Library of facilitation techniques

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Liberating Structures

Helping Heuristics

Participants can gain insight into their own pattern of interaction and habits. Helping Heuristics make it possible for them to experience how they can choose to change how they work with others by using a progression of practical methods. Heuristics are shortcuts that help people identify what is important when entering a new situation. They help them develop deeper insight into their own interaction patterns and make smarter decisions quickly. A series of short exchanges reveals heuristics or simple rules of thumb for productive helping. Try them out!

Liberating Structures

Open Space Technology

When people must tackle a common complex challenge, you can release their inherent creativity and leadership as well as their capacity to self-organize.

Open Space makes it possible to include everybody in constructing agendas and addressing issues that are important to them. Having co-created the agenda and free to follow their passion, people will take responsibility very quickly for solving problems and moving into action. Letting go of central control (i.e., the agenda and assignments) and putting it in the hands of all the participants generates commitment, action, innovation, and follow-through. You can use Open Space with groups as large as a couple of thousand people!

Shirley  Gaston

Tower of Power

This teamwork activity requires participants to work closely together to build a tower from a set of building blocks. 

The players need to coordinate their actions in order to be able to move the wooden blocks with the crane they have, and this can only be solved by precise planning, good communication and well-organised teamwork.

You may use this exercise to emphasise the following themes and outcomes:

  • In Leadership training: identifying interdependencies in systems, leadership communication, dealing with risk, giving feedback
  • In Team building: communicating effectively, cooperating, being an active listener, maintaining the balance, working with values
  • In Project management: simulating strategic planning, working under time pressure
  • In Communication training: meta communication, facilitating, dealing with different perspectives
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Digital Society School

Dot voting

Dot voting is a collective way of prioritizing and converging on a design solution that uses group voting.

To be used when there are more ideas than can be feasible to develop further.

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