Episode 103
March 10, 2021
103: Facilitation and Jazz Music with Rich Goidel
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Intro
This toe-tapping, energy-flowing, jam of a workshops work episode explores the similarities (and differences) between jazz music, strategy, and facilitation – with fabled facilitator Rich Goidel leading the beat.
Rich fell into facilitation from his career in creative planning and brand strategy and has been uncovering fascinating insights ever since, thanks in no small part to the unique intersections he finds between music, strategy, and facilitation.
We explore where these crossovers work and fall short, how we can all embody a bit more musicality in our work, and even find ourselves practicing a live activity using Rich’s industry-favourite Catalyst Cards!
Find out about
Rich’s accidental journey from brand strategy to facilitation
How the need for alignment shows up in so many places in our lives
Joining the dots between strategy, music, and facilitation – and how they can each inspire new thought in the others
Hard skills vs. soft skills – and why soft skills are the hardest to master
Understanding who owns the ‘blame’ if a workshop doesn’t go to plan
Why preparation often takes twice as long as the workshop delivery itself
The tricky debate of whether we can own creative ideas
Why practice grants us the freedom to work with flexibility and creativity
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Feeling inspired by the conversation in this episode? We can have our own – take a seat at my virtual table as part of a Mastermind Group.
And if the idea of NeverDoneBefore 2021, the festival of facilitation caught your attention, explore it in more detail now.
Questions and Answers
01:08When did you first start calling yourself a facilitator?
04:32What are the similarities and differences between strategy, music, and facilitation?
09:05What’s the magic ingredient in creating the space for leaders to be vulnerable?
17:17How do you help groups push themselves further and into discomfort – where real progress is made?
19:57Where do you draw the line between experimentation and taking the workshop off course?
24:32What does neutrality in facilitation mean to you?
28:18Who owns the ‘mistake’ if a workshop goes off track?
31:34What makes a workshop fail?
35:50What’s your stance on ownership of creative exercises? Can we own ideas?
40:43What is your favourite way to use Catalyst Cards in an exercise?
45:34Rich and I practice using Catalyst Cards mid-podcast!
48:08What would be the wrong way to use Catalyst Cards?
51:32If you had a hashtag, what would it be?
52:41What is the one thing you would like listeners to take away from this episode?
Links
Rich’s Catalyst Cards
Facilitator’s Guide to Participatory Decision-Making by Sam Kaner
Rich’s article, Racing Against The Clock (A Facilitator’s Lament)