011 - How to Design Brainstorming Sessions for Huge Groups with Frans Scheepens

In this episode, I talk to Frans Scheepens, a brainstorm designer, entrepreneur and certified facilitator. We talk about conducting brainstorming sessions with very large groups as he has designed and facilitated groups with up to 650 participants. Frans founded Brainfuel a company that helps groups to generate many ideas that will solve important problems. 
 
In the show, Frans shares hands-on advice on how to design and facilitate large group brainstorming sessions. He shares suitable ice-breaker exercises, voting techniques and best practices on how to deal with upcoming challenges and distractions. You will learn how to make sure that all ideas count and how you would have to instruct facilitators to support the sub-groups in the process.

Don’t miss the part when Frans explains why brainstorming sessions have such a bad reputation and what you can do to deliver brainstorming workshops that work. 

 
Questions and Answers

[1:16] If you were a hashtag, what would it be?

[1:28] How do you define ‘brainstorming’?

[2:08] Is a brainstorming just a nice concept for a meeting without agenda?

[2:59] Where does the bad reputation of brainstorming come from?

[4:05] What questions qualify for a brainstorm?

[6:25] When you advice to include ‘people from the outside’ in the session, who do you mean?

[7:28] Is there an optimum number of people to include in a brainstorming session? 

[8:47] How do you avoid outsiders to create resistance regarding their ideas?

[9:43] Would you give participants homework for the preparation of the brainstorm?

[11:25] What is your favourite icebreaker/ check-in exercise? 

[13:00] How much time would you consider for such an exercise? 

[14:23] What is a ‘daring brainstorm’? 

[14:46] What’s the maximum size of a brainstorm session you did?

[15:18] Who would facilitate these sub-teams?

[17:00] How do you manage distraction for such a large group?

[18:30] What would you advise on how to deal with distraction or side-talk during a session? 

[22:39] What is the perspective that you need to empathize with when designing such brainstorming sessions?

[25:55] What is a ‘brain-dump’? 

[27:33] What is your method of brainstorming?

[28:18] Can you walk us through the superhero method?

[32:06] In a very operational way, what is your approach to brainstorming? 

[39:46] How do you choose the best ideas? 

[44:37] How do the sub-groups then share their results with each other?  

[45:59] To what extent does the facilitator has a responsibility on the follow-up of the brainstorming session?

[47:02] Would you also engage in the follow-up?

[51:00] What makes workshops work?

[51:38] What shall someone, who missed the last 50 minutes, takeaway from the show? 

[52:32] How can interested listeners get in touch with you?  

Related links you may want to check out:

• Frans business page: www.brainfuel.nl
• A short video about Frans' sessions
• Our sponsor Session Lab (affiliate link) 

 Connect to Guest on 

Transcript

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SPEAKER_05 0:02

What if the next team workshop delivered the results you hoped for? What if everyone believed that the working session was a valuable use of their time and felt inspired to take action? My name is Miriam Hapnis, and it is my mission to help you to deliver workshops that work. Today with me on the show is Franz Schippens. He's a professional brainstormer, a certified facilitator, and an entrepreneur. And we're gonna speak about how to facilitate brainstorms with huge groups. Hi Franz, I'm happy to have you on the show, and I've been so excited to talk with you about how to facilitate large groups because this is a challenge.

SPEAKER_01 0:47

It actually is, but it's very nice to do. So and it's uh if you're right about it, uh if you know what you're doing, it's possible.

SPEAKER_05 0:56

And we're gonna talk about all that and share your wisdom with all of our listeners. Yes. So I gave a very brief introduction and um one question I always like to ask in the beginning is if you had to boil it down to one word, if you were to be a hashtag, what would you be?

SPEAKER_01 1:16

Then I would be brainstorm designer.

SPEAKER_05 1:19

Brainstorm designer. Yes. I like that. And it makes me obviously right away curious on how you define brainstorming.

SPEAKER_01 1:28

Brainstorming is all about getting new ideas, getting new uh perspectives on your problem and solving them. And for that you need to have a lot of ideas. Quantity breeds quality. That's what I firmly believe in.

SPEAKER_05 1:42

And I love the quote, um, I think it was Seth Godin who said, good ideas come from bad ideas as long as there are many.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

Yes, exactly. I totally agree.

SPEAKER_05 1:52

And um when I I recently overheard a colleague who invited for a brainstorming session. And to me it seemed as if it was just a meeting without an agenda, and brainstorming was a nicer word or nicer way to put it.

SPEAKER_01 2:08

Well, then you're uh sorely mistaken because uh I believe that when you want to use the time of people effectively, you do need to have a good program. Of course, you can deviate uh if something happens during a session, but uh having uh a good plan in place when you start brainstorming that is actually very helpful and makes it clear for people what it's all about.

SPEAKER_05 2:35

Why do you think that or maybe you don't think it, but I have the impression that brainstorming has quite a bad reputation. So, for instance, for lunch I just met a friend, and when I told him about my excitement to interview you today about brainstorming, he was like, Oh, I hate brainstorming, they're useless anyway.

SPEAKER_01 2:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 2:55

Where does this bad reputation come from?

SPEAKER_01 2:58

Uh because most people forget what it's all about, uh what is really important for the client and for the participants, and uh most people who uh have done a lot of brainstorms know that often the results don't count because it's just having a lot of ideas, and uh you think about it uh two or three weeks after the fact and nobody knows what's being done with the ideas, and actually, I think that's one of the main reasons why brainstorms have a bad name, you have a lot of ideas, you have a lot of energy, and nothing is done with it, and that's actually why uh brainstorming has such a bad reputation, I believe. And of course, if you don't uh work with the right questions, if you don't have the problem uh uh uh good in mind what you want to solve, then also you have a wonderful solutions for the wrong idea for the wrong problem.

SPEAKER_05 3:53

I like that, and it's uh as if you just read my mind because I wondered what would be a question that qualifies for a brainstorm and what questions would not qualify for a brainstorm.

SPEAKER_01 4:06

Yeah, I think that actually finding the right brainstorming question is one of the uh the real solutions of getting the fund back in uh in brainstorming. If you have a question that's too broad, it's it's too too general, you all you all you will get very general answers. If you have like um if how can we improve our sales? They will say more salespeople. Yeah, okay, right. That's not really an inventive idea. If you make it too narrow, if you don't or you don't focus on the right kind of uh question, then it feels that you're that people instinctively feel they're working on the wrong problem. And if you have started the train, it's if you have started your uh your session, if you started your brainstorm, it's very hard to deviate again. And and that's what it brought what you really need to be aware of at the start of the uh of your brainstorm. Of course, you have prepared with your uh with your client, but do you really have the the right question? That's that's a the main question for you to find out in the early stages of your brainstorm.

SPEAKER_05 5:17

And it sounds to me as if prior to the brainstorm that you would facilitate for your client, you have you must almost have a coaching session to really boil down to find the the right question.

SPEAKER_01 5:30

Yeah, exactly. If you uh it's uh more often than not when you start with a problem that the the the client uh proposes to brainstorm about and you talk some more about it, then they find out oh wait a minute, this is not this is not really the problem. I need to solve a different problem than they than they actually think they need to solve. So that's uh that's really important. Finding out what the client wants to be solved wants to be solved, who are involved. That's also a major part why brainstorming has a bad reputation, is that because you have the wrong team in the room. You don't have the people present that really uh have a big stake in it for in, for instance. Please try to get them involved also. Don't just stick with your own team. Get people from the outside.

SPEAKER_05 6:22

So, what do you mean with outside?

SPEAKER_01 6:25

Uh, often uh it's a very good idea to find somebody from uh with a a clear financial perspective from your from your own organization, for instance. Somebody who's not in on your team. If you're in marketing, get somebody from finance, if you're in uh city planning, get somebody from who's more uh conscious about social uh development in in your city. Uh, and also maybe you can uh add somebody who's from your target group and uh try to involve them or get people who uh you know will get a lot of new ideas because they are more creative or have a really uh special view on uh on your problem. Try to incorporate uh more people in it.

SPEAKER_05 7:17

And when I hear more people, I wonder whether there's a sweet spot of people. What I'm happy to investigate later, there apparently is no maximum, but I wonder for a minimum of people for brainstorm.

SPEAKER_01 7:28

Uh I think you can already start with three to four people. Uh if you really want to have it uh for just one group, I think that uh between six to nine people that's actually for me then uh a nice group because then you still can have some breakouts, so you have you can break them up in groups of uh two or three people, and they can work on uh on their own ID. That's actually very nice for people to not just always stick in one group, uh be in one group, uh, but have uh some time to really delve into something that you're really passionate about. So if you have the choice, six to nine uh is for me uh I think the best group you can have, but it's no trouble in on your own to have 15, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_05 8:15

Before we talk more about the subgroups, um I also wonder, especially if you have different people joining with different backgrounds, yeah. I can already imagine this scene where someone from finance joins the marketing team and then the marketing team goes with yeah, but no.

SPEAKER_02 8:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 8:36

So do you have some ground rules or what I what is the approach to brainstorm that you would take to avoid this negative?

SPEAKER_01 8:46

Uh it probably always happens. At first, ideas from the outside are almost always rejected or politely received, and then okay, well let's forget about it. Uh you actually have to take those people in protection as uh facilitators. So you really uh uh give them the floor. Um that's one day make sure they're they're telling what they're thinking. That's important. And when people actually uh find out with what kind of ideas they're coming and what that their so-called stupid questions are actually uh a revelation for the for the new ideas that come after that, I think it's very important to uh make sure that they're comfortable and that they are accepted in the group.

SPEAKER_05 9:37

So, would you give homework for the preparation to the brainstorm?

SPEAKER_01 9:43

Almost never. No. It's uh you can uh of course you give them information on what's it about, and maybe you ask them to come up with an example of innovation that they like very much so you can build on that in your session, but not too much, because uh it often creates uh a situation that one or two uh two people have actually done the homework, and the rest is just thinking, Oh, I didn't do anything, I have to come up with something, so it only creates a difference in the group that's uh often not uh not helpful, true.

SPEAKER_05 10:19

And I can imagine that maybe we get married to our ideas. So we did the homework at home, and then we want to present it and we want to stick to it, and then we're not open for new.

SPEAKER_01 10:30

I totally agree. Yeah, so you try to uh come up with a level playing field, that's what what's it all about, and often just having people give them the chance to really meet each other and do that in a l a little different way. Come up with a funny, uh, funny way of introducing yourself or uh combining uh uh personal and uh business uh questions together. Uh that helps also to uh see people in a different light and find connections that maybe you're from a different uh department in your in your organization, but actually, you you also like to go to uh on holiday in Norway for instance, finding commonalities.

SPEAKER_05 11:15

So this sounds to me very much like icebreakers check-in.

SPEAKER_01 11:20

Yes, actually, yes.

SPEAKER_05 11:21

What is your favorite check-in or icebreaker exercise?

SPEAKER_01 11:26

Uh, one that I really like, especially if the group is uh a little bigger, is uh to have quadrants on the floor so uh two axes, and you pose a personal question, and uh people have to decide uh do you like a holiday in France or in uh Norway, like I said before. Um, and just have them choose where they want to where they want to stand and then add a question that's uh that's all about the content. So for instance, um what are the the major developments in the in our in our market? Uh is it AI artisan uh artificial intelligence or is it uh the privacy development? What whatever uh your question will be, and just have those people stand in quadrants and they're they're already preparing to uh discuss with the other groups, but just have them meet the people they agree with, yeah. And and so uh meet to meet the people you agree with. That's actually a very nice uh nice way of getting people to uh uh differentiate and learn other people to know with different sets of questions, and it's a lovely way of having them uh really meet each other in a quick way.

SPEAKER_05 12:46

I can imagine that it's also a conversation trigger because you need to talk to the people in order to know okay, am I now further away from you or closer? And how close am I?

SPEAKER_01 12:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 12:56

How much time would you consider for such an exercise?

SPEAKER_01 13:00

Um most of the time you can do two to three questions in 15 to 20 minutes, and then then it's already then the the new thing about it is already gone, so then you need to move on. So um really about quick exercises, uh 15 minutes, that's uh the sweet spot, I think.

SPEAKER_05 13:19

And I can imagine that it also gives you as a facilitator the perfect opportunity to then regroup the teams in a way that they're more diverse.

SPEAKER_01 13:28

Yep. Yeah. And and uh because uh if you pose two or three uh sets of questions, uh you have been with almost everybody, you have been in one group or another. So you have met probably everybody already, even if it's not long, uh you already have talked to somebody, so it really lowers the barrier to uh to connect with people.

SPEAKER_05 13:53

True, and I can see it perfectly work with very large groups, even. Yeah, yeah. Thanks for sharing. Yeah that's great. I might copy you on that one. On your LinkedIn profile, I read that um in your introduction that you're facilitating or that you're an expert in daring brainstorms. Yes. And at first I thought, isn't every brainstorm daring? And then I thought maybe no brainstorm is daring. So what is so what is a daring brainstorm?

SPEAKER_01 14:23

A daring brainstorm that's uh well uh uh one thing that you can uh find it in is in size, of course. I really love it when you try to make it really big because that's not something that a lot of people do. So uh I always try to push the limits of what's possible uh to do in facilitation.

SPEAKER_05 14:44

What's your maximum size you've done?

SPEAKER_01 14:46

Uh I have done groups of six hundred and fifty people.

SPEAKER_05 14:49

Six hundred and fifty people? Yes. Let me digest this for a second. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 14:54

Yeah, and they're all in groups of uh uh uh uh around about 15 uh people. So you have a lot of uh decentralized brainstorming going on.

SPEAKER_05 15:06

So each group I assume would then have a sub-facilitator.

SPEAKER_01 15:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 15:11

And these would be people from your team from Brain Fuel?

SPEAKER_01 15:15

Yeah. Most of the time we have uh actually it's even uh more layered. So uh we have uh in for instance we did one uh with 200 people, uh that's the one that that's the closest by uh not not that long ago, and we had six people of us uh coaching five people, four to five people of the client. So we what we actually did is we did a training in the morning with the people uh who were going to facilitate from the from the client side, and we connected them with our facilitators. So uh especially when you introduce a brainstorm method that you don't know that well, it's really nice to just have our uh facilitator from Brainfu Brain Fuel have them explain what uh the participants actually need to do. And if you uh you help those all those groups overseeing four or five groups is actually well to do for one of our facilitators who are experienced in our methods, and they can introduce uh the difficult parts if the if one of the uh teams of the uh client is not working uh is not uh gets stuck, we can help them to uh get unstuck.

SPEAKER_05 16:35

Yeah. Getting stuck I see as one challenge. The challenge that would even come to my mind first would be distraction.

SPEAKER_01 16:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 16:45

When I imagine a group, even of 30 people, not thinking of 200 or 650, there's so much noise in terms of distraction of phones, of side talking. Yeah. Um, how would you manage that?

SPEAKER_01 16:59

Well, actually, you uh I learned the hard way because one time we had a very big room, and at first we thought this is ideal, but actually it would it it it sounded like a church, so everybody uh really uh uh well there was a lot of noise. Let's just say that. Yeah, but what what you do then is just have people uh get closer, and uh the the bonus of such a situation is that everybody really has to pay attention. Yeah, so if you put a spin on it as a facilitator, of course they don't like it, but actually if you manage them, uh manage to get them uh to get closer, they will uh uh do very uh very well in the brainstorm.

SPEAKER_05 17:44

And what would be your advice to uh one of those sub-facilitators to deal with distractions? So for instance, I facilitated also a large workshop and we had sub-facilitators. Yeah. And there were some more experienced than others and some with more, I would say, natural authority than others. Yeah. And then at some tables you would have these two people who just start their private conversation and get very excited about it. Yeah. But this distracts then the entire group. I had the impression that the natural instinct for such a newbie facilitator would be to react with authority.

SPEAKER_03 18:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 18:18

But this doesn't help the creative or safe space that you aim to create. So exactly.

SPEAKER_01 18:26

What would you advise? What I would advise in this case is try to uh uh if you have two people discussing a lot, uh try to make a summary that uh that really uh takes in account their view, and then just turn to another person that's actually not uh not involved in the discussion yet and ask them to to participate to to ask the for their their opinion. So there's the solution in this kind uh in this situation, especially if you don't want to linger too long with those two people, you can address it by uh talking to the two people, but actually it's more smart to just take their own words and turn it to uh turn the floor open for the other uh participants in that group. And uh usually that really comes uh uh the people you uh you involved in that way, they're already waiting to join in or to bring their point, and then actually the dynamic between the two people who are really discussing amongst themselves changes immediately because they get an uh a different view from other people.

SPEAKER_05 19:38

And they maybe get the platform to share their ideas.

SPEAKER_01 19:41

Yeah, exactly. And that and so uh of course you can uh go back to the brainstorming rules, uh let everybody participate, build on each other's ideas, but often I try to deflect the energy to other people and let them run with that energy in a way.

SPEAKER_05 20:00

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SPEAKER_01 20:55

What's most important for them is to know that we're always there for them. If you give them trust that you will help them out if they uh if they run into trouble, and just make sure that it's fun and make sure that this high energy in the all over with the the the big group that you already have by uh the way you start have a high uh energy, they uh can latch on and they can really uh using that energy, they can start uh that group uh quite easily, and of course there will be trouble, and uh just one very personal advice always tell okay, this is the first time I do it, so please help me uh uh facilitate you. That's uh just make sure that people uh they are quite forgiving to uh to their own colleagues if they're not that used to uh facilit facilitating yet. So that's also an important one, and just keep going, don't don't get stuck and uh and har ask for help when you need it.

SPEAKER_05 22:04

Yes. And this um empathy that you're basically referring to reminds me of something that you said while we're not recording yet. That when designing these large brainstorms, you first try to put yourself into the shoes of the participants and then may maybe also about the sub-facilitators to empathize with them to make it so easy to understand that everyone can actually join in and follow.

SPEAKER_01 22:31

That's it.

SPEAKER_05 22:32

What is the perspective of the participant and the subfacilitator that you need to empathize with?

SPEAKER_01 22:39

Sometimes you know your own methods and your facilitation uh exercises, you know them by heart. They don't. So really put yourself in your first uh the first time you did it yourself, what went wrong, uh, what went well, and try to formulate it in such a way that they can actually step by step uh go through your uh exercise and they know I need to do this first and then that. Really clear steps that helps a l uh helps a lot. But also uh make sure that if they have that they have they still feel the room to make it their own and give their own twist on on your exercise. If you can combine those two, have clear instructions where you really uh sometimes even write out okay, you need to be aware of this and this and this. If that happens, you can uh this is your countermeasure. Um just giving them some examples of what they can expect can also help a lot so that they can envision uh envision themselves what is going to happen if they are gonna facilitate.

SPEAKER_05 23:50

Would you then have a test run?

SPEAKER_01 23:52

Yes. Okay. Always.

SPEAKER_05 23:54

Okay, so that they experience this themselves and then can put themselves into the shoes of their participants.

SPEAKER_01 24:00

Yeah, that that's that's one of the main uh the main things you need to do. Have them have a test run and explain that a test run is never the same than the real real thing, but you will experience at one hand uh what you're going to do as a facilitator, and at the same time, you will be participant for the the other people who are uh doing the test run with you. So you will experience how an instruction that you give, how it uh how you perceive it as a uh participant yourself. So there's a double learning. On the one hand, you you you feel what your participants will feel because a lot of uh uh brainstorming exercises at first seem a little bit absurd. So you you feel you have that uh experience and at the same time you uh you practice with the method. And we can tell we uh you can ask the questions uh to our facilitators um uh what you uh how to solve uh things you uh you have uh trouble with.

SPEAKER_05 25:01

And I imagine when especially when a sub facilitator would believe uh certain exercise is absurd, then this person will feel uncomfortable with doing that.

SPEAKER_01 25:12

Ah, exactly.

SPEAKER_05 25:13

So what are you doing to cope with this?

SPEAKER_01 25:17

Have them do it. Just have them really you can talk about it, but just have them do the exercise themselves and find out, uh and maybe even check the results. So what ideas did you come up with with this uh ridiculous exercise that you didn't come up with before? Just make sure that they have their own brain dump first. So write down your ideas, and what new ideas come to the uh to the fore when you uh do the exercise, and then they always see oh wonderful. That's something that we really missed out in the in the in the brain dump.

SPEAKER_05 25:51

Yeah, brain dump. Yeah, what is a brain dump?

SPEAKER_01 25:54

Oh, a brain dump is uh that that's a really important that's also one of the reasons why people hate uh brainstorming. Uh that's because you dive directly into the in your uh well-crafted exercises, but people already have ideas. So if they don't get those ideas out of their head, the it it conflicts uh immediately with your exercise. So first you need five to ten to fifteen minutes of just having people write down every idea they already have.

SPEAKER_05 26:28

On this specific topic of the brainstorm.

SPEAKER_01 26:31

Yes, ask the question, have them write down all the ideas they already have. Mostly the most of the time they're done uh in in ten ten minutes. And you can even have some discussion about it so they they get more uh feel for the for the subject, and then you start with your exercises, not before. Because a lot of people, uh especially the more rational people, they have a lot of trouble if they already have an ID, they want to uh get it out there. And if they don't if they have to talk through your exercise, they have to get their ideas in that way.

SPEAKER_05 27:04

They will be distracted all time long.

SPEAKER_01 27:06

Yeah, why do we need this exercise? Already know what I want to say.

SPEAKER_05 27:10

I heard this sentence so many times, now I know why.

SPEAKER_01 27:12

Yeah, and that's why five to ten minutes, and you don't have this problem anymore.

SPEAKER_05 27:17

And what would you do then with these ideas?

SPEAKER_01 27:20

Uh uh treat them as equally as the ideas that come out of the brainstorming exercises. All ideas are uh are welcome.

SPEAKER_05 27:28

So, what is um your method of brainstorming?

SPEAKER_01 27:33

Well, we uh we uh have made a uh uh a brainstorming uh method with cards, so association cards with persons, with of characters, with uh animals, with locations and with uh objects. And with every uh card uh type of card we have different brainstorming methods. That way we make it more easy to have uh most facilitators have done the superhero that's a really old dependable uh brainstorming method that's already around since I think the the 30s of the 20th century.

SPEAKER_05 28:13

Can't you can you walk us through for those who are not familiar with it?

SPEAKER_01 28:18

The superhero is is uh giving people permission to stand in somebody else's shoes and have a different perspective and come up with the ideas that they're a little bit afraid of to uh to mention because they might be a little bit wild. So it actually just pick uh a superhero in our case in the case of our cards. You you pick a card and you get Nelson Mandela, or you get uh the wicked witch, or uh you can get all a lot of different characters, and you you ask the question: what would Mandela do in your case? How would he solve this problem? And that actually gives a totally different perspective than the than just your own company uh perspective, and that uh that is a really easy way of opening new uh new avenues to pursue in uh IDs.

SPEAKER_05 29:10

Interesting. And it reminds me of an experiment I once read about children nutrition, maybe maybe a little bit off topic, but still. So um they were looking at children who were eating too many French fries, and McDonald's I think they introduced apple edges.

SPEAKER_03 29:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 29:26

And they asked the children, Do you want the french fries or the apples? And most of the children would choose the french fries, obviously. And then they introduced a small trick and they asked the kids, What would Superman choose? And they said, Of course he would choose the apples. Okay. So do you want french fries or apples? And then 90% of the children, just after this question, would choose the apples.

SPEAKER_01 29:51

Yeah, and and and that's uh the the same mechanism goes with this uh Superman uh uh superhero uh approach. And uh in that way we have a lot of uh I think at the moment we have 20, 25 uh different uh brainstorming methods. This is a very easy one, and we also have some complicated ones, and for every group and every situation, there are different methods that you can use. And the interesting thing is with brainstorming, often we stop when we have applied or different uh exercises. Uh and but that is really where the work starts for a good brainstorm because just having all those well uh hundred, two hundred, sometimes three hundred post-its on the wall, people don't have any feeling for what's really on the on the wall yet. So you need to have some exercises that are uh help them sort through those uh through all those ideas, and and that's uh actually one of the my favorite uh exercises is naming and framing. That's just not judging the ideas on are they good or are they bad, but just uh group all the ideas that come from the same uh perspective, from the same idea that that look alike. Yes, and then you you can uh then you will also uh always see that the the big breakdown of those hundred, two hundred uh post-its will uh uh bottle down or boil down to uh eight, nine, twelve different groups, and then it becomes much more um uh relatable and you can do something with those results.

SPEAKER_05 31:41

Yeah. Before I ask you what you would then do with the results, yeah. I wonder for um just a technical question for the brainstorm itself. Yeah, for instance, I usually use a time timer and I don't allow any side talks or discussions. I just ask my participants to shout out their ideas and write them down to avoid distraction. Yeah. And I wonder how you would go with that.

SPEAKER_01 32:06

Oh, that that that's actually a very nice question because um this all depends on what is the group and what do you want to achieve, and who are you as a facilitator? For you, this this this this might work very well. For me, sometimes I am really uh well uh all about time, uh timekeeping, but other other times I just make sure that uh there's especially a lot of room just to have people talk about the results.

SPEAKER_05 32:38

True depends what the group needs.

SPEAKER_01 32:40

Yeah, and and and uh it's always a combination who are you as a facilitator, what's your personal style? And there are a lot of different uh ways you can look at that. Uh and and if you know who you are, you can facilitate a lot better.

SPEAKER_05 32:55

Yeah. So if we apply this question to these large groups, yeah, where you need a very strict structure also with the sub-facilitators, because it's difficult maybe for a sub-facilitator, one takes more time and prefers discussion and the other one don't.

SPEAKER_01 33:10

I when we when we have this kind of big uh big groups, uh I can tell you after two two and a half uh uh hours, I have walked about 15 uh 15 miles. Wow. Because together with uh we're always there are always two uh lead facilitators who walk around and make sure that we're always accessible for uh our uh facilitators but also the facilitators of the of the clients. Uh you need to be omnipresent in a way, because that's the only way you can keep time, and you can help uh all those groups that are really uh struggling. If you were you have to be everywhere, that that's the feeling that you often have, but that's actually uh you learn to look at groups from a distance and know there's something rotten in the group. So you you can predict and you can see on how the dynamics is uh are from a distance, you can see where you need to be to intervene.

SPEAKER_05 34:15

So, what are the red flags that you can perceive?

SPEAKER_01 34:19

Uh often uh more important uh than anything else is body language because you have a lot of groups, and sometimes we uh the uh when especially with those large group large groups, you have twenty to twenty-five groups often. And so there's a a lot of people you can uh look at. So if you see there are seven groups already uh writing on the postage, you immediately notice uh somewhere else where the the facilitators still talking, still introducing, where people are discussing a lot, and then you just gently seal uh below the radar uh uh uh is how I call it. You you really uh come in not as uh the authoritative facilitator, but you keep your distance and and get your uh get permission from the facilitator to uh uh to have a little intervention. Intervention. Yeah, and and then then you can really uh swing all those uh uh groups up uh and give the give them a lot of energy.

SPEAKER_05 35:26

How would you do that?

SPEAKER_01 35:28

Uh of course uh the I always say the the solving of the problem is somewhere else than where you're looking at. So if you want the groups to have a high energy when they start, you start by keeping the introduction short. That's the main reason why people uh are uh are uh are falling asleep is because the you get a way too long introduction. And uh I'm not sure who said it, but uh there's a famous quote uh uh sorry for this long letter because I didn't have time to write a short one.

SPEAKER_05 36:05

I think it was Hemingway.

SPEAKER_01 36:07

Wonderful. Thank you. Finally I know who it was. Because uh that's actually uh uh so true for introductions in uh uh uh in big brainstorms and in any session. If you prepare well, anything that needs to be uh said can be said in five minutes.

SPEAKER_05 36:27

I totally agree. And I can imagine that the previous coaching or exercise that you're doing with the host of the session to actually boil down the problem into a brainstorming question helps a lot.

SPEAKER_01 36:39

Yeah. That's that's what you see production short. That's what you see in my session plans is all uh the talking points. Uh I always do uh give the the client uh a suggestions. I think these are the three points you need to make. Do you agree? Yeah, or make them your own, change it around. I'll have a look at it later. Uh helping them to formulate what they actually want. Um sometimes you need to back off and uh your client wants to do it uh themselves, but uh uh more often than not, they're very uh happy if you just provide what are now are the points that you need to make to uh make clear why people are there, what will be done with their contribution, and uh why it's gonna help their company or their organization.

SPEAKER_05 37:27

Yeah. So and this is a nice bridge to come back to um the clusters. So um you generate all these ideas. Yep. Um you have 150 or more post-its on the wall, you group them.

SPEAKER_01 37:42

Per per group, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 37:43

And then where would you go from there? Because I wonder how do you at one point you need to vote on a favorite idea.

SPEAKER_01 37:50

Uh yeah, you all uh all things that you uh do in a normal brainstorm you can do with a with a small group, also. Uh sometimes you need to be quicker. So if you really are uh strapped for time, uh you can always fall back to uh Dr. Love. And Dr. Love is just one method where you where people are really passionate about about the solution, just have them uh step in front of the group, uh proclaim their love for uh for the solution they they like and see if it resonates with the group. And if there are a lot of people uh who uh who like that a lot, well go for it and uh make a group of that uh of those people, have them come up with an implementation plan of uh one or uh one to five steps. What do we need to do to make this uh a reality? And that's actually one choice you can make just to uh to vote by energy. I feel energy for this ID and let's uh choose. But that's actually a method if you look deeper into it. That's not always the right way. Uh you you lose a lot of uh quality IDs because introverts. Introverts, there we there we have them. Yeah. Power to the introverts, yes. And um so naming and framing, like I said before, you can do this actually quite quick if you uh have the permission from the group group to okay be quick about it and make sure that they know okay, we really need uh need to speed up, but we do need this step of uh choosing IDs. It's often in our case, it's one third of the program we have with that group. We spent really one third of the uh of the session, even if there's short ones, uh, on choosing the the best IDs.

SPEAKER_05 39:43

And how do you how do you choose them?

SPEAKER_01 39:46

Uh so you you you go about with for instance naming and framing and then you talk them over. What are uh you can even we have our own uh uh selection uh method uh selection day where people can vote not just dot vote and just uh give them three stickers and uh uh two will be put on the ID they really like, and the third one. Well, okay, that's let's put it there. That's often what help happens with dot dot voting. But we have uh uh what's an idea that uh uh will succeed in the short run, uh what uh what idea will be uh good in the long run, uh, what's the idea you like the best, the idea you love, and what's the most unique, the most creative idea. And if you give people those four choices, they s they tend to spend more time on really choosing their placing their uh their votes uh uh on the right ID. And then you have you have a much deeper discussion than with normal dot for dot voting where just oh that's the the largest group, so that must be the best idea.

SPEAKER_05 41:03

But then you might have the hurting effect that everyone just follows one or they are tired.

SPEAKER_01 41:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 41:10

I like to ask groups then to point out the most irrelevant ideas.

SPEAKER_01 41:15

Wonderful, yes.

SPEAKER_05 41:17

And I and usually then they think okay, we can throw them away. And I'm like, no, stop. These are the really interesting ideas because usually they hide either overconfidence or blind spots.

SPEAKER_03 41:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 41:30

So having special attention to those that they would throw away because of irrelevance, I thought it's really helpful and it's a nice conversation trigger then.

SPEAKER_01 41:39

Yeah, and and uh that's actually in the the selection day stickers that we use. We have a unicorn which stands for the the the most unique, the most creative idea. And actually that uh works two ways. On the one hand, you have the ideas that we don't know how to realize them yet, but if we succeed, this will be very uh very helpful. This will really be a major solution, but also this is a very nice idea, but it's never gonna work. So uh wonderful that you came up with it, but we can't use it. And uh actually in in uh those dual uh signals that you can get from that uh is is kind of the same what you uh you are saying about which ideas can we uh skip in a way. That that's exactly how those uh that that sticker works also.

SPEAKER_05 42:34

Yeah, I like the unicorns.

SPEAKER_01 42:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 42:37

So how would you then go from the selection of a few or maybe one idea? Would you then still in the brainstorming session go deeper into one idea or three ideas?

SPEAKER_01 42:50

Yeah, you you you can uh do it in several ways. On the one hand, we uh we have uh we work a lot with uh uh uh canvases canvas to uh in this this way. Uh in this this case we have uh one canvas that we call the greatest hits. It's just an an A3 paper, and uh we have them choose the three best IDs, uh, the most funny idea uh so that you have something to joke about in when you're uh giving it back to the the whole group, that there are some funny stuff, also, and give them the chance to just write down which conclusions uh have you come upon in the discussion of your IDs, and what insights did you get from uh the whole exercise. And if you give them five to ten minutes just to uh fill in that uh that form, you have actually a very nice way of getting people to really boil down the best IDs from that group. And that's that's a if you have one person from the the client who can assess A little bit those ideas, and you have a facilitator who can manage the discussion with the group. That often you can do this in just five to ten minutes.

SPEAKER_05 44:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:09

All part of the selection process.

SPEAKER_05 44:11

And I imagine that then the facilitator, the table facilitator, would present it then to the planum in a kind of summary session.

SPEAKER_01 44:20

Yes, but you can understand if there are twenty-five tables and you have twenty-five sub facilitators presenting. This is taking way too long.

SPEAKER_05 44:31

So you have 80% falling into a coma.

SPEAKER_01 44:34

Yes. Yeah, exactly. This so what actually those uh uh canvases do is we have them uh we we can examine them, give them a a prolonged break for twenty twenty twenty minutes and you can walk around and just study them. Study them, pick out uh uh those ideas that really stand out.

SPEAKER_05 44:55

Then it's like a poster session.

SPEAKER_01 44:57

Yep.

SPEAKER_05 44:58

You can even combine this with a after when some drink or exactly and you need to be clear, you need to be clear about what are we going to do with your ideas.

SPEAKER_01 45:09

Make sure they know no idea is wasted, so everything will be recorded, everything uh uh gets its place in the new plan, in the new direction of the company. Somebody is going to do something with your results, even with those large groups. If you don't do that, uh well, then you get the same negative attitude towards brainstorming. If you can't see within one or two weeks what the this big brainstorm has delivered for your company, if there are no changes from that uh big brainstorm, well you're neglecting all your employees.

SPEAKER_05 45:48

Totally. And to what extent does the facilitator have a responsibility in the implementation and follow-up of a brainstorming session?

SPEAKER_01 45:59

Uh what we often try to do is to have the people who are joining uh from the organization themselves who have a role as maybe an expert or the facilitator, they need to be people who actually also need to do something with those results because then you get immediate feedback on which IDs uh need to be explored further. And uh, so if you're if you're a really smart company, uh you can really use these even short, and most of these sessions are no longer than two and a half to three hours. Oh, yeah, that's the maximum uh that you can uh uh take from such a large group, and it's a lot of energy as well. That's an enormous amount of energy, and if you have all the right people in the right place, you can really do something with those results. So we work a lot with the the client on how do you get all those people there at the right place at the right time.

SPEAKER_05 46:58

And would you then also engage in the follow-up?

SPEAKER_01 47:02

Uh yes, sometimes we do, uh, but it's more often that we uh try to make sure that the the the results are recorded in the right way. We really try to work together with the client to make sure that they have their people ready to uh to get uh to come to grips even with all the all the input they get. Yeah, because uh they really need to be aware, and that's what we really uh warn them for, also, is that you get a lot of results if you in uh with this this kind of session, and uh you really need to be prepared to invest time to uh do something with those results. Otherwise, we're not even doing uh this kind of big intervention because it's uh it's only gonna detract from us as facilitators.

SPEAKER_05 47:53

And it's a risk. So it's if the participants have the impression that their ideas or their time is disrespected, then this will result in a disengagement from their jobs or positions.

SPEAKER_01 48:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 48:07

Yeah. Um I see that time is running quickly. Um, and there's one question on my mind that I still want to ask before wrapping up. The facilitators. So, what do you think about facilitators who participate?

SPEAKER_01 48:22

Again, it's a question of style. I'll uh uh personally I never do it. Uh well, never. I I do sometimes say okay, I uh actively step out of my role as a facilitator and say maybe this could be something that you that that's helpful. But in the uh in the long run you become too involved in uh uh and too opinionated in my uh in my experience because if uh then you also almost everybody who participates also has favorites in the group that they like to uh riff IDs with, and so it becomes a more one-way street, and other people who have different different different ideas are not involved anymore. But nevertheless, sometimes people really like this. So, again, you have to uh I come back to that's one major uh development area for brain fuel, also is finding out okay, what kind of facilitator are you? In which kind of situations is this actually a good idea? Because sometimes there are clients who really love when the facilitator joins in, and uh so you uh what we're trying to do is to find out on yeah what different kinds of uh aspects can you score a facilitator. Find out what is your uh your preferred style, uh, and then if you want to you can really develop yourself in a different uh different direction. So if you know okay, there are some drawbacks in this situation to be too particip uh uh uh too involved as a facilitator in coming up with ideas. How do you learn to from who do you need to look for in our community to learn how to stay out of it? And that's actually what we uh uh what's really lovely about uh being part of a bigger facilitator group like with uh Brainfuel. You uh we actively learn from each other and really uh not only on the job but also in uh having people join in a community of practice uh with us to uh come up with new methods but also uh put to the fore what uh troubles that you have run into.

SPEAKER_05 50:49

To wrap up, yes. If you had to summarize your ideas on what w makes workshops work, what is it in a nutshell?

SPEAKER_01 51:01

Make sure that you know what the group can and will be doing. So make sure that you know uh who's there uh in your involved in your brainstorm. That's that's an important have a good idea of who uh uh who's gonna join in.

SPEAKER_05 51:22

So the last question or the uh second last question I always ask is imagine that's our a listener fell asleep after one minute and now just suddenly wakes up. What would you like him or her to remember or to pick up?

SPEAKER_01 51:39

I think the the the most important advice that I can give is if something goes wrong, don't just look at the moment it went wrong. Most of the time the problem started half an hour, one hour earlier. What did you do there? So always look what can I do to m uh to solve the problem that I had ran into in my session, uh, but also look at a half an hour, an hour before what did you do in your instruction in the way you treated people? And often that that's where the solution lies. The problem solving the problem is looking where you're uh where you don't think of looking.

SPEAKER_05 52:22

Great. And if the listeners now want to learn more, are curious, or want to get in touch with you or hire you, how can they find you?

SPEAKER_00 52:32

Brainfuel.nl and com.

SPEAKER_05 52:36

Easy as it is, and I will put it in the show notes. Thank you very much, Franz.

SPEAKER_00 52:41

Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 52:45

Thank you for staying tuned and listening to the show. I appreciate your attention as I know how busy you are. If you enjoyed it, please subscribe and engage by sharing your comments and thoughts and visit workshops.org to download the one page summary. I'm looking forward to seeing you back at the next episode, and I wish you a fruitful day.