All too often we spontaneously label and dismiss or we automatically respond to scenarios without taking just 20 seconds more to consider if they are worth more of our time.

• More time to uncover an opportunity for success.
• More time just once to reduce redundant efforts in the future.
• More time to elevate a customer experience.
• More time to reflect and respond with greater emotional intelligence.
• More time to resolve conflict.
• More time to collaborate and innovate.
• More time to pause and consider a better way!

We all have that nagging little voice. Many times it’s screaming at us. It’s screaming at us for a reason.

So, here’s the challenge — plan responses to your little voice:
—Pause and process just 10 seconds before overreacting.
—Pause to consider later with a clear calm focus.
“Interesting… give me a little time to process and I’ll get back to you shortly.”
—Document the issue and research potential solutions or seek advise from a mentor.
—Reach out to someone else involved to troubleshoot together.

When that voice says, “There has GOT to be a BETTER WAY” – it is 100% correct.
It’s simply up to us to at least trigger the change.

Hopefully some of you have seen this, for those that haven’t – it’s well worth a 6 minute investment to experience some classic humor from 1937!

I’m not going to ask ‘have you ever’ but instead ‘how often’ do you experience this type of communication challenge? We all do! Too frequently we witness it between others in a meeting. And, it’s usually not a laughing matter :(.

I was once in a large sales meeting when the presenter and a participant had a clear disagreement. Each felt very strongly and was not backing down from their position. This went on for several minutes. None of the executive team in the group intervened, and many of us felt very awkward. And certainly neither of them ‘won’ the debate.

The art and science of effective facilitation is simply grounded in actively watching for and mitigating miscommunication between stakeholders. It’s not about picking a side, it’s about asking the right questions to get the diverse parties to better understand each others perspectives.

In this skit – Abbott and Costello started out understanding each other well, but as soon as unclear information was exchanged each of them became stuck in their approach and simply kept repeating the same questions to be undestood, but didn’t truly seek to understand the other.

A facilitator’s role is to:

• Actively guide the group to follow the agenda
• Redirect folks when they digress or there is conflict
• Foster engagement from everyone
• Promote established protocols: decision making, action ownership, time, and use of collaboration tools

A Facilitator objectively coaches the group to meet its objectives in an effective, efficient, collaborative and respectful manner.

Who is the facilitator?
In large groups someone should be formally appointed the role.
BUT – in an organization with a mature, collaborative, agile culture – EVERYONE is a facilitator. Everyone holds each other accountable. Once this discipline is broadly adopted, conflict resolution becomes a rarely needed action.

So – give it a try, be a facilitator!

• What is the team working on?
• What’s next?
• Why is it important? What’s the business value?
• How is progress aligning to the plan?
• What are the biggest challenges?
• Do you have the right resources?

Asking logical, foundational, even common sense questions with empathy, will show the team you care about their perspective, their experience, and their expertise. These questions will open up conversations to elevate team alignment and trigger continuous improvement to processes and team collaboration.

And, don’t forget to ask: What can I do to help?

To learn more, check out this great article from Mindful Ambition:
How to Cultivate Beginner’s Mind for a Fresh Perspective | Mindful Ambition

footnote: For those of you that know me, yes that is my granddaughter Skylar at age 1.