FS05 Discovering the Joys of Facilitation with Megan Evans

Megan Evans is a consultant, facilitator and trainer and host of the IAF meet ups in Wales. Megan describes how she first got into facilitation quite a few years ago, experiencing it as a participant and then being “roped in”. She was inspired by being asked what she and other people thought, and not just being told. Fascinated by the skills and style and started to get more and more involved in doing it herself. She worked for Participation Cymru – the aim of which was to spread participative and facilitative techniques across Wales throughout different organisations. Megan uses a lot of facilitative methods to ensure everyone’s voices can be heard. She talks about it being stressful “in a good way” and what she loves about facilitation, particularly when the group is engaged and don’t notice the facilitator anymore. She describes the best learning as coming from others and how important it is to watch others facilitate. She also goes on training, reads books and does a lot of learning by doing. She also hosts the IAF meet ups in Cardiff where there is a lot of learning and sharing. Learning from others is really important. Although she’s never had a facilitation mentor she would recommend people do. She has a number of colleagues that she co-facilitate with, thereby sharing the load. Over the years she has learnt to recognise that planning is the most important thing and although is more comfortable in her own shoes it still raises her blood pressure a bit! A recent ToP training (ICA) she went on demonstrated the importance of asking questions and Megan tells us a bit more about her involvement with the ICA and the training she does for them. We talk more about an experience that stood out for Megan (an Open Space Technology Session for 130 people) and some of the challenges she has come across. Two of Megan’s favourite methodologies are Open Space Technology and The ICA’s consensus building approach. The next Wales meet up is on 3rd December (3pm – 6pm at the Little Man Café in Cardiff) which will be a 3 hour session and Megan described what they will be doing in that session. You can get in touch with Megan via email (in the episode) Wales Meet up https://www.meetup.com/IAF-Wales-facilitators-and-friends/events/fvmxcryzqbfb/ ICA UK training https://www.ica-uk.org.uk/courses/ Let us know your thoughts: [email protected]  www.IAF-world.org And go mad on Twitter! @IAFenglandwales @Fac-stories  @Helenejewell #IAFPodcast 

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