Methodology and Mixed Methods Bring Competitors Together to Act

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Introduction

How do you facilitate collaboration among groups with a history of competition and siloed work, faced with a change challenge?   A set of lessons from experience are:

• get people to work together, rather than talk at each other – minimize passive listening

• use engaging methods and techniques in a designed logical series of incremental steps

• focus on results of collective benefit – iteratively review progress towards those results.

This approach to phrased design has two defining characteristics:  it is both incremental – it happens in steps – and iterative – the emerging outputs are regularly revisited and strengthened through the steps.  Sessions build on previous ones, transferring value-added outputs toward final results.

At key points of incremental progress, outputs are reviewed together and validated or tweaked.  The facilitation team provides summaries at key points in the process, an integral part of design with allocated time for reflection.  Each iteration of results is a kind of baton, but more because each session adds unique value to the final outcomes, along the hierarchical chain that links back to purpose and forward to final impact.

The third point, “focus on results of collective benefit”, is both a key principle and a unifying theme in a sequence of process steps.  “Collective benefits” may be defined and clear to all.  Sometimes they are not.  A good practice is to ensure this focus is part of the objectives for an event or process. 

Another good practice is to consult with participants and key decision makers about their priorities for collective benefit, the change they want to see.  This provides intelligence about how they can work together on results that bring collective benefit.  Consultation will either validate initial design thinking or prompt recalibration to integrate new perspectives. 

Reason to focus on “collective benefit” is that it unifies the three lessons in the set.  It invites participants to look up from their individual, professional and organizational preoccupations, ensuring a strong agenda and process by answering the unstated but real questions, “What’s in it for me?”  and “So what?” 

Designing agendas that reinforce the agency of the participants before, during and after an engagement in a process is part of the facilitation spiral that underpins our methodology at Facilitate It.   

Methodology guiding this approach – more than methods

Principles of effective process management and learning are the base of this approach.   People need to be actively engaged in a process or they withdraw.  A full diversity of perspectives is needed for a process to be fully successful.  The basis of design needs to include engagement points, equally with subject matter or substance, and both equally in relation to results.

These principles inform the wider methodology that serves as a process management “container”.  A methodology is so much more than a method or collection of methods.  A methodology is a unified school of practice, from which you operate.  It is a nested hierarchy of elements that move from philosophy and principles to specific actions.  Applying a hierarchical structure to process design and management brings rigor, clarity, intentionality and efficiency.   Such an approach is fluid and dynamic, not rigid or inflexible. 

The hierarchy of process elements in full – from broad foundation to specific action

Your methodology is the integrated system of philosophy, values, theory, models and practices that define how and why you facilitate.  It’s your professional DNA, for example:  interactive, participatory, productive, purpose-driven, results based, feminist.

Your approach is a high-level way of thinking about and engaging with a process challenge, derived from the methodology.  It answers the question, “What kind of process will this be?”  For example:  participatory, andragogical, results-based; or alternatively, directive and transactional.  You can see strong points of intersection between levels in the hierarchy.  Process management moves between them.   Your approach may be guided by a conceptual framework, for example the gender and development analytical framework.   

Your method is a systematic framework for implementing an approach.  Methods organize the stages and flow of the process, within the “scope and sequence” of coverage set for it in an initial concept and design.  Method defines the how of a specific approach.  Some methods are codified, such as future search, or world café.  Other methods combine elements of codified models with tacit knowledge of each unique event or process.  Sometimes a model is a method:  a force field analysis is called both.   

Techniques are standard procedures or skills that bring a method to life.  The technique generates tangible outputs, e.g.: brainstorming, table conversations, dot voting, force field analysis, and breakout groups.  

Procedures are step by step instructions within a technique, or directions in a process.  Often instructions are projected and reviewed with a group to introduce an activity.  Only give instructions to the procedural steps that people need to do right now to generate the outputs.  For example:  Reflect for five minutes on (x).  Note your priorities for action on sticky notes, one point per note.  When five minutes are up, or earlier if you have few points, take the sticky notes and place them on the appropriate wall chart – draw the group’s attention to the prepared wall charts with headings.   

I sometimes combine elements of the methodological hierarchy, but stay true to the function of each level within the whole.  The specific ways in which principles, theory and concepts inform an event or process design are not typically of much interest to participants.  What they see and experience is what engages them.  This requires a conceptualization of methodology that involves on stage and backstage depths of field.     

Methodology elements on the stage and back stage – concentrated on purpose

Not all methodology elements are visible or need to be articulated.  Some belong in the background.  The ones participants see and experience are in the foreground. 

Both the back stage and the on stage elements of methodology are concentrated through focus on purpose.  For both the backstage and the on stage elements in a specific design, the focal point is purpose.  Use the web of facilitation elements to design more coherent, effective and impactful processes.  Methodological clarity is not academic.  It is the foundation of facilitation leadership and excellence.  It ensures that each chosen activity serves the ultimate purpose of the group’s work.    Diagram 1 shows the web of unified process elements important in facilitation.

Key linkages among and between the elements are not immediately visible in a one-dimensional diagram.  An example illustrates how the links serve as connective tissue within the web of elements.

A facilitator’s feminist and adult learning based methodology (back stage) leads to a participatory approach (partly back stage and partly on stage).  The force field analysis method (on stage) combines with techniques of brainstorming, wall galleries, use of dots to prioritize, and a consensus decision-making model, with specific procedural instructions (e.g. Take five minutes to reflect and identify your priorities.  Write one idea per sticky note”).   

Why methodology is so important in professional facilitation

I learned and developed the approach described here from hard experience.  Two experiences stand out. 

What’s your conceptual model? 

In early years of activist work on gender equality, the 1980s, five Canadians had the good fortune to be trained as trainers in gender and development by the people who developed the model at the University of Sussex, Institute of Development Studies.  In the opening session, the resource people led a round of participants inviting them to identify the current model or conceptual framework that informed their work on women’s equality.  Not one person had one.  We were motivated by values and a passion for change in unequal gender relations.  An important lasting lesson was that those were necessary but insufficient to influence change.  My attention over the next four decades to methodology is the result.   

A robust methodology blends activism, academia and experience with facilitation into an evolving flexible framework.  The power of a strong methodology is that it provides the structure and rigor needed to create profound, scalable change and capacity. 

What’s the best method or technique? 

When I began to facilitate and work on instructional design and facilitation, I spent much time learning about methods and techniques, trying to choose “the best one” to achieve an objective.  My working conclusion is there is no single “best” method or technique.  Different ones can achieve a similar purpose.  What works in one situation may not be suitable for another.  Different groups have varying appetites for and interest in some methods and techniques. 

No matter what method and technique are chosen, without a clear “home” in a wider process design, and clear links to unifying purpose, the potential of session outputs to be part of a managed change can evaporate.  This can be true even when participants enjoy themselves and some positive outcomes are achieved.  Missed opportunity costs can be high.    

Instead of focusing on methods, I began to concentrate on methodology.  I learned to design a sequence of methods in a disciplined participatory methodology where each step builds on the previous ones to achieve collective and irreversible progress.  Objectives for sessions are paired with outputs and selection of a method or techniques is not considered until those pairs are clear and strong.  The approach is both incremental and iterative, consistently nurturing key aspects of results. 

When I received the feedback below from the lead organizers of a three-day strategic policy review retreat with participants from three different organization with a history of some competition, in the early 2000s, it was a strong validation and I’ve continued to refine and adapt methodology since.  The two important goals for design are bolded.   

“Thank you for the excellent manner in which you facilitated the recently held joint regional retreat.  I wish in particular to acknowledge the advice that you provided from the preparatory stage to the conclusion, which ensured that the participants’ interests were maintained until the end.  Ultimately, your expertise and experience was pivotal and decisive in guiding the participants to formulate actionable recommendations that could be tracked and followed up and reported on. ...The main objective of the retreat was achieved.”  

The case example follows, and the post closes with core recommendations for practitioners.

Case example: sequence of methods and techniques generating a joint action plan

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Participants from three organizations came together in a regional strategic retreat to develop an action plan to implement a new policy.  The participants and the organizations had some history of competition, and not all supported the new policy.  The purpose of the retreat was to bring those who had to lead implementation of the policy together to plan a way forward.  The goal was to generate a joint action plan agreed to by participants and the three organizations. 

Available time for the retreat was two days.  Methods and techniques need to fit within the given time and achieve the purpose.  Magical thinking in the design stage causes people to tend to pack in too much and undermine achievement of objectives by not allocating enough time or integrating lunch and breaks into a unified programme.   

A visual timeline of the session sequence is shown in Diagram 2, the retreat timeline.  To maximize productive use of time, schedule breaks and lunch at key points where group reflection and consolidation are needed. 

Specific methods and techniques

The full methodology was implemented over two days.  If you don't need the detail of the sessions and methods, you may want to skip to the end of the post.

DAY 1

Session 1: 45 minutes

Briefing in plenary on a new policy.  Essential reference.  Short introduction to the work of the group and the current shared challenge.  Tips:  provide a briefing note for people to read before the event and recap key points only.   Provide limited time for questions of clarification only.  If the key references include a timeline, adopt it.  If time runs out and people still have questions, activate one of the other mechanisms for input, e.g. index cards, a consultation app, sticky notes.  (Note: the sequence of methods followed an opening in which people were welcomed, the agenda recapped and process norms agreed, including with communication mechanisms.)   

Session 2:  1 hr 45 minutes  

Force-field analysis in working groups (adapted).  Identify forces working for and against implementation of the new policy.  Create a wall graphic.  Working group members pool thinking and each create a “fish diagram”, organized into three groups by priority.  Tips: prepare fish diagrams beforehand and have ready sets of necessary supplies for all working groups.  Introduce the method of force-field analysis to frame the task, noting use has been adapted, the session is step 1 of 8.  Use “popcorn” technique in reporting back: each group make one succinct point at a time until all are collected and recorded. 

Session 3:  1 hr 45 minutes

Plan priority actions to address the forces.  Individual reflection, use of sticky notes organized into related groups with headings (prepared during the break).  Tips:  protect a minimum time for reflection.  Some people can’t wait to “get going” but people need opportunity to reflect, a leadership practice, before starting to write.   Emphasize that all points have value and request is to focus on priorities, essentials, what’s needed first/next (i.e. phase recommended actions in logical sequence).   

Session 4: 2 hours

Prioritize actions and commitments.  Use of coloured dots.  Design choices include number of dots, use of colour coding, what dots represent.  Sometimes giving specific sub-groups of participants different colours can provide insights, e.g. one colour for people from each organization.  In the case example, the iterative process required two rounds of prioritizing with dots. 

• The first round identified top priorities for collective attention, and any no-go areas, at least at this time.  Green and red dots distributed, 5 of each (no need to use all). 

• The second round identified priorities on which individual wanted to and can commit to working.  This is a first indicative round, to shape priorities.  Tasking and more formal commitment to action comes later. 

Tips:  as part of the evolving record of reference, keep all points, not only the ones prioritized.  As progress is made, priorities change and initial thinking can inform way forward and momentum.   

DAY 2

Session 5:  1.5 hrs – 2 hours (option for break or people could build breaks into the session)

Build the draft collective action plan.  Overnight work is required by the facilitation team to create meta-level action plan framework and themes for working groups.  Participants self-select the action sets on which they want to work.   Task for working groups;  detail requirements for action on the prioritized sets from Day 1. Tips:  recap work from the first day, reviewing key outputs for each.  Be consciously transferring responsibility for the process to the group, in the design supporting them to distribute the work themselves rather than have it imposed.  Reinforce participant agency both in the process and in action to follow.

Session 6: 1.5 - 2 hours (flexible: it takes as long as it takes)

Assign agency and ownership with modified consensus model.  In structured consensus decision-making model, people take one of four positions indicating degree of support and availability to help implement. Tips:  lead organizers need to have had an active role in the back stage work of co-facilitation, defining organizational priorities and commitments.  In this step, the back ground work of the organizers merged with or is integrated into the fore ground work of the group in setting direction and defining necessary actions to achieve the purpose.   Schedule the session before lunch so lead organizers can finalize their responsibilities in shaping the action plan over the lunch hour, preparing to close the retreat. 

Session  7: 1 hour

Consolidate output of an action plan with a clear timeline.  Over lunch, the facilitation team supports transfer of known timed actions from previous sessions to a wall graphic of a working timeline (prepared the evening before).  When participants return, they are supported in moving to the consolidation stage.   Tips:  use sheets of flip-chart paper taped together to create a full wall graphic.  You want the external “group memory” available to all, not someone working on it on a laptop.  Base the timeline on known significant events for the group, the organizers, and the purpose of the event:  transfer those first.  In a different colour, note on the timeline specific dates identified by working groups in their report-backs and action planning. 

Session 8: 45 minutes

Provide support and commitment from most senior person present.  The key role of decision-makers in collaborative processes is best integrated into design to the maximum possible.  Possibilities vary greatly.  In the case example, a senior leader was an active participant who had 5-10 minutes in the opening and closing of each day to share his thinking, provide encouragement, flag a distracting direction.  By the time the last session in the sequence happened, he is recapping the themes noted in earlier opportunities to “lead from within”.  Tips:  align what’s possible in the “senior validation” step of this type of methodology to what’s possible.  Typically some immediate commitments can be made, but final approvals and resourcing needs to happen when people are back at work.  If possible, include in the timeline the dates by which senior managers and organizers will revert with final agreements, approvals, resourcing and tasking.

Core recommendations for facilitation practitioners

1. Develop and continue to refine your own methodology. 

Gather your thoughts and tool kits.  Reflect on and articulate the philosophy, values, conceptual frameworks and theories that inform and underpin your work.  What is your conceptual model, your “facilitation spiral”?

2.      Follow a standard and explicit order in your design.  

Use the hierarchy of facilitation elements to ensure alignment in a logical and strong sequence for your design thinking. 

• Start with purpose.

• Select an approach or combination of approaches suited to that purpose.

• Choose methods that embody and capture the approach.

• Choose techniques that operationalize the methods. 

• Detail clear instructions for procedures – clarity for the participants. 

Key lesson: Avoid starting with a technique and trying to force a purpose onto it. 

3.      Make seeking clarity a central continuing part of your facilitation role. 

Use precise language and clarity from the design process to communicate with clients, co-facilitation team members and participants.  It demonstrates professionalism, ensures shared understanding.  As a facilitator, you can be the voice asking for clarity when participants for many different reasons may not feel confident to do so.  If you’re not clear, they won’t be either.  Sometimes there is no clarity.  Acknowledging that is part of transparency and builds confidence.  Full clarity draws on the process results chain as well as the methodology hierarchy. 

4.      Integrate the back stage and the on stage – background and foreground – with purpose. 

Let your foundational values and theories consciously and deliberately inform your selection of methods and techniques and moment-to-moment choices when facilitation goes live.  Use the agreed purpose of an event or process as the focal lens through which all the related design decisions are considered, including on methods and techniques.  Move easily between the “balcony and the dancefloor”, the broader programme guiding the event or process and activities in individual sessions. 

To conclude

If you already have and use a facilitation methodology, we’d love to learn about it.  Please be in touch about a possible guest post.

If you’d like to learn more about the specifics of designing sequences of participant engagement with a mix of methods and techniques aligned to purpose, please get in touch.  We’re developing posts, articles and handbooks on facilitation topics and can prioritize any that meet your needs.

Facilitation is as personal as it is professional.  Each person develops his or her own way of facilitating.  We hope this post gives you some ideas about how to strengthen the methodology you use in your own unique, living approach.