Facilitating a Business Meeting on Short Notice? Five Ways to Get the Desired Collaboration

There's a big difference between managing a meeting and facilitating one. These are five things you can do when time is short and you need to facilitate collaboration.

I was asked to “facilitate the discussions” between two technical teams, their consultants, and senior administrators from two organizations. It was a pivotal work session on a billion-dollar program. And it was all going down in three days, which was obviously not enough time to formally organize a facilitated session. These are five things I did at the last minute to get the desired collaboration from the session.

Facilitation Defined

Facilitation is defined as a structured session(s) in which the meeting leader (the facilitator) guides the participants through a series of predefined steps to arrive at a result that is created, understood, and accepted by all participants.

Key concepts include

1. Guides the participants

2. Predefined steps

3. Created, understood, and accepted

4. By all participants

CATER as the Framework

CATER is a mental model that helps you move from good to great facilitation. CATER also defines the essential elements of helping determine what constitutes facilitation and what constitutes leading (or managing) a business meeting.

CATER stands for:

• Communicate in pre-session exchanges.

• Ask powerful questions.

• Anticipate Trouble.

• Use engaging Exercises.

• Manage the Rhythm.

I decided to use CATER as the foundation for converting a managed meeting into a collaboration extravaganza (a facilitated session).

Pre-Session Exchange 

The pre-session exchange usually consists of face-to-face interviews, phone interviews, or online surveys. The pre-session exchange involves each participant. 

There was hardly time for that much organization in this case.

My alternative was to call the team leaders for each organization or consulting firm. I asked each person the top three to five questions that should be asked during the session.

Ask Powerful Questions

Powerful questions lead participants to active thought, debate, and compelling results. They normally come within the facilitated session and tend to be open-ended. But without background, I was a little in the dark and risked looking ill-informed or disconnected from the work performed to date.

In this case, I built a one-pager of key questions from the pre-session exchange. It was attached to the already developed agenda (there was no time to change that) and circulated to all of the members. These served as a minimum list of guiding questions for the facilitated exchange.

Anticipate Trouble

Disruption is a reality. Trouble will occur. Great facilitators embrace the reality of disruption and are prepared to navigate challenges.

In this case, we had a short meeting (1.5 hours), technical specialists who would want to overshare their input, big money in the swing, and an air of distrust between the participants.

I decided to use the clock and the list of questions as my primary way to manage trouble. In several cases, I risked stepping on toes when I moved things along, but clearly everyone could see I was trying to keep the collaborative focus.

Engaging Exercises 

Engaging exercises are what draw favorable attention or interest. Some synonyms for engaging make the point better: alluring, appealing, captivating, charismatic, enchanting, entrancing, fascinating, glamorous, magnetic, and seductive.

There was hardly time for all of the things that make interactions “engaging,” so I fell back on showing models, the notecard exercise, and a potential breakout session.

There were no engaging exercises on the agenda developed by others, but I had them ready to go if I needed to pivot.

Manage the Rhythm

Whether a single or multiple sessions, “ups” and “downs” will occur during the facilitation process. All facilitators must master the rhythm and timing associated with group dynamics.

The big rhythm piece here was how everyone was going to get along as they collaborated with important technical information. I decided to pivot on the clock (short session). If things were going well, we would extend the time by 30 minutes. If things were going poorly, we would use a plus-delta technique and wrap up early.

How the Modified Facilitated Session Ended

The work session ended well. Everyone collaborated well, the necessary information was exchanged, future actions and decisions were agreed upon, and all participants left with confidence in the process.

Scoring it item by item:

Pre-Session Exchange – exceeded expectations. This proved to be a difference maker. On the negative side, not including everyone led to a few complaints from people in the same organization.

Ask Powerful Questions – exceeded expectation. The one-pager fulfilled its mission.

Anticipate Trouble – met expectations. There was some trouble, but the preparation made the difference in dealing with it. Using the clock was the right way to move through the trouble.

Engaging Exercises – met expectations. We didn't plan to use them and didn't need to use them. The approach, however, was the correct one.

Manage the Rhythm – exceeded expectations. I formally dismissed the meeting at the designated time but offered for anyone to stay if more information exchange was needed. All 20 participants stayed for another 30 minutes. Then we respected everyone's time and dismissed. The rhythm stayed within control.

The Difference Between Leading and Facilitating

Understanding what facilitation is and the elements of CATER provides the foundation for guiding participants to solutions that are created, understood, and accepted by all.

Is it possible to facilitate at the last minute? Not really. These are five things I did to make it appear as much like a facilitated session as possible, and most importantly, achieve the desired collaboration.

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Communicating with FINESSE is the not-for-profit community of technical professionals dedicated to being highly effective communicators and facilitators. Learn more about our publications, webinars, and workshops.

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CATER is discussed more in "Facilitating with FINESSE: A Guide to Successful Business Solutions." The book applies CATER to ten commonly facilitated business applications, ranging from risk assessments, business cases, failure analysis, and strategic plans. Move your facilitation from good to great by CATERing to participants!