Here are some tips for how to set customized team guidelines (also known as ground rules) as well as offer them typical guidelines from which they could pick and choose.  Both activities take from 15 to…

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Wake Them Up! Raising Energy in Meetings

Low energy, boring, waste of time. What do these 3 words conjure up for you? Likely most of you answered – meetings! What if we could get all of our meetings off to a positive, high-energy, anything but boring start? Today, we’ll focus on the benefits of perking your group up right from the start…

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This is Why You Shouldn’t Give Up on Virtual Meetings

So here’s what happened… I had what felt like a major failure with my free webinar last week. We had practiced everything. All the layouts were perfect – well not exactly perfect but good enough. But the technology surprised us to say the least. Close to the beginning, we were in the middle of conducting…

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“Please Do Not Ask Me to Be Creative!”

Participants will often express this sentiment, “Please do not ask me to do anything “touchy, feely”, creative, or silly (these are often all lumped together as similar by your participants) . Thus, when we as facilitators suggest something creative, we are often met with resistance, sighs, and “deer in the headlights” (i.e., scared) looks. Interestingly,…

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Pack Your Bag – 6 Props for Awesome Meetings

In this video and written blog, I’m going to actually share what I do to get ready for a meeting and take you into my dining room to open up my workshop suitcase. Enjoy the video or just read below to get more ideas. Every time I get ready for facilitating meetings, I notice nervousness…

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11 Must Do’s For Better Meetings

This week and last week I have been delivering a customized version of our Meetings That Rock in webinar format to a group of managers in Alaska who are motivated to improve the way their meetings are conducted.  One of the handouts we provide them is on the 11 steps of participatory meetings.  I thought…

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When Things Heat Up – What Expert Larry Dressler Does

Over the last year we have featured a number of facilitators asking them the same questions.  This month we have the wonderful treat from hearing from a well known facilitator and author, Larry Dressler.  Larry wrote “Standing In The Fire” and has just had his book translated into Japanese!  I met Larry for the first…

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Stop Wasting Everything You’ve Learned About Facilitation

I pulled a book off my shelf today by Susan Jeffers, “Embracing Uncertainty: Breakthrough Methods for Achieving Peace of Mind When Facing the Unknown”. The title is totally relevant to what I call facilitation design. (Ms. Jeffers also wrote “Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway”).   In this blog, I’m going to talk about a model…

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Just Say “Yes” to Small Groups

I heard some birds chirping outside my window while I was meditating the other morning. I am supposed to just notice the chirping and then go back to my breath. But instead I took a moment to really enjoy those sounds. Unfortunately, I digressed even further because it reminded me of my childhood. I used…

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I Don’t Know What to Ask My Client – Tips for a Successful Interview

A Coaching Model to Help Us Interview Our Clients Awhile back I spoke about a Danish colleague who presented at the International Association of Facilitators Conference in the USA. (See “Space: The Final Frontier of Facilitation”) His name is Jens Lillebaek. He is an IAF certified professional facilitator (CPF©), a coach and a chief advisor…

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