Course Details

Facilitation Skills for Complex Project Meetings Training Course: Guiding productive discussions and decision-making in diverse groups

Introduction

Transform your project meetings from time-consuming obligations into dynamic engines of progress with our "Facilitation Skills for Complex Project Meetings" training course. In today's interconnected world, projects thrive on collaborative decision-making and productive discussions among diverse stakeholders, often across geographical and cultural boundaries. This intensive 10-day program equips project professionals with advanced facilitation techniques to guide groups through complex topics, manage challenging behaviors, foster consensus, and ensure tangible outcomes. Learn to create inclusive environments, leverage collective intelligence, and drive decisive action, ensuring your project meetings consistently deliver value and propel your initiatives forward.

Duration

10 Days

Target Audience

This course is essential for project managers, program managers, scrum masters, team leads, business analysts, PMO members, consultants, and anyone who regularly leads or participates in complex project meetings, workshops, or discussions involving diverse stakeholders and potentially challenging dynamics. It is particularly beneficial for those who:

• Struggle with unproductive, long, or off-topic meetings.
• Need to drive consensus among conflicting viewpoints.
• Work with cross-functional, multicultural, or geographically distributed teams.
• Want to improve their ability to extract valuable insights and decisions from group discussions.
• Seek to enhance their leadership presence and communication skills in group settings.

Course Objectives

Upon successful completion of the "Facilitation Skills for Complex Project Meetings" training course, participants will be able to:

• Understand the core principles and role of effective meeting facilitation.
• Differentiate between various meeting types and apply appropriate facilitation strategies.
• Design and structure meeting agendas to maximize productivity and achieve clear outcomes.
• Master advanced techniques for guiding discussions, encouraging participation, and managing time.
• Effectively handle challenging behaviors, conflicts, and disagreements in group settings.
• Utilize visual facilitation tools and techniques to enhance understanding and engagement.
• Implement robust decision-making models to achieve group consensus or clear resolutions.
• Foster an inclusive environment that values diverse perspectives and promotes psychological safety.
• Conduct effective follow-up actions to ensure meeting outcomes are realized.
• Formulate a comprehensive action plan for applying advanced facilitation skills to their project meetings.

Course Modules

Module 1: The Foundations of Effective Facilitation

• Defining facilitation: Role, mindset, and key responsibilities.
• Differentiating between facilitating, leading, presenting, and moderating.
• The benefits of skilled facilitation for project success: Improved decisions, engagement, efficiency.
• Core principles of effective facilitation: Neutrality, preparation, participation, focus, clarity.
• Self-assessment: Identifying your current facilitation strengths and areas for growth.

Module 2: Preparing for Complex Project Meetings

• Defining clear meeting purpose, objectives, and desired outcomes.
• Identifying and analyzing key stakeholders: Their roles, interests, and potential biases.
• Designing effective agendas: Structuring discussions, allocating time, setting expectations.
• Choosing the right meeting format and tools (e.g., in-person, virtual, hybrid, whiteboards, collaboration software).
• Pre-meeting communication strategies to ensure participant readiness.

Module 3: Guiding Discussions and Managing Flow

• Opening the meeting: Setting the tone, clarifying objectives, establishing ground rules.
• Techniques for encouraging broad participation and drawing out quiet voices.
• Asking powerful questions: Open-ended, probing, clarifying questions.
• Active listening skills for understanding and summarizing key points.
• Managing discussion flow: Keeping on track, re-focusing, transitioning between topics.

Module 4: Managing Challenging Behaviors and Conflict

• Identifying common challenging behaviors in meetings (e.g., monopolizers, silent participants, distractors, aggressors).
• Strategies for de-escalating conflict and managing disagreements constructively.
• Techniques for handling tangents, interruptions, and off-topic discussions.
• Addressing passive-aggressive behavior and underlying tensions.
• Maintaining neutrality while managing difficult dynamics.

Module 5: Advanced Visual Facilitation Techniques

• The power of visual thinking in group settings.
• Using whiteboards, flipcharts, and digital canvases for capturing ideas.
• Graphic recording basics: Sketching, symbols, and connectors.
• Creating visual agendas, decision trees, and mind maps in real-time.
• Leveraging virtual collaboration tools (e.g., Miro, Mural) for visual engagement.

Module 6: Decision-Making and Consensus Building

• Understanding different decision-making models: Unanimity, consensus, majority vote, autocratic, consent.
• Facilitating effective brainstorming and idea generation for solutions.
• Techniques for prioritizing options and evaluating alternatives.
• Guiding groups towards consensus and clear resolutions.
• Documenting decisions, action items, and owners clearly.

Module 7: Facilitating for Diverse Groups (Culture, Virtual, Hybrid)

• Adapting facilitation styles for cultural differences and communication norms.
• Best practices for facilitating virtual meetings: Engagement, technology management, fatigue reduction.
• Strategies for managing hybrid meetings: Ensuring equity of participation for remote and in-person attendees.
• Fostering inclusivity and psychological safety for all participants.
• Addressing language barriers and communication nuances.

Module 8: Post-Meeting Follow-Up and Continuous Improvement

• Summarizing meeting outcomes, decisions, and action items.
• Distributing clear meeting minutes and follow-up communication.
• Ensuring accountability for agreed-upon actions.
• Evaluating meeting effectiveness and gathering feedback from participants.
• Reflecting on your own facilitation performance for continuous improvement.

Module 9: Specialized Project Meeting Facilitation

• Facilitating project planning workshops (e.g., scope definition, risk workshops).
• Leading effective project review and retrospective meetings.
• Guiding stakeholder alignment and expectation management sessions.
• Facilitating problem-solving and root cause analysis meetings.
• Techniques for facilitating large group decision-making sessions (e.g., Open Space Technology, World Cafe).

Module 10: Developing Your Facilitation Leadership & Action Plan

• The facilitator as a leader: Influencing without authority.
• Building confidence and presence as a facilitator.
• Practicing advanced facilitation scenarios through role-playing.
• Ethical considerations in facilitation: Transparency, manipulation vs. guidance.
• Personalized action plan: Identifying specific meeting types to improve and outlining strategies for applying learned skills.

CERTIFICATION

• Upon successful completion of this training, participants will be issued with Macskills Training and Development Institute Certificate

TRAINING VENUE

• Training will be held at Macskills Training Centre. We also tailor make the training upon request at different locations across the world.

AIRPORT PICK UP AND ACCOMMODATION

• Airport pick up and accommodation is arranged upon request

TERMS OF PAYMENT

Payment should be made to Macskills Development Institute bank account before the start of the training and receipts sent to info@macskillsdevelopment.com