Tips for Workshop Facilitation

Dr. Jennifer Cham Lead User Experience ArchitectEMBL-EBI

Who is Jenny Cham?

Lead User Experience Architect; founded the UX design capability at EMBL-EBI (2009)

Plan & deliver “Gamestorming” style workshops, design studios, focus groups, brainstorming & graphic recording

Coauthor: Ten Simple Rules for Running Interactive Workshops. PLoSComputational Biology, 2014

Example layout for a workshop with moderators & team facilitators

Facilitation process – a lens on the discussion

Taken from Nick Skinner’s Facilitation Tips Presentation (Poppyfish People Development)

Defining group facilitation“Group facilitation is a process in which a person whose selection is acceptable to all members of the group, who is substantively neutral, and who has no substantive decision-making authority, diagnoses and intervenes to help a group improve how it identifies and solves problems and makes decisions, to increase the group’s effectiveness”

Roger Schwarz, author of ‘The Skilled Facilitator’

Effective facilitators Give clear instruction of objectives, rules and materials – what is expected?

Set & keep time boundaries

Check the team understands the brief -“Is everyone clear about the task?”

Reaffirm what the task is and what is expected

Ask questions for clarity of outcome. Promote discussion

Involve everyone

Effective groups

Use specific examples

Agree what important words mean

Share all relevant information

Explain reasoning

Discuss difficult issues

Focus on interests, not positions

Jointly design next steps

Facilitators don’t have all the answers!

Ricochet to the group“what do other people think about that?”

Reflect to an individual“you asked the question, what do you think?”

Deflect (with care to help move the discussion on)“I think the question you should be thinking about is…”

Facilitators do have great kit

Decent stationery is essential

Suitable spaces for group work

Natural light

Healthy snacks

Good logistics support

Use approaches & kit flexibly

SOURCES

Ten Simple Rules for Running Interactive Workshops. PLoS Computational Biology, 2014

Material adapted from Nick Skinner’s facilitation tips presentation (Poppyfishpeople development)

The Skilled Facilitator: A Comprehensive Resource for Consultants, Facilitators, Managers, Trainers and CoachesBy Roger Schwarz

Gamestorming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and ChangemakersBy Gray, Brown, Macanufo

FURTHER INFORMATION

UX in science blogs Jenny Cham’s blog http://jennycham.co.uk/EBI interfaces blog https://ebiinterfaces.wordpress.com/

UX training module at EBI’s train onlinehttps://www.ebi.ac.uk/training/online/course/user-experience-design

Sketchnotes on UX & ScienceJenny’s https://www.flickr.com/photos/97823772@N02/

UX in bioinformatics journal papers listhttp://www.ebi.ac.uk/about/people/jenny-cham

Slide share talks on UX & sciencehttp://www.slideshare.net/JenniferCham/presentations

QUESTIONS?

(Good facilitators always ask if there are any of these!)

THANKS FOR LISTENING