How to be a good facilitator in a meeting. Whether you are a professional facilitator or you volunteered to lead a meeting or perhaps you were voluntold to lead a meeting, by the end of this video, you will be a smarter and more effective group leader if you watch the end. If you watch one tip, you'll be your.
. . watch half of it you'll be half as smart and effective as a group leader.
I'm Chad Littlefield, I get to do this for a living and in this video, I'm not going to hold back. I'm going to share what I do with some of the top leaders and organizations on the planet. Let's get into it.
Throughout this video, we're going to unpack a phrase that completely transformed the way that I work with groups. I'm also going to share one of my favorite secrets or tools that takes less than 60 seconds but completely transforms 60 minutes of a meeting. I'm going to crack open the back of my brain and share a framework that I use to increase my clarity as a facilitator, which is one of the most important skills that you can master as a facilitator is being really really clear.
I'm going to give you a framework to help increase your clarity quite a bit and then we got to go to the dark side for a minute so I am going to share a common trap that people often fall into as a facilitator that greatly reduces their efficacy as a leader and a facilitator or presenter in any given moment. And finally, my job is to make facilitators and leaders and educators look really good. In fact, I just got a little LinkedIn message from somebody that says, "I love your stuff, Chad.
All your tools and things that you share and your videos and your channel because you make us look good," and I was like that's one of the tallest compliments. And so not only I'm gonna unpack some tools that will make you look good, I also want to share a tool that can help you be remembered as a facilitator especially if you're doing this professionally or even if you're doing this as a part of your profession, you want people to remember the meeting you lead or the class that you facilitate and think, "Wow. That was phenomenally led.
I wish you could be in all of my meetings," right? That's like the end goal, that's the dream so to speak. Alright enough prep, here's the statement from a mentor that totally transformed the way that I lead groups: "State matters more than script.
" I'm saying yours. . .
your state matters more than script but also their state matters more than script. And so, one of the ways that you can be a really phenomenal and effective facilitator for any meeting or gathering is to be intentional about right in the beginning, in the first. .
. somewhere in the first 3 to 10 minutes saying or doing something that helps the group shift their state. So, that could be as simple as if you know the group well, you have some rapport, like me and my co-founder Will Wise, when we have our heads screwed on straight, we actually start every single one of our meetings in 60 seconds of total silence.
So, we just pause. If we're meeting over Zoom, we turn off our videos and we do absolutely nothing. We invite 60 seconds of peace, silence and perhaps even a bit of boredom and what I notice every single time and it always surprises me actually is the clarity that comes out of that 60 seconds is huge because I just came from whatever meeting I was in, my brain's in accelerator mode and so transition to the next meeting, having that 60 second divider changes my state which influences the rest of the script that we're going through.
So, that's one example of how you might invite a state change in a group. This phrase came from a lovely gentleman named Matt Church over in Australia and he's really really good about shifting state with words only. So, I like to use experiences to shift state but you also might consider what's the one sentence that I could say to my group to really either shock them or capture their attention or what's the 1 sentence or idea or story that you could share that brings them from wherever they are in the past or whatever they might be thinking about in the future and just allows them to arrive in this exact moment because if you can shift people's state into now, here and right now, your meeting will be way, way, way more productive whereas oftentimes meetings start and you see people responding to emails or they're doing something else and then they look up and just because they looked up doesn't mean they're actually present.
And if you have a group that is partially present, you're having a partial meeting. Related to this idea that state matters more than script, the tool that takes less than 60 seconds, not sitting in silence but the tool takes less than 60 seconds but can absolutely transform 60 minutes plus of a meeting is you taking a moment to get really clear about what your intention is for the meeting and share that with the group. Now, ideally, intention actually incorporates the needs of everybody in the group and so you have to ask yourself before you say that sentence, before you form that sentence, what does everybody else care about?
Do they want to get out of there as quickly as possible? Do they want to get straight to business, get work done? Do they want to reconnect and have a chat?
Do they want to write? Think about what is it that people need and come up with 1 single sentence that incorporates that, and a little tip here, what people need I would say falls into a few different buckets of currency. So, think about on one hand time, right, we live in a culture where there's too much to do and too little time and so if your intention promises to save people time or to use time really effectively or something related to a time benefit, that could be really useful for a really busy group.
Another currency might be money. And so, if you're meeting in a business context and you've got a bunch of senior leaders your intention statement, that thing that takes less than 60 seconds to say but informs the entire rest of your meeting might have a dollar figure attached to it or a percentage of money. So, here's an example of what I might say.
"My intention during this meeting is to actually have a conversation and make some decisions that I think can actually save our entire team 25% of wasted dollars that we spend every single year. " The 3rd currency you might consider and weave into your intention is status. People like.
. . so status, think about reputation, ego, right?
This is like where you like, stroke people's ego a little bit maybe. To be really transparent with you, I probably used this one a little bit at the very beginning of this video when I said if you watch until the end you will be a smarter and more effective group leader. If you watch half of the video, you'll be half as smart and effective of a group leader.
So, that's a status thing, kind of related to mastery in your craft. You clicked on this video, you're watching this, you're giving up a little piece of your time to become a better human being by watching this video. 4th currency is mood, right?
Can your intention statement say or promise that this meeting might reduce people's stress level or increase people's joy and happiness or ramp up the fulfillment that they get out of their jobs, right? Some intention that speaks to either reducing bad moods or increasing good moods, that can be really useful and just a quick pause before I share the 5th currency that you might consider as you're sharing your intention, little leadership tip, if you have intentions that affect other people but you don't share them with them, that's actually manipulation, right? Trying to get people to do something without telling them what it is you're trying to get them to do is manipulating and I don't know about you, I do not love to be manipulated.
And so, this one tool that literally can be as simple as one clear sentence that incorporates the needs of the whole has the ability to completely root out manipulation because when you say something like, "My intention during this meeting is to actually cut your stress in half and add a little element of fun to your work over the next month," right? So, when I say a sentence like that to a group at the beginning of a meeting and you're gonna have to come up with your own that right that might not fit your meeting, but when I say a sentence like that to a group, they have the choice right in that moment to say, "Yeah, I want half the stress and a little bit more joy and fulfillment in my work," or they have the chance to say, "No, I'm not playing the same game that you are," and either way, they're not being manipulated because you've been really clear about what your intention is so they know exactly where we're going, what's happening, what the purpose and aim of this meeting is. When you're clear about your intention, it allows you to meet for purpose rather than for time which is typically what we do and a really good facilitators guide a group and smooth the process of meeting for purpose rather than for time by getting really clear about intention.
Now, the thing is there might be multiple intentions in the room and this is the 5th currency is creating some sense of community or belonging. So, one tool that admittedly would take longer than 60 seconds related to intention is you might invite a group to take 60 seconds to get clear about their intention for the meeting. Actually write it down on a sticky note, toss it into the middle of the room or put it in the chat and then to have people look through other people's intentions and just come off mute or shout out and read somebody else's intention that they really resonate with, that they're like, "Yes.
I am on board with this," and that way you've actually verbalized the group's intention and implicitly accomplish this 5th currency which is create a little bit of community and sense of connection right in the beginning by getting clear about everyone's intentions, not just yours as the facilitator. Next, I'm super psyched to share the framework that I use to increase my clarity. It's really really simple, it helps keep people out of the fog.
The worst thing that can happen when you're facilitating a meeting is people don't know what's happening, why they're meeting, why they're doing whatever it is you're inviting them to do, why they're in the conversation that you've just split them out into etc. You want to keep people out of the fog and knowing and connected to this purpose all throughout. And so, this framework comes from a little teeny book called The Pocket Guide to Facilitating Human Connections.
It was the. . .
one of the first resources or books that I ever created. Next came me and Will's book, "Ask Powerful Questions: Create Conversations That Matter," but in this book, it's more of a dive into experience based facilitations, not so much dialogue facilitation. So, the first 3rd of the book or so are all the facilitation concepts philosophies foundations that sit in the back of my brain that inform the choices I make when I'm actually working with clients.
The framework is actually called FOGS and I'm not a huge fan of acronyms, it's a pretty clever acronym that spells FOGS. And so the FF stands for framing and so to even frame up this tool right now, this is the same framework that I use when I'm working with Crayola or Notre Dame or any of the other organizations that you'll find around our website, right? These are things that I've learned through practice, this is not something I like, "Oh, let me write it down in a book and hope it works," like I use this every single day with some of the top universities and organizations on the planet and so this FOGS framework really simply stands for frame it.
So, you want to frame what it is that you're about to invite the group to do. Context is everything, right? If I say think of something red, you can think of anything red.
If I say think of something red that's within 10 feet of your location right now, you're all of a sudden going to be like folder, right, or heart or anything else that's red around you and that's what framing something, frame the context of something does. It puts people all in the same boat. So, when we say like the buzzword of like, "Let's get on the same page or let's get aligned," framing it as a facilitator, you actually put everybody on the same page, you put everybody in the same context.
You can do that by sharing an intention statement but framing is really important. 2nd piece is objective and this is the. .
. I'll share actually the O and the G. So, objective and guidelines.
Any game, so soccer, football, any. . .
it's not a game but a sport, swimming, right? There's an objective and then there's guidelines or rules on how you accomplish it. And one of the reasons we like games or sports are there some attraction as human beings is when you have a clear mission or objective and then you have some parameters of how you're going to accomplish that, it really helps.
And so that could be as simple as, "Hey, the objective right now is to learn some insights from your colleagues that might not be in your brain but could help save you time in this next month. " Guidelines might be, "But we've only got 10 minutes for this conversation so when we split out into groups, jump right into it," or jump right into it and if it's a group that doesn't know each other well I might say, "Jump right into it and just whip around in alphabetical order so you don't waste time figuring out who goes first or last. " So, those would be 2 guidelines at a very simple level.
The more complex or experiential you go, the more guidelines you might have but really simply stating what the clear objective is and then giving the group some parameters. Parameters actually increase creativity. Lastly, the S in FOGS stands for safety.
So, here's the entire framework if you want to freeze frame it or take a screenshot and safety, depending on your context, means a couple different things. Physical safety, right, you don't want people getting hurt. So, if you're doing something that's experiential or outside maybe that is relevant.
For most of you, it's going to be emotional or psychological safety. So, how are you weaving in this idea of challenge by choice, letting people participate at a level of their own comfort rather than pushing anybody too far. As a facilitator, you want to create the space and the choice for authenticity and vulnerability but you cannot and should not force it.
As I was recording this video, I realized I was a little bit passionate about this topic because I'm currently coaching a couple people on how to be better facilitators in meetings. So, I've got a lot to say, this video is getting long so we're going to cut it here as a part 1 and if you wanna click on part 2 right over here, we'll jump into some of the really common traps that even professional and novice facilitators often find themselves in and I'll be sharing how to get out of those traps to be a really phenomenal facilitator. I'm Chad.
See you there.
