This week was a great week. I was asked to deliver an in-company, offline course about co-creation, lasting a couple of days. These were people I had never worked with before. And as usual, I found myself almost uncontrollably switching between a trainer and a facilitator role.

The facilitator in me shows up even before I know it. It is a force of habit. Whenever I explain a little bit of theory, as a teacher probably should do, I end up triggering a way too extensive dialogue, growing completely intrigued by all the perspectives. Once that safe space is in place, I can’t wait to learn about everyone’s take on the theory I am teaching. It seems the facilitator in me doesn’t really care about the needs of the trainer in me, leaving the trainer puzzled about how to squeeze in the theoretical explanations in the remaining time.

Wearing the facilitator’s hat

When I train facilitation, one of the key questions at least one participant always asks is, “Can a facilitator share their opinion?” I am sure there are different valid perspectives on this question, but in my training, the answer is a big fat NO. This is a difficult answer for people in sales and consultancy as they feel they are expected to have the answers for their clients. Nevertheless, even in sales and consultancy, the answer remains the same.

In the article, Earning trust as a facilitator, I explained how strongly the most trusted person in the room can influence decision making. Earning and maintaining trust is a big part of the facilitator’s job. When facilitators share their opinions, they misuse the trust to influence decision making, even if it is not their intention. A trusted facilitator has too much influence when sharing opinions. This will not be appreciated (especially not by the participants who don’t agree with the facilitator’s opinion). They can feel manipulated. They might even disengage from the workshop.

When organizing workshops with clients, being in sales, consultancy or any other role where you are expected to provide answers, you can be a neutral facilitator and simultaneously have colleagues participate in contributing with their experience and expertise, providing the answers.

Teacher versus facilitator role

Teachers provide knowledge. Their job is to share their wisdom. This seems to be quite the opposite of facilitation. However, there are also a lot of similarities. Or at least there should be.

Good teaching includes facilitation, but good facilitation does not include good teaching.

In my opinion, good teachers often switch between teaching and facilitating while delivering a course to a group of people. It makes the course a lot more interesting and, at the same time, improves learning. At times, a “teacher” explains a concept, and then the “facilitator” triggers conversation to bring the concept to life in the minds of the “students”.

The “facilitator” can trigger conversation and conduct it in such a way that the “students” find the answers themselves, and the “teacher” can then bring it home by structuring these answers into a conceptual framework. Playing with these roles as a trainer creates suspense and engagement, taking the participants on an interesting learning journey.

What makes a great facilitator

To be able to switch intentionally between both roles when delivering a training, it helps to make a clear separation between the teacher role and the facilitator role. This means identifying the similarities and the differences, so you know exactly when it is appropriate for the teacher in you to make room for the facilitator and the other way around.

That separation became very clear to me when considering the foundational mindset of a good facilitator for the teacher role. The foundational mindset of a good facilitator conveniently has the same principles as applied to “Enlightened Living”, coined by Eckhart Tolle in his book A New Earth. I am guessing it is also somewhat rooted in Buddhist philosophy.

A good, or maybe I should say, a great facilitator shows no judgement, resistance, or attachment.

Non-judgement

When you judge a person or situation, you are not allowing for much surprise. It is a way of labelling to control. And when you define something, the risk is that all the following observations become self-fulfilling. You see the world in the way you defined it. This basically means you are projecting past experiences on people or situations and thereby bring past experiences, often unjustly, back to life. It is the worst thing you can do as a facilitator because it narrows your observations to what you think you know is true. As a result, you will have a lot of blind spots that prevent you from seeing or experiencing the unexpected. This will cripple your ability to properly facilitate.

A facilitator needs to embrace all possibilities, looking at people and situations with a “beginner’s mind”, allowing everything to unfold naturally in all its glory. A moment is never just a moment; every moment, every interaction, every serendipitous encounter is unique. Celebrating the adventure of looking through a “beginner’s mind” is the joy of facilitation.

The greatest teachers are also non-judgmental. They embrace the different perspectives and unique learning journeys different people travel. They understand that there is never one perfect, correct perspective but different interpretations that deepen the learning of a concept.

Non-judgement is what great facilitators and great teachers share.

Non-resistance

Workshops never go as planned. Conversations between participants are impossible to plan. They just take their course. Resisting the unexpected would be the opposite of what a facilitator wants to do. A facilitator is looking for controversy. Most of the time, breakthrough moments are born out of tension and pressure, just like a diamond. It starts with having no specific expectations for the output or the way of collaborating. The art of facilitation is then about fueling conversation, triggering thoughts about blind spots and keeping everyone open and connected. The art of facilitation is not about avoiding difficult confrontations.

Similar to facilitation, teachers often achieve breakthrough learnings with their students if they create moments of tension. For example, when students face contradictions and ambiguity or need to defend their point of view with good arguments, they often have the best learning moments.

Non-resistance is what great facilitators and great teachers share.

Non-attachment

As explained earlier, facilitators can’t be attached to predispositions or outcomes. Instead, they are servant leaders whose mission is to get the best out of the group in co-creation. The participants own the content, and the facilitator facilitates by being the architect of the moment, the guardian of purpose and the owner of time.

Being detached allows you to gain a higher perspective from which to view the events in a workshop instead of being trapped inside them. You can look at the workshop moment from many different angles; you are the most present, conscious, and aware person in the shared space as the facilitator.

Teachers have an unavoidable attachment to the concepts they are teaching. Their aim is to explain something in the best way to their students. They want to enrich their students’ minds with these new ideas. When you teach, you share your wisdom and interpretation of the shared knowledge. This is the opposite of facilitation.

On the other hand, as a teacher, you also want to have a higher perspective when your students are digesting new knowledge in conversation. You want to observe how they interpret the content and all the different angles that different minds uncover on the same topic. This allows a teacher to assess the extent to which students grasp these new concepts.

Therefore, a teacher can switch to the role of facilitator so that the students can become participants in a conversation whenever they want to bring theory to life in conversation. That’s when they need to consciously become “non-attached” to allow participating minds to fully explore. Great teachers are, therefore, also great facilitators. But great facilitators shouldn’t be teaching - at least not directly sharing their wisdom.

In sum …

Great facilitators and great teachers share a non-judgmental and non-resistant mindset at all times. This is why they can bring people together in learning and co-creation. This is why they can be catalysts to create desired new futures. This fearlessness of change, and power of presence, can unlock creativity among workshop participants and students.

The smart way in which teachers can alternate between attachment and non-attachment to the content of their teaching, at the right moments during their teachings, determines the impact of their teaching. If they can switch into facilitators and let go of the content at a crucial moment of processing by their students, their teachings will activate the minds of their students to unleash new interpretations and new insights for all.

When you deliver a training in the future, strategically think about when you will switch roles to become a facilitator to enhance the learning process.

When you lead a workshop in the future, feeling pressured to provide the answers, give the facilitator’s hat to someone else. It is often an even better workshop when the captain is not a topic expert.

Learn more about facilitation by enrolling in one of our courses:

captainsofleadership.com/courses

Happy Captaineering,

Alwin

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