Let me continue to write about my learning from the recent offsite meeting experience. See this first post for background.
My 2nd piece of learning - Take note when you facilitate discussion! Or I would say - Whist this blog is called 'Ask, Not Tell', my learning is 'Not Only Ask Question, But Also Take Note.' OK, let me tell you how I learnt this from the offsite meeting experience.
Like most team building event, I ran a team game. It is called 'Broken Square' and its main aim is to bring out the importance of 'sharing'. It went very well. During the debrief session, the participants were stimulated to voice out their thoughts on 'sharing' e.g.
'Why should we share?' (This is the first question they asked after I gave the instruction. A powerful question for debrief purpose!) 'We got to understand what the common goal is before we can all work toward it.' 'They (a sub-team) refused to share, after they have completed their own square.'
I was very excited with all these thoughts flowing around the room. After a while, we moved to the debrief question linking back to the real work. The question is 'How are the challenges just now similar to yours at work?' This was also the time when I gave them the pre-event survey result. The purpose was to make them feel safer to give tough comment. We did have some good discussion on some key team issues at real work. Just that we could do better…..
I knew that there were some more insights which I could bring it up. But… I forgot…. What a pity!!
I should have taken note on the key insights gained from the team game before we linked the discussion back to work. No need to be a lot. 3-5 key points would be enough. Preferably record their statements or questions (about the game) in exact wording. In the subsequent discussion on the real team issues, I can then quote these statements or questions to further stimulate their thoughts.
When you facilitate, there are just too many things for your mind to work on e.g. processing the comment, highlighting the key points, thinking of next question, thinking how to ask that question…. Less ‘CPU’ is left for memory. So, got to take note!! It sounds basic but it is important.
让我继续分享我从最近offsite meeting 中学习到的地方，如果你需要知道多一点背景，你可以点击这里查看上一篇文章。 我第二件学习到的东西是 – 我应该在引导讨论时做笔记！让我告诉你我是如何从哪个会议中体会做笔记的重要。
如同大多数团队建设活动，我让他们做了一个团体游戏，基本上他们需要每一小组也组成一个正方图形，活动的目的是带出主动共享资源的重要性。 活动进行得挺顺利，而在事后检讨讨论时，他们也被激发说出不少关于主动共享资源的想法，例如：
'为什么要共享？ ' （这是当我介绍活动时他们提出的第一个问题，这是一个对以后讨论非常有用的问题！ ） '我们必须先了解共同目标是什么，我们大家才可以一起努力实现它。’ '当他们（小组）完成他们自己的正方形后，他们就拒绝贡献了。’
我对他们能提出那么多的问题与想法感到非常雀跃。在往后的讨论环节，我们把主题带回工作上，例如，我问他们‘刚才大家碰上的挑战跟工作上的有什么相似的地方？’。我也是在这个时刻派发那问券结果，目的是让他们更愿意发言。我们在这环节也真的讨论到一些真实工作上的主要问题，只是，我相信我们这个讨论可以更高效的….
我知道是有更多的题目我可以带出来让他们讨论的，只是我忘记了，真可惜！
我是应该把活动后的检讨重点记下来，不需要写下很多东西，3到5个重点就可以，最好是把他们亲口说的意见或问题原话写下来，在之后的工作讨论时，我就可以用这些话激发他们对现实问题的讨论。
当我们在引导讨论的时候，我们的脑袋实在要同时处理太多的工作，例如：思考他们的发言，抽取其中重点，准备下一条问题，思考如何发问，等等，比起平时我们的记忆力会差一点，所以我们应该做笔记，这虽然听上去很基本，却是十分重要！
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