The Beauty of the Briefing. This is where a good facilitator adds real value. Let’s take a typical multi stakeholder setting: Three public service organizations want to fundamentally change the educational landscape towards more inclusion. They have a fair idea of what they plan to do, and they need me to facilitate it. 

For the briefing, each sends a representative, and I get a feeling it’s primarily for FOMO. It shouldn’t be the others who dominate the field. We talk about goals. I ask lots of questions, and some get slightly impatient, because ... haven’t they talked about all this before? And then it starts seeping in: That yes, they have talked about all this, and they do have an idea of what they want to do, and they did feel they were aligned - more or less. But actually, they’re talking about very different things, because they have different perspectives. 

Jobs like this one have the potential for real impact. Changes of infrastructure last for decades (in this case: a school landscape for a region of 8.4 Mio. people). If you miss to ask the right questions, you might do the wrong thing and waste a lot of money. And sometimes, even my brightest clients are so deeply immersed in their work, that they lack the necessary inner distance.

For me, the briefing to any facilitation job is the most important part of my work. I need to clearly understand the goal, the motivation, and the scope. I typically ask for pitfalls and possible conflict. I challenge the clients’ reasoning, and sometimes if, what they plan, makes sense at all. People have got mad at me, and that’s absolutely fine. 

In the case described above, by the way, my clients were very happy that I challenged them, and they walked away with new insights. Their workshop will look a lot different from what they had in mind.