Reflections from IAF Mumbai Hub Session - Springboarding Sustainability through Stories

Pic credit: Dall-E

Conducting a facilitation session for the International Association of Facilitators (IAF) is always a pleasure.  It can also get a bit tense if you try to do different topics using a process that fits the session, but you haven't tried before.

That's what I did last month when I agreed to do a session on "Springboarding Sustainability through Stories" for IAF's Mumbai Hub.  I was blessed with participants who gave their full attention in the session.  There were two CPFs in attendance - Shyam Iyer and Kala Diwanji.

Here's what went well  - a deep discussion on the vast topic of "sustainability" was enabled for the participants.  I learnt that the process "Impact Gap Canvas" can generate deep discussion.  Participants were able to first research sustainability stories and then create some of their own as they discussed how they can make sustainability practices a part of their life.  I contracted with the CPFs to be participants in the session.

What I could have done differently - I could have designed more physical movement during the session for the participants as it would keep their energy levels up.  I also could have spent more time setting the context for the session.

Here are some pics of the action:

Some possibilities of actions towards sustainability

With Parineeta Mehra who willingly supported me with the logistics

The harvest at the end of the session

My gratitude to IAF Mumbai hub for this wonderful opportunity.  

Additional thanks to 

• Parineeta Mehra for her support with logistics.  
• SessionLab where I found the Impact Gap Canvas
• The CPFs for sharing with me a few tips for improving my facilitation skills.
• The participants for giving of their time and whole-hearted attention.

Action from IAF Mumbai Hub Session - The Art of Focused Development Discussion

Feedback as an activity, is not looked at with pleasure.  Try telling someone that you have "feedback" for them, and watch their expression and body language.  If you happen to be their manager, then you may get grudging acceptance.  

Few team managers and leaders are comfortable giving feedback.  This is mainly because they haven't been trained on how to do it.  I recall in my career, during the months of February or March, we in HR were running training sessions on the appraisal process. These appraisal sessions were for both managers and employees.  They consisted of a slide deck, and comments by the HR presenter - that was all. 

Employees were told how to accept feedback from their bosses. Bosses were given information on the Appraisal process, and feedback was considered a side effect. Appraisal Feedback anyway tends to focus on past performance, and little is discussed about future.  The employee is focused on getting the best possible rating for themselves and so any form of Development Feedback takes last place.  Bottom line - the development discussion is not given much importance for the future.

With this knowledge, Varsha Chitnis and myself decided to put together a session to enable a Focused Development Discussion.  Our experiences told us that individual biases and trust have a huge impact on how a development discussion can be conducted. So we incorporated these aspects into our session design and called it The Art of Focused Development Discussion.

Here are some images of the action on that day.

Desired Outcome for the session

Our Session Flow

Harvest from our First Activity

Clustering of behaviours

Clustering of biases and behaviours

Connections made between biases and behaviours

The Blueprint for the FDD

Learnings and Feedback that we received.

The enthusiastic learners

We thoroughly enjoyed designing and running the session. Our sincere thanks to the International Association of Facilitators - Mumbai Hub for the opportunity to do this session.  We are grateful to all the participants who took the time to attend and contribute their experiences into the session.

Stretching Outside Your Comfort Zone

Photo credit - pexels-lisa-fotios-1471991

This picture nearly perfectly describes me in my comfort zone.  

What's discomforting to me? A few things.  Top of the list (maybe near the top) would be dancing. 

Now, I love music, and can find the rhythm of the song and can tap or sway reasonably well to it. Music, like dancing, is a kinesthetic experience. But for me, Dancing involves asking various parts of my body to do things in a particular sequence and coordination to music, at which it seems to rebel since my childhood.  So I have developed some expertise in avoiding dance during parties over the years.

Recently I was asked along with a colleague, Varsha Chitnis, to co-facilitate the morning Plenary session on Day 2 of the IAF Asia Conference of the International Association of Facilitators (IAF) at Hyderabad along with a super facilitator from Japan, Mr. Hideyuki Yoshioka.   We were allotted 45 minutes and asked to energize the group (of only 190 delegates of different ages) and connect it to the previous day's learnings.

During our initial zoom discussions, we brainstormed as to how this session could be energetic and fun.  Among the various ideas we discussed was how to include music into the session.  Hideyuki-san proposed that we incorporate Zumba into the session.  With further discussion, the design took shape to combine learning and the Zumba dance. It was fortunate for us that Hideyuki-san was a Certified Zumba Instructor. While we became very excited about the design, my fear of dancing came to the fore.  I would have gladly taken a back seat rather than be dancing on stage.

As we practiced our moves over Zoom with guidance from Hideyuki-san (he's a certified Zumba Instructor), my discomfort grew stronger. During a practice session, I spoke about my discomfort with dancing and how I was concerned that I might make huge errors and bring down the team. Both of them kindly told me that I have to do this, and not to worry too much.  They encouraged me to keep trying and gave me courage to make mistakes and move ahead.

The result:

Us showing the way

Delegates practicing their dance steps

Delegates getting into the Zumba groove

After our session.

With Varsha Chitnis and Hideyuki-san

There was complete enthusiastic participation from the delegates, which we felt enabled us to go beyond our own potential. We felt the energy in the room shift higher as they put on their moves to the music.  I know that my co-facilitators danced better than me.

The feedback we got was on the lines of "Best session so far at the conference", "we really enjoyed the session", "we loved it", "Awesome".  A personal feedback I got from a couple of people was that it was inspiring to see my  courage in dancing on stage, despite my errors.

After the conference, I reflected on what could have made me do something that wasn't really me, yet get accepted and appreciated by the delegates.  Here's what I came up with:

• I acknowledged my discomfort with dancing to myself.
• I voiced it with my co-facilitators
• My co-facilitators encouraged me to keep trying and not dwell on mistakes.
• Because of their immense  and kind support, I was able to engage my curiosity, use my growth mindset,  to focus my learning instead of my fears, and practice the steps.
• Practice is important - regular deliberate practice even more so. Hideyuki-san made a video of us during a practice session which he shared with us.

I'm extremely grateful to IAF for the opportunity to do this session, and my co-facilitators Hideyuki Yoshioka and Varsha Chitnis for believing in me and being with me as I stretched outside of my comfort zone.

Let me also add that the conference was an awesome experience overall.  It was three days of fun and learning at Hyderabad for which I am thankful to all the facilitators and the delegates.

When appreciation is received

 

I'm just grateful for the opportunity to contribute to an organization like the International Association of Facilitators.

Feedback - Understanding Microaggression at the Workplace

Happy to share the feedback from a recent online session on Microaggression for 60+ employees of a tech company that I designed and delivered as part of the Facweek (Facilitation Week 2022) celebrations.

The expected outcomes were to enable participants to understand what microaggression is, it's impact on the organization and employees and how to go about creating a safe place to work. I'm happy to say that the feedback was quite positive and participants have taken rich learning and action points from the session.

Here's how they plan to deal with Microaggression and create a safe place to work.

Thanks to IAF (International Association of Facilitators) for giving me the opportunity to do this session.

Here are the things they will put into action immediately.