Erica Marx

Spectrums & Clusters

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#opening#system#debrief#debriefing#trust#listening and awareness#closing activity#reflection#team alignment#agreement

Various ways to have participants 'map' themselves in response to a facilitator's prompt. See also 'constellations'

1

Goal

  1. Enhance Understanding: By physically mapping out positions or ideas, participants can better grasp the diversity and range of perspectives within the group, promoting empathy and awareness.

  2. Facilitate Communication: These activities create opportunities for open dialogue and discussion, allowing participants to articulate their viewpoints and listen to others, which can lead to more effective communication and collaboration.

  3. Promote Engagement: The interactive nature of mapping activities actively involves participants, making the exploration of abstract concepts or complex issues more engaging and accessible.

  4. Encourage Collaboration: Clustering encourages individuals to find common ground and work together to explore shared interests or concerns, strengthening group cohesion and teamwork.

  5. Visualize Group Dynamics: Mapping activities provide a clear and immediate visual representation of group dynamics, helping participants and facilitators identify patterns, relationships, and potential areas of conflict or consensus.

  6. Support Decision-Making: By clearly illustrating the distribution of opinions or preferences, these activities can aid in group decision-making processes, making it easier to reach agreements or identify priorities.

  7. Foster Personal Growth: Participants have the opportunity to reflect on their own beliefs and positions within the group, promoting personal insight and development.

Instructions

Spectrums

The facilitator provides a prompt that generally can be answered by placing yourself along a continuum. For each prompt, designate one side of the room for one extreme and the other for the other extreme. Participants respond to the prompt by lining up. For example: Are you an introvert or extravert? Extreme introverts over here (gesture), extreme extroverts over there (gesture). 

Sample prompts
morning bird / night owl
put stuff away in hotel room / live out your suitcase 
tired / wide awake
leader / follower
risk taker / risk adverse
detail focused / big picture focused 
trust first / earn trust


Facilitator tips 
Start with lighter and easier to answer prompts, build toward prompt that require more reflection and prompt discussions.

Switch walls for each prompt so people have to move. For example, if the first question has people line up in the room from front to back of the room, have the next prompt line people up from right to left in the room. 


Your prompts will be interpreted differently by each listener. You'll be surprised! Keep the prompts simple and don't add your own meaning to what it means to assign yourself to one extreme or another. 

There's no place to 'hide' in this activity. Be aware of psychological safety in the group and choose prompts that do not require people to disclose information that they may want to keep private. 

Variations
  • Have people discuss the prompt in small groups/pairs before they place themselves. 
  • Give prompts that the group negotiates the extremes, such as 'distance you travelled to get here today'

Debrief

  • Have people discuss why they answered how they did with other people near them after they have placed themselves. 


Clusters

Participants find natural clusters among themselves through observations and discussions. For example, group yourself by similar colors, unique powers, goals for today, etc. 

Facilitation
Be clear about how much time people have to form their groups
Be clear about min & max group size
Optional - have each group share out how/why they clustered in the way they did. 


Application
Use a prompt set goals, create agreements, or identify priorities. Collect 1-2 from each group that shares out.


Constellations

People respond with distance of agreement to a statement placed in the center of the room. See detailed write-up here:
https://www.sessionlab.com/methods/constellations

Background

Erica Marx Coaching is a team coaching company based in Ithaca, NY and working internationally. We take a relationship systems approach to creating cultures of collaboration in organizations. We offer retreats, workshops, trainings, keynotes, executive & team coaching.

https://www.ericamarxcoaching.com/
erica@ericamarx.com
(607) 269 - 7401

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