The work we do at IDEO is pretty dang hard. Not just for me or for us, but for our clients and partners, too. Clients often come to us because they want to do something very, very different than what they’ve done before. That kind of work is exciting, but it’s also incredibly vulnerable. You don’t usually have a big, flashing arrow pointing towards a sign that says “THIS IDEA WILL TOTALLY WORK.” You don’t always have the benefit of historical data or large sample sizes or incremental improvement over a long period of time. To build something new, you have to be willing to step into the void. And being scary is kind of the void’s whole thing. 

At IDEO, we live in the void. And our work is about inviting our clients to join us there, starting the very first time we meet them. We’ve learned some lessons over the years about how to take a room of people we’ve never met before and turn it into an environment that encourages folks to take risks and open up. To quickly and thoughtfully build the kind of rapport and collaborative muscles needed to break through the wall of inertia that confronts any truly innovative idea

So, here are some tips and tricks for facilitating a meeting/workshop/offsite/Zoom call to build the psychological safety amongst teams that enables wild leaps forward. 

Start Off Strong

Open with a Joke (Maybe) — If you’re playing a “host” role, your earliest interactions with folks will introduce them to the energy and tone of the gathering. If you seem authentic and calm, others will mimic you. The goal here is, just like your mom would tell you, to be yourself. So if you’re a jokester, crack a joke. If you’re not, then don’t! But do let the people in the room get a sense of who you are from the very beginning. It gives them permission to do the same, which makes it easier to get past the rehearsed, rote ways of interacting that limit a group’s ability to think big. 

Credential Just Enough — When we introduce ourselves to a room of new faces, we walk a bit of a tightrope. We don’t want to spend too much time talking about ourselves, but we do want people to feel like they’re in good hands. When introducing yourself, instead of just saying your title and how excited you are to be there, add in 1-3 facts about your past experience, perspective, or expertise that will make people feel confident that you’ve helped people like them do something like this before. 

Get People Playing — After we’ve set the tone and introduced ourselves, the very next thing we often do is ask everyone in the room to join in what I like to call “structured fun.” We like doing this because, well, people like to have fun. But also because it asks folks to put down their serious-person armor, so they are freer to explore and play, to defer judgement, and to experience everyone in the room on an even playing field. It gives us a chance to say, “we want and need you to bring a different side of yourself to this experience” than they might otherwise. Innovation requires us to put down our intellectual defenses so that ideas have a chance to grow before we cut them down. Beginning with play helps ease folks into that mode.

 → Learn more about our practices for warming up here

Get Into It

Show You’re Listening — As a facilitator, you should be listening so actively that your Oura ring thinks you’re mountain biking. The most basic format of active listening is the Very Intent Head Nod™️. More usefully, it can show up in three different kinds of behaviors: serving as the connective tissue between ideas; challenging and provoking new ways of thinking (politely); and inspiring and extending others’ ideas (humbly). You should strive to deepen the conversation and channel its momentum through active listening. 

• Connective Tissue might sound like: “That relates to what Kermit was saying before about….” or “Fozzie, that touches on the work your team has been doing. What would you add?” 
• Challenge and Provoke might sound like: “Your point is a bit counter to what we just agreed on. How do you square those two ideas?” or “I heard that slightly differently. Here was my interpretation… What do you think?” 
• Inspire and Extend might sound like: “What I love about that idea is xyz.  How else have you made xyz work?” or “I’m really interested in what you said about abc. Can you go a little deeper there?”

Admit When You Don’t Know — There will undoubtedly come a time when you’ll be asked a question you think you should be able to answer and you simply can’t. You, the facilitator of this moment, are motivated to look like an expert and reassure the room that they haven’t made a mistake in trusting you. Your impulse might be to softshoe around the question with a non-answer, or to say something that sounds vaguely correct. But the most trust-building thing you can do at this moment is to admit that you don’t know. I said “admit” but it shouldn’t be a shameful act. Releasing yourself from needing to be the expert opens up new avenues for others to contribute. 

• This might sound like: “I’m not an expert there. Does anyone else have a perspective to share?” 
• Or: “That’s not my area of depth, but I would love to introduce you to Gonzo who has tons of experience with that exact question”
• Or: “I can’t tell you off the top of my head but let me write myself a note to look into it and get back to you ASAP.”

Celebrate Every Contribution —  When we ask people to work in new, vulnerable ways, it’s our responsibility to help them feel successful while they’re doing it. This isn’t about handing out participation trophies. It’s about acknowledging the bravery and generosity of speaking up when it would be easier not to. Helping people feel valuable is an important element of creating a culture where creative risks can be taken. 

• This might sound like: “That’s a great point, thank you for raising it.” 
• Or: “The thing that really resonated with me about what you just said is…”
• Or: “You’re helping me think about this differently, thank you. Anyone else?”

Close With Intention

Synthesize Live — As a facilitator, there is real power in being able to take everything that was shared in a meeting — all the ideas, questions, tangents, and wormholes-gone-down — and distill them into a few salient takeaways. Some people have a natural knack for this; others have ChatGPT. If you can get to the end of a working session and say, “Here’s what I think are the most important things we discussed today… What did I miss?” you give the room a “low fidelity prototype” of the key takeaways. From there, people can confirm or complicate your summary. The magic is in getting tangible in the moment and giving people space to react. 

Check Out, Don’t Fizzle — In our “what have you done for me lately” culture, it can be easy to get to the end of an energizing, productive working session and already be looking to the next thing on your calendar. But we believe there’s real value in closing the container that you’ve just created. Saving time to check out of a session can give you important clues about how the ideas and conversations you just shared are sitting with people, and help you figure out the right next steps. 

• This might look like: Going around the room and having each person share one word that describes how they’re feeling leaving the space 
• Or: Leaving 10 minutes at the end to do a “Hopes and Fears” exercise 
• Or: Having everyone turn to a partner and share something they heard in the session that changed their thinking  

These are some of our tried and true tricks. What are other ways you’ve facilitated a space that encourages wild thinking? I’d love to hear. Hit me up :)