Conversations at the NDB Festival

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Episode 141

December 1st, 2021

141: Insights about Facilitation: Conversations at the NDB Festival

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Intro

Friday 19 November, 2021 marked the second NeverDoneBefore Festival.

In keeping with the spirit of the day, I elected to do something unique and, admittedly, daunting: a live podcast recording with anyone and everyone who wished to participate. No agenda, no plans, no idea what we’d discuss.

Eight wonderful conversations with eight wonderful facilitators from across the globe followed. Now we’ve brought those conversations together, turning them into micro-interviews and dividing them across three short episodes, to paint a picture of the NDB 2021 experience.

Listen along to hear how these facilitators reflected their learnings against their own practice, assumptions, and plans for the future. It’s a NeverDoneBefore moment – captured in time, preserved in podcast form!

Find out about

How facilitation is a dance between order and chaos, with Patrick Tiongson
Why we need to learn to think in the long-term again, with Saar Ben-Attar
How to intentionally design a workshop for slow thinking, with Jeremy Akers
Where to find inspiration for a NDB workshop, with Jacob Chromy
What a workshop with Amaranatho Robey teaches you, with Dov Tsal
How it felt to demo a product at the festival, with Helena Tikkanen Merk
Why silence is the missing ingredient in workshops, with Susanne Heiss
How to find – and use – your facilitator’s intuition, with Kirsty Lewis

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And if the idea of NeverDoneBefore, the community of facilitators, caught your attention; click here to explore it in more detail!

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Questions and Answers

01:13Patrick Tiongson: when did you start calling yourself a facilitator? 03:29To you, what is the difference between facilitation and moderating a conversation? 06:33As above, but Patrick asked me! 11:31When you look back at your experience as a moderator and a facilitator, what’s a lesson you’d like to share with the audience now? 17:30Saar Ben-Attar: How have you seen the online space facilitate conversations? 21:29Do you think our longing for creativity and serendipity has driven innovation in communications technology? 24:33Thinking long-term about events and trying to imagine the future of NeverDoneBefore. 31:38When you look back at your experience as a facilitator, what’s a lesson you’d like to share with the audience now? 34:24Jeremy Akers: You just hosted your first NeverDoneBefore workshop: The Slow Thinking Dojo. What did you learn and experiment with? 36:10What do you mean when you talk about participants being ready to “go for it”? 36:57What was the structure you designed to help participants go for it? 41:06What surprised you from a facilitation perspective? 41:57When you look back at your experience as a facilitator, what’s a lesson you’d like to share with the audience now? 01:26Jacob Chromy: When you look back at your experience as a facilitator, what’s a lesson you’d like to share with the audience now? 06:19How do you come up with a NeverDoneBefore workshop idea? 11:29Dov Tsal: You just came out of your NeverDoneBefore workshop with Amaranatho. What did you learn? 18:52What are your reflections from a facilitation perspective? 19:45 What is the difference between a discussion and a workshop? 22:33 When you look back at your experience as a facilitator, what’s a lesson you’d like to share with the audience now? 01:23 Helena Tikkanen Merk: You just finished your NeverDoneBefore demo. What did you learn from it? 02:39 What did you explore in your debrief? 04:40 As a founder, what was your experience of the Zoom Apps beta? 08:03 As a founder, what was your experience of the Zoom Apps beta? 09:29 What have you learned about humans and connection through Glimpse? 12:23 Could we use Glimpse to train ourselves into being better listeners and conversational partners? 21:25 Can we rely on algorithms to separate the context of our conversations? 25:27 Susanne Heiss: You completed your NeverDoneBefore workshop with Manal Sayid earlier. What did you learn from it? 27:48 Why do you think we don’t use silence more often in workshops? 29:34 What were your expectations for the workshop – if you had any – and what surprised you? 34:24 What do you think is it that made your workshop (and its outcomes) possible? 36:03 Kirsty Lewis: We’ve just come out of an intriguing session. What did you learn from it? 36:46 Where does the responsibility of the facilitator start? 41:13 When does intuition come into play in facilitation? How do we find it?