Episode 146: Workshop Design in the Moment (and from your back pocket) with Meg Bolger
Meg Bolger is a facilitator working to create a more beautiful and just world. She's the co-developer of Facilitator Cards, a deck of 60 processing tools for facilitators. Meg is also the co-author of Unlocking the Magic of Facilitation and the co-creator of The Safe Zone Project, a free online resource for creating powerful, effective LGBTQ+ awareness and training workshops.
I spend TOO many time designing workshops, making sure every activity, every piece of content is fit for purpose!
Wouldn't it be great if planning a workshop was as easy as shuffling some cards around?
Today's guest thought so, too!
In this conversation, we talk about how Meg found her feet in facilitation, how she became clever at structuring her facilitation activities and process, and how she can pretty much, create a workshop from thin air, using a cool tactical tool - her deck of Facilitator Cards.
We also explore the role of facilitator: How we can often wear many hats, and how it’s important to differentiate between educator, trainer, process facilitator.
Close to the end of the conversation, Mel also shares a really cool metaphorical question she asks participants in her virtual sessions, so stick around for that!
About our guest: Meg Bolger
Meg Bolger is a facilitator working to create a more beautiful and just world. She's the co-developer of Facilitator Cards, a deck of 60 processing tools for facilitators. Meg is also the co-author of Unlocking the Magic of Facilitation and the co-creator of The Safe Zone Project, a free online resource for creating powerful, effective LGBTQ+ awareness and training workshops.
Meg lives in Tacoma, WA with her partner where she can be making overly elaborate food, going on long walks, and badly playing guitar.
Learn more about Meg's current work at Facilitator.Cards and all of her projects at MegBolger.com.
In this episode you will learn:
Process of developing facilitation skills
Designing your workshop using facilitator cards
Preparing for a facilitation event through mind mapping
How to deal with a facilitation topic with which you have strong opinion about
Learning from mistakes as a facilitator
Questions Leanne asked Meg during the interview:
Did you always want to be a facilitator? How did you discover the work?
How did you build your own facilitation skills?
How did your book come to be?
Why do you think using something tangible like cards is such a useful idea? And what’s on your card that really inspires conversation?
How do you prepare for a big facilitation event?
Have you ever facilitated a workshop where you have a very strong opinion which makes the role of facilitator / remaining unbiased, difficult?
What advice would you give a first time facilitator?
Resources mentioned
Visit Meg Bolger website
Quotes from the episode:
“I’m learning by making mistakes in front of people.”
What you think you think are goals on paper as learning outcomes, are not good enough to develop facilitation from.”
Watch the video!
About your host: Leanne Hughes
Leanne Hughes is an international facilitator, speaker and coach who loves creating unpredictable workshop experiences, that predictably work.
She combines her experience in Marketing, with her education in Human Resources and Psychology, to help leaders create engaging everyday experiences - that are so contagious they scale across teams, functions and regions.
Leanne has facilitated leadership, onboarding and team-development workshops across Australia, Canada, France, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Mongolia, Singapore and believes in a strengths-centred approach to learning and development. She has over 13 years’ of experience across a range of industries including mining, government and tourism sectors.
She’s the host of the First Time Facilitator podcast and was a finalist in the 2018 Australian Learning Impact awards for Learning Professional of the Year.
Like this show?
Please leave me a review here — even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so I can thank you personally.
Tweet Leanne your number one takeaway from this episode!
Grab my cheat sheet:
The 5 unpredictable ways to start a Zoom meeting (that predictably work)
Episode 145: Activate your attention: How to prime your natural listening and observation skills for meaningful and rich conversations with Marisa Agrasut
As a practitioner, facilitator and enabler, for the last 18 years, Marisa has been working with teams helping them understand, apply and leverage tools, frameworks and methodologies to optimise value creation. From consulting to co-creating, working with Fortune 500 companies to national ministries and non/not-just-for-profits.
This podcast is all about experimenting into the future! In today’s episode, I draw an activity extract out from a recent Virtually Possible 2.0 call, where i was joined by Marisa Agrasut and Joeri Schilders.
In this conversation, Marisa shares a virtual session she developed called: Activate your attention; how to prime your natural listening and observation skills for meaningful and rich conversations.
I’m sharing this as an episode on the show for two reasons:
Listen to the activity she delivers and consider how you could weave it into an upcoming session and
As part of the activity, Marisa and I reflect on 5 amazing facilitator prompts, which may inspire ideas on how you define the value you bring in your work as a facilitator.
Questions for Facilitators:
How do you normally describe yourself?
What value do you describe you bring?
Is what we do a specialised skill?
Should we be ‘licensed’ or held to an ethical code?
What could be done to improve our professional practice?
Exercises done during the interview:
Group discussion about facilitation
Listening activity
Providing feedback about the topics discussed
About our co-hosts:
Marisa Agrasut
As a practitioner, facilitator and enabler, for the last 18 years, Marisa has been working with teams helping them understand, apply and leverage tools, frameworks and methodologies to optimise value creation. From consulting to co-creating, working with Fortune 500 companies to national ministries and non/not-just-for-profits.
During the 2009 Asian economic crisis Marisa embarked on her first - people, planet, profit business model venture, at that time - challenging the negative perception of plant-based diets; enabling reduced-carbon and responsible consumption through a (then) pioneering circularity, systems-thinking, and purpose-led business.
In 2016 she co-founded The Inceptery - working at the edge of conventional boundaries and assumptions, challenging notions of success in our current paradigm, helping future oriented companies embed and further the business resilience imperative into their organisations.
Over the years her practice has evolved primarily from leading creative/value creation processes internally in consultancies for and with clients, to focussing now on the externalisation of cross functional working practices, embedding innovation capability into teams that she works with.
A graduate in Strategic Design Management, she harbours a lifetime fascination with the limitless power of intentionality - meeting at the intersect of where we sense-make, gain insight, find needs, opportunities and originate ideas; to bring about new consciousness, solutions, businesses and technology to improve human-planetary conditions profitably.
Possessing the ‘ambidexterity’ so necessary for this practice she also spends time guiding, coaching and challenging teams, facilitating global innovation labs as well as continues to lead and participate in such initiatives herself.
Find Marisa at The Inceptary or connect with The Inceptary on LinkedIn.
After having lived abroad (US, UK, China and now Singapore) for almost half his life, Joeri set up The Magic Sauce in Singapore in 2013 and facilitates meaty innovation projects.
Joeri Schilders
Over the past decade and a bit, Joeri has worked on 100+ innovation projects for some of the top companies in the world.
Anything from new product development across Asian emerging markets, digitising traditional manufacturing in Europe, to building systemic innovation cultures around the globe.
On top of that, Joeri runs a YouTube channel called ‘The Magic Sauce’ and is the host of ‘The Rebel Rulez Podcast’ which celebrates rebels, rule breakers and sh*t stirrers.
He is fluent in Mandarin, owns over 100 sunglasses (don’t ask) and loves bringing his cats - Baz and Bex into his creative videos.
Resources:
Joeri “The Magic Sauce” Schilders
Check out The Magic Sauce YouTube channel - it’s so good!! You’ll love it.
Visit The Magic Sauce website
Connect with Joeri on Linkedin
Marisa
Check out Marissa’s website The Inceptery
Connect with Marissa on Linkedin
Like The Inceptery Facebook Page
Watch the Video!
About your host: Leanne Hughes
Leanne Hughes is an international facilitator, speaker and coach who loves creating unpredictable workshop experiences, that predictably work.
She combines her experience in Marketing, with her education in Human Resources and Psychology, to help leaders create engaging everyday experiences - that are so contagious they scale across teams, functions and regions.
Leanne has facilitated leadership, onboarding and team-development workshops across Australia, Canada, France, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Mongolia, Singapore and believes in a strengths-centred approach to learning and development. She has over 13 years’ of experience across a range of industries including mining, government and tourism sectors.
She’s the host of the First Time Facilitator podcast and was a finalist in the 2018 Australian Learning Impact awards for Learning Professional of the Year.
Like this show?
Please leave me a review here — even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so I can thank you personally.
Tweet Leanne your number one takeaway from this episode!
Grab my cheat sheet:
The 5 unpredictable ways to start a Zoom meeting (that predictably work)