Why This Course?
Leader; Facilitator; Convener; Master Communicator; these are labels and traits of today’s most effective project practitioners. Yet how do you get the skills to serve these roles? In many cases, we learn them gradually. Most of us are competent in many individual techniques of the effective group leader: yet few are able to”put it all together” in a personal style that assists small groups in “getting results”.

Whether a 5 person meeting or a 25 person intensive session, most groups can be far more effective, given proper preparation and implementation. This session provides exposure and practice in the methods and skills of the successful Facilitator, while providing insight into the strengths of meeting participants, their styles, and their needs. Using instruments, exercises and role-playing, participants develop an increased appreciation for the differences between people, different ways of managing group interaction, and an awareness of the vital signs of group process effectiveness.

The session also explores specialized Facilitated sessions, such as our Rapid Initial Planning, and our KnowRisk® Assessment and Response Identification sessions, our consulting services for over 20 years. The class can expand to 3-days, to record facilitation role-playing scenarios and review and critique performance of the scenarios.

Learning Objectives(2 days)

	Describe the role and traits of a successful group leader/facilitator; identify how the successful facilitator initiates, executes and follows-through.
	Demonstrate appropriate facilitator skills in a variety of situations, and provide more effective leadership to problem-solving sessions, and other project-related group processes.
	Identify different methods of assessing participants’ personal style, and leader/follower behaviors; demonstrate the ability to improve group effectiveness, by applying the methods.
	Determine how and when to apply Facilitating skills to make a difference in group-process effectiveness, especially when you are not the person in charge of the process.
	Assess Facilitator skills and develop an action plan for continuing to improve them.

Audience
This session is for Project Managers and key team members who facilitate project-related group sessions. The session is especially valuable for those who are performing our trademarked Rapid Initial Planning for Portfolio or Project planning. The session will be valuable for all practitioners, but is most successful for those who already demonstrate a high level of interpersonal effectiveness. The session is of greatest benefit for those who will be able to apply it immediately.

For basic Meeting Management skills, instead of this session, see our half-day Modular Project Management session on that topic.