Contents of Issue 1:
Editorial:
Facilitation Research - Broadening Organizational Thinking
By Mark A. Fuller
Articles:
Evaluating the Strengths and Weaknesses of Group Decision-Making Processes: A Competing Values Approach
By Bradley E. Wright and John Rohrbaugh
Ideally, meeting evaluations should enable a facilitator to diagnose a group's strengths and weaknesses and select appropriate interventions to help the group improve it's effectiveness. The authors critique various approaches to the evaluation of group decision making and suggest that evaluations should focus on processes rather than outcomes, address the group rather than individual roles and behaviors, and view the group in organizational context rather than in isolation. Building on the Competing Values Approach (CVA) to organizational analysis, they describe four perspectives on group decision processes: empirical, rational, political, and consensual. They present a case in which a validated evaluation instrument, based on the CVA, was used to gain insight into the decision-making processes of an executive team.
Reconsidering Brainstorming
By Paul A. Mongeau and Mary Claire Morr
Brainstorming is reviewed in face-to-face and electronic contexts. Comparing brainstorming as it was initially defined to how it has been studied reveals several important differences. The accumulated research evidence indicates that face-to-face brainstorming groups produce fewer ideas than nominal groups (i.e., individuals who generate ideas without interacting with other idea generators). More recent research indicates that electronic brainstorming groups generate more ideas than do nominal groups. Increasing group size inhibits the performance of face-to-face brainstorming yet facilitates the performance of electronic brainstorming. Process blocking and evaluation apprehension appear to provide the fullest explanation of this phenomenon. Suggestions are made for facilitators who use brainstorming and for future research.
Cultivating Collective Consciousness with Transcendent Self-Presence: A Guided Dialogue Method
By Jean Watts, Pat Miller, PhD, & John Kloepfer, PhD
Group Facilitators cultivate collective consciousness in a group by using a dialogue method of conversation that reconciles the inner life of mind and spirit of the participant's with their outer world of action and outcome. This requires two modes of self-reflection: introspection and transcendent self-presence. The Guided Dialogue Method is a formation process that guides participants through a progression of four interacting, but distinct levels of self-reflection: Objective -- getting the participants' attention by engaging the senses, Reflective -- eliciting the participants' imagination and emotional responses, Interpretive -- catalyzing the sharing of lived experiences and decisions, and Maieutic -- eliciting a sense of wonder and openness to the transcendent dimension of life. The article includes both the theory and a practical walk-through model.
Group Facilitation in a Networked World
By Catherine M. Beise, Fred Niederman, and Peggy M. Beranek
Group support systems (GSS), initially developed to support problem- solving groups in face-to-face meeting settings, are extending their capabilities to support meeting participants separated geographically and temporally, as a result of advances in networking systems and application software. Facilitation is viewed as an important factor in the success of face-to-face GSS meetings. This article explores the role of the meeting facilitator in assisting distributed group meetings supported by various technologies. Interviews with 34 practicing facilitators reveal their concerns and expectations regarding benefits and limitations of distributed GSS (DGSS). The interview results offer useful insights to DGSS designers, researchers, and practitioners. The facilitators' concerns include potential loss of non-verbal signals in addressing group process issues such as participation and conflict resolution, while they perceive that DGSS can offer benefits such as focusing and structuring. The facilitator's role is likely to continue to include serving as a change agent, while evolving from individual meeting manager to that of project manager, participant trainer, and technology enabler. Traditional facilitators will likely have to increase their skill and comfort with information technology, as well as adjust and adapt to new tools and methods for accomplishing their traditional tasks.
Classics for Group Facilitators:
Assets And Liabilities In Group Problem Solving:
The Need For An Integrative Function
By Norman R. F. Maier
In this classic 1967 article, Norman R. F. Maier delivers a convincing and practical summary of the assets and liabilities that groups bring to problem-solving situations. For effective group problem solving he argues for the superiority of "cooperative problem-solving activity," over "persuasion or selling approaches," and suggests that cooperative activities can be strengthened by the provision of an "integrative function." Using an intriguing analogy to the nerve ring of the starfish he develops a leadership model for group process. Although he uses the terms "discussion leader," or simply "leader," we can now recognize this early, clear description of the role of a group facilitator.
Book Reviews:
The Facilitator's Guide to Participatory Decision Making
By Sam Kaner with Lenny Lind, Catherine Toldi, Sarah Fisk and Duane Berger
Reviewed by Lynda Lieberman Baker
The Skilled Facilitator:
Practical Wisdom for Developing Effective Groups
By Roger Schwarz
Reviewed by Richard Orth
Managers as Facilitators:
A Practical Guide to Getting Work Done in a Changing Workplace
By Richard G. Weaver and John D. Farrell
Reviewed by: Fred Niederman
Current and back issues are available for $25 each from the
International Association of Facilitators.
