NLP Facilitation Podcast - Sue Banjo

Facilitation - Discussion between Michael Beale and Sue Banjo, February 2008.

Sue Banjo has worked in a number of senior people, process, quality and change management roles with European and Global responsibilities. She has project managed a number of multi-site/country improvement/change management programs and has delivered Project, Process and Customer Service training across Europe, North America, Singapore, China and Australia

http://www.nlp-expert.co.uk/facilitation/Sue.mp3

Michael : Good afternoon Sue. Firstly I'd like to really welcome you to this podcast interview, as you are in fact the first person that I've talked to about facilitation, which is a subject that is of great interest to me. Can we kick it off - can you introduce yourself by saying a little bit about who you are and what you do?

Sue :   Yes,  thank you and good afternoon to you Mike. I've been working around facilitation for around twenty, twenty five years or so, and been involved in well over a thousand workshops. And some of those workshops have been across Europe, North America, China, Singapore, Hong Kong, so a real array of workshops looking at areas such as process improvement, working with different cultures, and looking at effective teams. So really a wealth of experience around facilitation and managing workshops.

Michael : Ok, what sort of companies have you worked for? Or with?

Sue : There's been some different organisations with different industry sectors - so from British Telecom, in the Uk and across Europe. Freecom corporation, across America. More recently British Nuclear Group, even down with NTL Telewest on the new big terminal at BAA that's launching, that's due to open to the end of March 2008.

Michael : Why do you think facilitation is important in business today?

Sue : Facilitation it important, or should I say, facilitation is important - I think one of the difficulties these days is that lots of people often refer to themselves as 'facilitation' where people are after facilitator projects, to facilitate or prepare objectives. So I think the word facilitate is overly used in the workforce, and people believe facilitation  is perhaps about doing something to help a person get a job done.
Professional facilitation, and the professional facilitator is very much about someone coming in, helping to build a team, showing a new dimension, looking at a new aspect of problem solving, helping a group reach consensus, coming up with creative thinking, so it really is about someone providing an intervention into an organisation or a group, and really helping that group's organisation, move forward in in steps - incremental rather than just slowly - incremental steps to improvement - but it will really lift that group and move them on as a increase in terms of where they need to get to.

Michael : What do you think are the key factors that make a facilitation session successful?

Sue : Key factors are very much understanding what the group and the client need to get out of that session. So if it's a session that's about developing a group being more effective, make it absolutely clear what the deliverable is for the client and the group, and designing a process, which really looks at employee collaboration in delivering whatever that client-deliverable, is.

Michael : When would you suggest a company looked to hire an external facilitator, and when would you suggest they thought about using one of their own people?

Sue : I guess whether it's an internal or an external facilitator, providing that facilitator has been trained, and has been through some professional assessment, then that is the mark of a good facilitator. Often I find though with organisations, if the facilitator has been with the organisation for some time, or even if they're in some line of talking to the manager who they're running a particular workshop for, or a particular intervention for, often there can be pressure for that facilitator to come up with a particular view that that manager has.
What an external facilitate can bring is a complete, unbiased, neutrality to that problem solving process. So treating everyone with equality, and coming out with a decision that's best for the group, and that may not always be whats best for the manager - that's what I believe an external facilitator can have. Often with an external facilitator there can be improved problem solving, some creativity, some help to cut across the politics that are across the organisation.
So an external facilitator can come into a situation afresh and not have perhaps all the existing baggage with some groups that am internal facilitator may have.

Michael : You mentioned earlier on about facilitator accreditation, can you talk about that - About specific facilitator training?

Sue : Yes, certainly. There are a number of facilitator accreditation bodies, the international Association of Facilitation has a very rigorous facilitation accreditation. They have chapters all around the world. I qualified over in Florida a number of years ago, but they have a European chapter. And basically what they're looking for is that you can demonstrate that you can already manage a number of workshops, that you're able to design a workshop - in line with their core competencies. so designing, engaging the client, designing the clients requirement, managing the actual workshop, building consensus, building a collaborative approach, sustaining involvement from all of those participants, reaching the conclusion, reaching the consensus and then producing that output and reviewing both the workshop and the result from the client. So they're looking for you to demonstrate that you already have that training, you've gone through that process a number of times, and then in addition to that they then hold an accreditation day where they're actually looking for you to run a particular workshop - and a number of their assessors are part of that workshop that you're running. So they're viewing how you would run the workshop, and your abilities to run that workshop.

Michael : Let's move on now to a little bit about facilitation. Where and when do you facilitate?

Sue : Facilitation, because it can be used in so many different areas, so anything from problem solving, perhaps setting up a new project. Change management is also a fantastic area, any area, or any aspect of work, where you really need employee collaboration, where you really need a number of people - if not, many people in the organisation that have that and input into, and help steer the organisation to where it needs to be.
So any aspect really, that you're aiming to improve within the organisation, you're looking to change in direction - you're really looking at some kind of collaborative approach to make something better within the work place.

Projects is another particularly good area - so in project start up you've got perhaps, ten, fifteen, twenty people on a project, you may be working on maybe identifying the work break-down structure looking at roles, looking at time scales, looking at risks, all of those are fantastic areas for a facilitate workshop. You get a lot of people in, a lot of ideas and views, and then you get that consensus on how to move forward.

Michael : Let me change a chunk of the question. Where is a good place to hold a facilitation thing? like, do you want to do it at work? Do you want to do it in a hotel?  Do you want to do it in the upper-mountains?

Sue : I'm a great believe in people - that if you take them out of the workplace and put them in a nicer environment for the day they can achieve fantastic things - it releases their creativity. So I'd certainly like my workshop, especially if it's over a half-a-day workshop, out in a lovely setting somewhere, and I've had some fantastic hotels, experiences looking overlooking the sea, overlooking lovely wooded land, overlooking golf courses etc. And they really do invigorate the thinking - so a wonderful day, a wonderful venue.

Plus people like to be treated with respect, they like to feel that the company cares about them. And also you often find many senior managers going of for the day - while treating the employees for the day, a nice venue, a nice location, with lunch, with all of the refreshments. Obviously there's no distractions of work, and they can really focus and their creativity really blooms.
So my suggestion would be - hold the workshop if possible,  and if your budget allows, off site.


Michael : Looking at the behaviours, as you as a facilitator, you as a very top level, and quite briefly - what are the some of the key behaviours that you as a facilitator would show in a workshop?

Sue : In facilitation one of the key values for me is empathy - treating all of the people that come along equally, treating them with respect - empathising with them. Sometimes some of the areas and aspects of work that they're looking at are difficult. I've been in work environments that have been downsizing - peoples jobs may be decreased - they may be downsizing people, or maybe looking to be making people redundant. These are very sensitive areas. So for me facilitation is about being empathetic, about having an empathy, it's not necessarily about being sympathetic, but empathetic, being able to put yourself in that persons position. Often there are a lot of emotions in workshops, workshops are often called because the organisation is changing because we're all going in a different direction - there's a lot of stress involved - so empathy, taking that stress out of the workshop - creating a safe environment for people to discuss their issues, and that people can feel safe in raising issues, and I always give people the option as to whether or not they decide what they want documented, the workshop outlines what is documented - they decide, they write down, and capture the things that they want documented. Obviously there are other discussions, they could be around very sensitive issue - they decide whether or not those areas are documented.

So my facilitator values are really about empathy about creating trust, about listening to people, about respecting people, and above all, creating that safe environment for people so people can feel comfortable to talk about the issues that they feel need to be addressed.

Michael : If you were going to teach somebody to be a facilitator - and maybe you've already covered it, maybe it's something different - what are the key things that you'd get them to pay attention to?

Sue : I guess that one of the key areas really is about the rapport between individuals in the team - having a good understanding and a good rapport, and that's why NLP is such a fantastic tool - there are so many fantastic tools in the NLP toolkit that can help develop that relationship with individuals - rapport building, getting people to understand their values, and inform outcomes. Lots of the tools to help individuals, because its the individuals of the group - the group is made up of individuals. That's an incredibly important point.
If a facilitator has nlp training, then they are a good portion of the way, in where they need to be in developing their facilitative skills to work with teams.

Michael : What skills do you have - and you've mentioned some of them before - but what skills do you have that enable you to do this?

Sue : I've trained. I did my NLP training. Also did my accredited facilitator training but over and above that there are so many tools out there for facilitators. I'm still learning. I did Edward De Bono's Parallel Thinking, which is all about tools for getting teams and groups looking at working together, understanding a problem or a project from the same perspective, the bell being balanced - team roles, I've trained for that. The Strength Deployment Inventory is a fantastic tool that I use, unlike tools like Myers Briggs which I'm trained on, and 16 PF, 16 personality factors - which identify particular traits or personality traits. The SDI looks at peoples values in terms of their motivational systems, and to me that's one of the key tools around to look at, and help building effective groups.

There are many great tools out there, and I guess at the end of the day, the more that you learn, the more that you understand, the more that you can apply - then as the old adage says: 'If you only have a hammer in your toolkit, then you're only ever looking for the nail.' The more tools you have, you can give a fantastic array of support and guidance as well as select the right tool for the right aspect that you're trying to achieve with the group.

Michael : What do you believe about yourself when you're facilitating a group?

Sue : I believe that I can help the group achieve. I think that it's fundamentally important that you have that belief in yourself, and that you are very positive and very confident, when you engage with a group, that you feel that you can help, that you can generally help that group to achieve something - that to me is incredibly important.

I always believe that the group can achieve anything providing that they have the right tools to be able to do that. And that takes a lot of time, to work with the client and to work with the group and understand what their aims are, what their goals are.

Michael : Do you have a personal mission or vision when you're doing this?  Who is Sue when you're up there doing your thing with a group?

Sue : That's a tricky question I think. I will answer that by saying that the most important thing that resonates with me, the most important is people say to me at the end of the workshop they feel that they have achieved something. They feel that they have been listened to, they felt relaxed, and they could achieve all of what they needed to achieve. If people say that at the end, then that is my mission, I have helped them achieve that.

And my vision is providing I understand what your vision is, I can help you achieve it. That is my vision, helping other people achieve their vision.

Michael : If you were going to recruit a facilitator, who would you know who to recruit?

Sue : I think how I recruit a facilitator is once I would go through some selection process I would have that facilitator co-facilitate several workshops and actually observe them. And I guess this comes back down to espoused theory and theory in use - what are their espoused theories - what are they saying as opposed to what are they actually doing?

I think a lot of people these days say 'oh yes I'm very sympathetic. I do this, I do that' but the reality of their behaviours it not matched by what they say. Yes there are some tools around, things that look at personalities the SDI, looks at motivational value systems,. There are a number of tools around so that you can select people or select people on - but I think that I would be looking to hear the language, how people said they would deal with others. I'm looking for people who respect others, I'm looking for people who embrace diversity in groups. I'm looking for people that can empathise. I'm looking for people that can put structure in chaos sometimes. That I would find difficult to do in a recruitment process and would really have to be looking at someone, looking at how they co-facilitated or co-managed a workshop.

Sue : If you had to describe facilitation as a story, almost as a fairy tale with fantasy characters and animals to show the relationship between the facilitator and the people that they were facilitating, what would you use?

Michael : I think what immediately springs to mind is something like Cinderella, but it's the Fairy Godmother with her wand - where she changes Cinderella into this wonderful person with this ballgown - and she changes the mice into the horses and change the pumpkin into the carriage.

When I think about facilitation, I think it's very much like transforming groups, improving things, transforming things for the better, harmonizing things - giving that wonderful sense of well being, that wonderful sense of accomplishment and purpose.
So yes, creating things, changing things for the better.

Michael : As we sort of coming to the end now, is there anything that you're doing that you'd like to plug or bring to our listeners attention?

Sue : I think facilitation is the very best way of getting best from individuals. I would just hope that more organisations, whether they use an internal or an external facilitator, actually look at putting more people through facilitator, good facilitator, training - you really can transform organisations with the right facilitator.

Michael : And if anybody wants to contact you, what's the best way of doing it?

Sue : You can check out the website visionfacilitation.com and then my mobile 07813322567. Email, either email slbanjo@aol.com or suebanjo@visionfacilitation.com

Michael : Ok, thank you very much Sue.

Sue : Thank you very much.

 

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