🎶 Dark blue, dark blue. Have you ever been alone in a crowded room? 🎶
I just transported some of you back to your iPod toting, skinny jean wearing, side bang rocking era. And, even if pop punk was never your thing, most of us can relate to that feeling of being alone in a crowded room.
You know the moments.
The ones where your heart swells because a group is finally having the conversation they’ve avoided for months. You’re spurring the action along with well-placed questions and just the right amount of silence.
As the group gets real, you’re doing mental calculations:
Who hasn’t spoken yet?
What can I shift in the agenda so there’s space for this conversation to run its course?
You surreptitiously navigate the details so they can productively navigate the conversation. When the group reaches a breakthrough, you know this moment might not have happened without you.
But it doesn’t feel like your moment. It feels like theirs. That’s the beauty of facilitation, and that’s the facilitator’s paradox.
We’re surrounded by people, but there’s a separation inherent in our role.
Although it makes sense to feel a little lonely at the front of the room, I don’t think that has to be inevitable.
How to Address the Facilitator’s Paradox
Connect to the purpose of the session
As Priya Parker teaches in The Art of Gathering, facilitators must evoke a “bold, sharp purpose” for the session.
There’s an inverse relationship between connection to the purpose and facilitator loneliness. More connection, less loneliness.
This doesn’t erase the boundaries between you and the group. Someone has to pull the invisible session strings, and that someone is you. Reconnecting to the session’s purpose reduces loneliness by reminding you of your contribution as a facilitator.
Reflection: How do you stay connected to the purpose of the session and to your role as a facilitator?
Co-facilitate when you can
With a co-facilitator, you’re no longer alone in a crowded room. It’s also a way to complement facilitation styles and strengths. You have a partner who can also see the invisible session strings and pull them alongside you. Your co-facilitator graciously swoops in because they can tell you’ve had it! with the participant who keeps derailing the conversation, sidebars with you to rework the agenda in real-time, and stretches you as they share their perspective in the post-session debrief. Co-facilitators truly are the gift that keeps on giving.
Reflection: What is the most supportive part about co-facilitation? The most challenging?
Cultivate a community of facilitators
Is it self-serving to gush about having a community of facilitators as the co-founder of Women Facilitating? Definitely.
Does that make community any less important? Absolutely not.
Even before WF, my community shaped me as a facilitator. Real talk with my facilitator friends saved me from awkward client conversations, put more money in my pocket, and jolted me out of activity autopilot.
Reflection: What facilitators are you in community with? How have they influenced your facilitation practice?
Women Facilitating helps women own rooms and drive conversations that matter.