Meeting Facilitation: What it is and how it can help
If you want results from your next meeting, we need to talk
Your meetings determine the future of your business.
If you use meetings for planning, they determine your future.
If you use meetings for solutions, they determine your profitability.
Bad meetings waste more than time, they waste the future you could have had with a result.
I help people reach agreements, make decisions, and find solutions.
I welcome the opportunity to talk with you about your next meeting.
Facilitation Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
• Why hire somebody to facilitate a meeting?
1) You get results
Example: A group met three times, each time for a full-day, trying to resolve a difficult issue. Each of these meetings broke down after hours of arguing. Then they hired me. My meeting lasted five hours and produced a list of five solutions, ranked in priority of their applicability.
2) You accomplish something
Example: A new professional association was struggling because of a lack of structure. In a four-hour meeting, I helped them a) define the type of association they wanted to have, b) prepare a mission statement, c) identify the leadership positions (officers and committee chairs) needed to run the association, d) identify the roles and responsibilities for each of these positions, e) hold an election where the participants voted themselves into some of the positions, and f) prepare a list of next steps to continue the work started in this meeting. It is unlikely that any group could accomplish this much without a facilitator.
3) You save time
A professional facilitator will free you from preparing an agenda, conducting the meeting, and writing minutes. In addition, a facilitator will make optimum use of everyone else’s time.
4) You save money
The most expensive part of a meeting is the payroll cost of the participants. Then there is the opportunity value of the work they could have completed if they were not in a meeting.
• How does a facilitator add value to a meeting?
1) Process tools
A facilitator brings process to a meeting. These activities help people make methodical progress toward agreements, decisions, and solutions. They collect and use the group’s wisdom. They produce results that everyone will support.
Thus, a facilitator does more than watch people talk.
2) Human dynamics
A facilitator knows how to establish a safe working environment that makes it easy for people to be candid and creative.
3) Business knowledge
A facilitator can take a group through the logical steps that produce a workable plan.
I have published hundreds of articles on leadership and business topics. I have worked with a vast array of Fortune 500 companies. And before starting my business in 1992, I gained 20 years of experience working as an employee for major corporations. I understand business.
• Examples of what you can expect.
Find Success Stories here.
• Can you facilitate your own meeting?
You can, but there's a catch. If you facilitate your meeting, you will not be able to participate in it.
And if you have a vested interest in the issue, then your facilitation could influence the result. If the group suspects that you are doing that, you will end up with a rebellion instead of a meeting.
• How can I save money on my next meeting?
Do one of three things: 1) Hire a facilitator, 2) Learn how to hold Effective Meetings by attending a workshop, or 3) Invite fewer people.
So?
Many of you hold meetings. If those meetings are important, call me.
When you want results, call an expert.
Call Steve Kaye at 714-528-1300.
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