Library of facilitation techniques

An activity to identify the direction in which your work should be moving.

This fast and physical group gets participants moving and working together in a way that generates energy and promotes collaboration. One at a time, members of the group become parts of the “machine”, each one making a distinct physical motion and a sound, until the whole group is working together in motion, as one human machine.

By specifying only the minimum number of simple rules, the Min Specs that must ABSOLUTELY be respected, you can unleash a group to innovate freely. Respecting the Min Specs will ensure that innovations will be both purposeful and responsible.

Like the Ten Commandments, Min Specs are enabling constraints: they detail only must dos and must not dos. You will eliminate the clutter of non-essential rules, the Max Specs that get in the way of innovation. Often two to five Min Specs are sufficient to boost performance by adding more freedom AND more responsibility to the group’s understanding of what it must do to make progress. Out of their experience in the field, participants shape and adapt Min Specs together, working as one. Following the rules makes it possible for the group to go wild!

The purpose of this simple exercise is to demonstrate three key principles useful for creativity and idea generation: quantity is a condition for quality; building on the ideas of others; the ideas we come up with are usually all the same. The format is simple, with small groups standing and drawing apples. At the end of the exercise, the whole group reflects and draws out learnings and reflections.

The goal of this game is to map out the motivations and interactions among actors in a system. The actors, in this case, may be as small-scale as individuals who need to work together to accomplish a task, or as large-scale as organizations brought together for a long-term purpose. A give-and-take matrix is a useful diagnostic tool, and helps players explore how value flows through the group.

After coming up with great ideas, the next challenge is figuring out the best way to make them happen. This exercise is one of many types of “scenario” games which can be used to test ideas and try out different approaches to bring them to life.

Systems thinking is a way of approaching problems that asks how various elements within a system — which could be an ecosystem, an organization, or something more dispersed such as a supply chain — influence one another. Rather than reacting to individual problems that arise, a systems thinker will ask about relationships to other activities within the system, look for patterns over time, and seek root causes.

A persuasive activity where participants "give" each other terrible presents.

Fun energiser to create energy and fun. Great to use after breaks such as lunch or coffee breaks.

Name Juggling is another variation of a try-to-learn-everyone's-name but the game guarantees high energy level as well as some strategic thinking.

This step-by-step method is intended to facilitate the co-creation of actual measures and steps towards change within a team or an organisation. All participants are involved and develop all the ideas together. You have idea owners but the content is created through a process where everyone is involved in all ideas.

Welcome to My World gives players an opportunity to better understand other players’ roles and responsibilities and how one sees others.