Name: Tiffany Busby

Course: Group Facilitation Certificate

Assignment: Module 5

As you think about the following questions, and prepare your responses,
emphasize the ways in which the learning from this Module can be maximized in
the workplace setting. Prepare one to two paragraphs per deliverable
component.

1. How can creating a vision for organizational change impact the

amount of resistance encountered in a group facilitation session?

According to P. Block (2011) in Flawless Consulting, when a centralized vision

is applied, this can interfere with the implementation effort. Creating a
management-driven vision misses the opportunity for people to choose to be
accountable by designing their own answers. A centrally-generated vision invites
compliance over freedom. This approach tends to suck the life out of
implementation efforts.

Some examples of the way that leadership visions interfere with actual change
include the following: Leadership by Lamination; We Need Higher Standards
and This Time We Mean Business; People Need Fixing; and If We Cant
Measure It, It Doesnt Matter. One of the faults of the Lamination approach is
that it assumes that only the leaderships vision matters. The other fault is that
the vision is often expected to last forever. The Higher Standards approach
tends to create compliance in lieu of accountability. It assumes that one group
knows what is best for the other. The flaw in the Fixing model is that we should
stay focused on the gifts and capacities of the people there and what they can do
about their own actions instead of fixing people. We should promote people
setting higher standards for themselves. Finally, the Measurement approach
ignores the fact that every measurement of human or qualitative dimension of
work leaves more untested than it covers; it is too mechanical to fully assess
human activities.

2. How will you apply your knowledge to create a powerful vision for
change within the parameters of a facilitators role?

The most powerful tool described by P. Block (2011) is to invite engagement and
dialogue in the consulting process. By engaging the client, you have an
opportunity to build support for change and to ignite the possibilities that
recommendations will be implemented. As true change requires commitment, it is

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important to structure the feedback meeting to allow time for discussion and to
confront resistance.

Another item that is powerful is to use a whole-system approach when the

situation would benefit from a cross-section of people participating in the problem
identification and solution identification. In this approach, the consultant focuses
on the process and sets aside his or her advisory roles. This approach matches
very well with a facilitation role and a consensus-orientated decision process, as
previously covered in the course.

3. Why do employees experience burnout, and what strategies will you

use to avoid this in a group facilitation setting to encourage
participation and minimize impact?

Employees experience burnout because they are provided inadequate resources

for their work; they are not given input into how to improve their work or the
organizational process; and/or they are promised support that they are not given.
Most burnout occurs because employees experience loss of control of their work;
the quality of their work; or the evaluation of their work.

In a group facilitation setting, I can avoid these issues through the following
measures: 1). Review and provide a safe setting for discussing problems and
issues, including the identification of resource issues. Also, I can ask questions
such as, Do you have what you need to accomplish xyz? or What would make
your job easier to accomplish? 2). Providing a forum through a whole-system
approach or consensus-orientated decision process would help to provide a
setting where employees have the opportunity to provide input to the
organization and their role, as well as to affect change. 3). Encouraging
managers to allow facilitated processes and dialogue--even if small and
informalcan assist employees with gaining control over their work and the
evaluation of their work through discussions with management and co-workers.

4. How can you create a diverse culture for facilitation that positively
impacts participant morale and productivity in a group facilitation
setting?

A culture for facilitation can be created over time through the use of successful
facilitation and suitable outcomes. Facilitation sessions can be used as a model
for additional use of group input and decisions, which can then build to cultural
changes within an organization where group decisions are more accepted and
embraced. The culture will be most likely to embrace facilitation approaches
when morale improves within previous participants and the overall

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implementation of the actions are more successful than those selected over
traditional decision methods.

The most important role of a facilitator in promoting a culture of facilitation is to

use the lessons from this course to identify, plan, and execute facilitated
sessions thoughtfully. Not all situations call for group decisions, and the facilitator
should be frank in identifying these and calling for a different approach. Further,
when decisions will benefit from group discussion, the facilitator should be willing
to focus on the process and the actions that are needed, in order to promote
implementation. Even after a successful discussion and consensus, change does
not occur on a rational level. The key players need to embrace the solutions and
conduct their respective roles in the change. The facilitator should manage the
implementation discussion to address resistance and to clearly identify the next
steps to ignite change. If these efforts are successful, the organizational culture
will be much more likely to embrace facilitation in the future.

5. What techniques will you use to create a dialogue with participants

participating in group facilitation when they are experiencing an
organizational change?

The main techniques I will use will be the following: to be authentic with
participants; to avoid trying to control what the managers/participants are
responsible for; and to be direct and assertive with my questions and responses.
To be authentic means that I will be clear about my own wants and to be direct
when I observe resistance to the project or the recommendations. I will avoid
being responsible for every action identified, as the facilitator is not controlling the
outcomes but is managing the process. As a facilitator, I can also promote
managers to be responsible for their functions. I can also help them to learn from
the experience and to become less reliant on consulting help. Being direct and
assertive means that I will avoid being non-assertive and failing to address
important issues. I will also avoid being aggressive, which means that I will not
use language that blames individuals.

Finally, I will not take challenges personally. This is important because it causes
the discussion to lose focus on action and the recommendations. This is hard to
do because defending oneself is a natural response to being attacked. However,
the more a facilitator can focus on the issues and the resistance that exists, the
better the outcome will be for the process.

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 6. What are your perceptions of change, and how might these
perceptions impact your attitude and actions in the future?

I think most people think that they are open to change, but, in fact, change is
usually scary and threatening when it deals with something important. Buying a
different brand of cereal is not too scary, but changing someones role in an
organization or getting a commitment to change how they do their job is usually
scary. Change has the risk of the unknown, which is very important in the psyche
when individual decisions are being made about pursing change or not. In
graduate school, I read a text called Nectar in a Sieve by Kamala Markandaya
where a very poor family had a hard time leaving a subsistence farming situation
which was driving them into starvation. Since they had few resources, it was very
threatening to them to change their situation because they had nothing on which
to recover if the change didnt work out. P. Block (2011) makes a similar point
that change is, by definition, threatening. Further, the bigger the change, the
more threatening the change may be. Further, Block makes the point that change
may be resisted because someone is in a good, powerful situation and they want
to protect that status.

To acknowledge that change is both hard and threatening is a good premise to

keep in mind when working with groups as a facilitator. I think that understanding
this basic reaction helps the facilitator to have empathy with the individuals and
to better understand the sources of hostility and resistance. It is likely that the
facilitator does not understand all the threats that a participant fears and the
prospect of a particular change may be very emotional to one or more of the
participants. This understanding that change is difficult will also help the facilitator
to take reactions less personally, which benefits both the facilitator and the
process.

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