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Facilitation Lab Podcast

Facilitation Lab Podcast

Douglas Ferguson

Welcome to the Facilitation Lab Podcast, where Douglas Ferguson, founder of facilitation academy Voltage Control, speaks with Voltage Control Certification Alumni and other facilitation experts about the remarkable impact they’re making. These discussions embrace a method-agnostic approach, so you can enjoy a wide range of topics and perspectives as we examine all the nuances of enabling meaningful group experiences. This series is dedicated to helping you navigate the realities of facilitating collaboration, ensuring every session you lead becomes truly transformative. If you’d like to join a live session sometime, you can join our Facilitation Lab Community. It’s an ideal space to apply what you learn in the podcast in real time with peers. Sign up today at voltagecontrol.com/facilitation-lab.
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Top 10 Facilitation Lab Podcast Episodes

Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best Facilitation Lab Podcast episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to Facilitation Lab Podcast for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite Facilitation Lab Podcast episode by adding your comments to the episode page.

Facilitation Lab Podcast - Episode 110: Flourishing In Times Of Transition
play

08/22/22 • 40 min

“And so the more that I looked at people outside of the ideal, this ideal that we should fail forward, this ideal that we should pivot forward, I became and remained fascinated with the notion of in that moment, when we have some kind of a catalyzing disruption or interruption, how do we get our bearings? How do we understand who we are in that and then how do we determine how we want to move forward? What are the actual steps that we take? What are the approaches that we use? What are the resources that we draw upon and how do we make sense of it?” -Joan Ball

In this episode of Control the Room, I had the pleasure of speaking with Joan Ball about her career helping organizations flourish in times of change. She starts with insights into the resources, resourcefulness, and their connection to navigating uncharted territory. Later, Joan shares how she uses Emergency Services as a metaphor to help her clients make sense of the dynamism they’re facing. We then discuss the importance of including unstructured time in our schedules. Listen in for the steps to anticipate and thrive during disruption.

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Facilitation Lab Podcast - David Sibbet: Think Visually

David Sibbet: Think Visually

Facilitation Lab Podcast

play

08/17/21 • 49 min

“ If you really listen to people and understand what's happening, if you illustrate an image that they're actually describing in their mind, [while] reflecting back maybe a sketch of what they were trying to say, people love it. People absolutely go crazy being listened to. ” -David Sibbet

In this episode of Control the Room, David Sibbet and I break down his unique career path in consulting and facilitating visual meetings and how individuals can use visual elements to amplify their learning (whether it’s navigating new tools, company projects, collaboration, etc.) . From the installation of his consulting company in the mid-70s to present day, David’s focus in design thinking continues to drive him to help companies achieve a “sophisticated level of systems thinking” in company meetings. David reflects on the components of his creation, the Group Graphics tool, and its effectiveness to help teams find focus during workshops.We examine the impact of using “clean language” in the workplace and the ability to have a metaphorical thinking mindset, which he believes can indirectly lead to inclusivity within your organization. David also shares lessons he learned through enduring the peaks and valleys of decision-making when working with past clients. We conclude by taking a closer look at his passion project and non-profit organization, the Global Learning & Exchange Network (GLEN) and the responsibility we must uphold to build a better world for humanity on both local and global levels. Listen in to hear David’s perspective on leading with a visual mindset to thrive in your organization.

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"I think it's about finding, as an individual, what recovery methods work for you and how you are able to carve that out in your own unique schedule."

-Ceili Cascarano

Sleep seems to be a perpetually tricky routine to land, and it’s one of the most important pillars of our overall health–it affects everything from our immune systems to our cognitive function. Listen in as I, your host Douglas Ferguson, discuss this and more with Ceili Cascarano on Episode 4 of the Control the Room Podcast.

Ceili is currently the co-founder and CEO of Somn, a digital sleep expert that helps people tackle their unique sleep issues. Somn brings clarity to the world of sleep. Without individuals understanding why they can't sleep, they aren't able to come up with a solution that works. Somn helps people navigate their sleep journeys and assists them in their sleep process.

Ceili has over ten years of experience in Big 50 corporate healthcare America where she worked on large national brands. She has recently worked in corporate innovation, where she helps build partnerships between Somn and other companies with a good product-market fit.

In today’s episode, Ceili and I talk about how sleep impacts daily function, different approaches people are taking for individual recovery, and how your daily routine can affect your quality of sleep. We discuss the emotional and physical benefits of exercise, how to speed up the decision-making process in meetings, and why you should never go into a meeting without knowing the purpose of the meeting.

Show Highlights

[01:13] Ceilie’s corporate marketing and innovation experience.

[03:39] The factors that create a market for Somn.

[07:08] The effect of sleep when facilitating meetings.

[10:14] Science-driven resources and solutions to achieve quality sleep.

[13:33] The ability to remove yourself from everyday situations gives your mind space for creativity.

[18:45] The power of a good-enough-to-go viewpoint.

[22:43] Accommodation of structured breaks throughout your day.

[27:35] Ceili on being a good leader.

[30:30] Owning your power in meetings and taking responsibility for your actions.

[33:00] How to take the Somn assessment.

Links and Resources

Ceili on Linked In

Somn on the web

About the Guest

Ceili is currently the co-founder and CEO of Somn, a digital sleep expert that helps people tackle their unique sleep issues. She is a strategist and business builder with 13+ years experience managing established brands and emerging innovations in CPG, healthcare and healthtech. Ceili spent over 10 years at Fortune 50 companies, and she has worked most recently in corporate venture capital, assessing new verticals, products, technologies, and business models for investment and growth. She has experience as a commercial leader and P&L owner for LISTERINE® and TYLENOL®.

About Voltage Control

Voltage Control is a facilitation agency that helps teams work better together with custom-designed meetings and workshops, both in-person and virtual. Our master facilitators offer trusted guidance and custom coaching to companies who want to transform ineffective meetings, reignite stalled projects, and cut through assumptions. Based in Austin, Voltage Control designs and leads public and private workshops that range from small meetings to large conference-style gatherings.

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Contact Voltage Control

Intro: Welcome to the Control the Room Podcast, a series devoted to the exploration of meeting culture and uncovering cures for the common meeting. Some meetings have tight control, and others are loose. To control the room means achieving outcomes while striking a balance between imposing and removing structure, asserting and distributing power, leaning in and leaning out, all in the service of having a truly magical meeting.

Douglas: Really excited to have Ceili Cascarano on the show today. She is the CEO and co-founder of Somn, and Somn was created to help people navigate the mysterious world of sleep.

Welcome to the show, Ceili.

Ceili: Thanks for having me.

Douglas: Let's kick it off with a little bit about how you got your start and a little bit more about Somn.

Ceili: Great. ...

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Facilitation Lab Podcast - Episode 100: Design For Change In Higher Education
play

06/13/22 • 49 min

“I don't know whether teacher change issues are any more difficult than others. It's just where I have experience. I think any time you're working on... I mean, you know this. People sort of like the idea of change. They just don't want to. And anytime you're working with really talented experts, human beings accustomed to tremendous autonomy, that's a really difficult room. And so the challenge for... In the educational technology version of me, the challenge was people realized that to use this technology well, they had to teach differently. And that forces all sorts of questions, not about practice necessarily, but about identity. I was like, oh, wait a minute. I thought I was pretty good at what I did. And now, maybe I'm entertaining the possibility that I could be better. And working through those identity issues, I think are really difficult.” -Jeff Grabill

In this episode of Control the Room, I had the pleasure of speaking with Erik Skogsberg, Sarah Gretter, and Jeff Grabill about their experience helping Higher Education organizations with design more impactful learning experiences. They share a handful of the unique challenges of designing change in Higher Education as well as similarities with other change initiatives. Later, they share how to create the conditions for sustainable longterm change within organizations. We then discuss the importance of having a shared vocabulary to help all the stakeholders communicate during change initiatives. Listen in for Michael’s interesting thoughts on the criteria all high-performing teams meet.

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Facilitation Lab Podcast - Preview

Preview

Facilitation Lab Podcast

play

04/29/20 • 1 min

Coming soon. Subscribe now.

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Facilitation Lab Podcast - Sarabeth Berk: Are You a Hybrid Thinker?
play

12/01/20 • 36 min

“Through my continued research, I realized there's a way you can blend and merge identities. And actually that's your truest form of yourself when you're in the intersections of multiple identities. And that's the hybrid.” Sarabeth Berk

Sarabeth Berk, Chief Creative Disruptor of More Than My Title, is a researcher and innovation strategist demystifying the human experience. She is known for her research on the hybrid professional - people with multiple professional identities who integrate talents together and bring unique value to employers and clients.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Sarabeth about the professional identity crisis that inspired her research on the hybrid professional, the increasing demand for hybrids in the job market, and how you can network to learn someone’s identity rather than their position. Listen in to find out if you might be a hybrid professional.

Show Highlights

[0:59] Sarabeth’s professional identity crisis

[6:25] Jobs of the future will always become commonplace

[16:17] Emerging hybrids vs established hybrids

[23:00] Identity work & being seen

[26:25] Gaining clarity of self through misunderstanding

[31:21] How to network with identity in mind

Links | Resources

Sarabeth on LinkedIn

More Than My Title

Are You a Hybrid Professional? Sarabeth’s TEDx Talk

About the Guest

Sarabeth Berk is a creative disruptor and innovation strategist who demystifies the human experience. As a researcher, she is known for her research on the hybrid professional - people with multiple professional identities who integrate talents together and bring unique value to employers and clients. Sarabeth is currently the Chief Creative Disruptor of More Than My Title, a professional coaching agency in Denver, CO that helps clients discover their truest professional identity.

About Voltage Control

Voltage Control is a facilitation agency that helps teams work better together with custom-designed meetings and workshops, both in-person and virtual. Our master facilitators offer trusted guidance and custom coaching to companies who want to transform ineffective meetings, reignite stalled projects, and cut through assumptions. Based in Austin, Voltage Control designs and leads public and private workshops that range from small meetings to large conference-style gatherings.

Share An Episode of Control The Room

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Android

Stitcher

Engage Control The Room

Voltage Control on the Web

Contact Voltage Control

Intro: Welcome to the Control the Room Podcast, a series devoted to the exploration of meeting culture and uncovering cures for the common meeting. Some meetings have tight control, and others are loose. To control the room means achieving outcomes while striking a balance between imposing and removing structure, asserting and distributing power, leaning in and leaning out, all in the service of having a truly magical meeting.

Douglas: Today I’m with Dr. Sarabeth Berk. Dr. Sarabeth Berk is a hybrid professional, who also researches hybrid professional identity. She’s also the author of More Than My Title. Welcome to the show, Sarabeth.

Sarabeth: I’m so glad to be here. Thanks, Douglas.

Douglas: So, tell us a little bit about how you got started in this work you do, this notion of hybrid professional identity. Where did that even come from?

Sarabeth: Yeah. It's been a wild journey, and it really started with that age-old question: What do you do? And I was going through my own career-change transition and trying to figure out what my next move was. And when people asked me, “What do you do?” I just struggled. I didn't know who I was. I wanted to be seen as more than my current job, and at that point, I was a teacher, and I was ready to break out. I wanted to transform systems and do more strategy and design and innovation work. And so essentially, I was having a professional-identity crisis. I didn't know who I was.

And that led me onto this big research journey and interviewing a lot of people and starting to understand, what is this notion of professional identity? We just don't talk about it. And I looked at existing research. But what was fascinating to me the most was when I talked to other people, I thought they had it f...

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Facilitation Lab Podcast - Mariano Battan: Insist on Celebration During Challenging Times
play

09/29/20 • 40 min

“Make moments of fun, of celebration, and acknowledging that we're all accomplishing good things together. And micro celebrations and bigger celebrations and learn how to celebrate remotely.” Mariano Suarez-Battan

In this episode, I’m very pleased to be speaking with Mariano Battan, CEO & Co-Founder of MURAL, a digital workspace that we at Voltage Control love to use both internally and for design sprints. Mariano says he loves to dream about new things, and sometimes he can make them come true.

Listen in to find out the power of purposeful silence, how to power up your team’s imagination at work, and why you should be blocking out time for kids and coffee.

Show Highlights

[5:10] Multi-threaded thinking in the digital realm

[12:35] Blocking time for kids and coffee

[17:56] Powering up imagination at work

[26:09] Making space for celebration

[32:56] Purposeful silence

[37:12] Micro-celebrations, remotely

Links | Resources

MURAL

Mariano on LinkedIn

Mariano on Twitter

About the Guest

Mariano Suarez-Battan is the CEO and Co-founder of MURAL, a digital workspace for visual collaboration. He is accelerating innovation by providing facilitators with the tools and inspiration that they need to make global change. Before MURAL, Mariano created video games through his studio, Three Melons, which was acquired by Disney in 2010.

About Voltage Control

Voltage Control is a facilitation agency that helps teams work better together with custom-designed meetings and workshops, both in-person and virtual. Our master facilitators offer trusted guidance and custom coaching to companies who want to transform ineffective meetings, reignite stalled projects, and cut through assumptions. Based in Austin, Voltage Control designs and leads public and private workshops that range from small meetings to large conference-style gatherings.

Share An Episode of Control The Room

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Android

Stitcher

Engage Control The Room

Voltage Control on the Web

Contact Voltage Control

Intro: Welcome to the Control the Room Podcast, a series devoted to the exploration of meeting culture and uncovering cures for the common meeting. Some meetings have tight control, and others are loose. To control the room means achieving outcomes while striking a balance between imposing and removing structure, asserting and distributing power, leaning in and leaning out, all in the service of having a truly magical meeting.

Douglas: Today I’m with Mariano Battan. Mariano’s the co-founder and CEO of MURAL. He’s on a mission to inspire, enhance, and connect imagination workers so that they can collaborate and problem solve wherever they may be. Welcome to the show, Mariano.

Mariano: Hello, Doug. And glad to be here.

Douglas: I'm really curious, Mariano. How did you get your start working in this field of bringing remote workers together to collaborate and do this imagine work and found a company to do that? It’s amazing.

Mariano: It is. And I was fortunate to be a mobile or remote worker. Ten years ago, I had a video-games company, and that company ultimately got acquired by Disney. So I was working for Disney. I'm from Argentina originally, but I was in the Mountain View office quite often. So I was “remote” because I was not really remote; I was just, like, distributed right? So my programming team was in Argentina. I was mostly in the U.S. I was designing a new game called Emotions. I was using Keynote to collect inspiration, and we can go further into the problem, but that sparked the idea of having an online space that felt more like a whiteboard, felt more like a project room. That's how we started 10 years ago already.

Douglas: Yeah, it's amazing. You know, I watched your presentation from MURAL Imagine recently, and you were sharing how you got your start using PowerPoint, or just reflecting on how you use it and how that helps you collect your thoughts. And it really, the light bulb went off for me, because we always talk about prototypes can be anything that we bring together to help visualize our ideas. And so we often talk about how PowerPoint can be a prototype. And so MURAL, in a way, is a tool to help build prototype or ideas and present them.

Mariano: Definitely a tool in a space to make space as we call ...

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Facilitation Lab Podcast - Episode 109: Discerning What’s Needed In The Moment
play

08/15/22 • 45 min

“But the thing that I hear the most from the students is that they're afraid that they're not going to know how to help. They're going to stand up in front of their peers and say, "I'm here to help you guide you through this, A3 problem solving workout or this kaizen, but at the core of it, I'm really just got this structure that I'm following. I'm afraid I'm going to sound like a robot or I'm going to be like, 'We are in current state. We are in root cause analysis'." Because they're learning the structure, they don't feel natural in it. And that is totally what I went through. But I knew I had that cheat sheet of the structure next to me so I could look down at it. And maybe what my practice was is just to feel more comfortable knowing that I don't know exactly and I've got to kind of follow a guide.” -Lori Serna

In this episode of Control the Room, I had the pleasure of speaking withLori Serna about her career leading business transformation initiatives at Cal Poly. She starts with tips on how to facilitate transformation at a large organization. Later, Lori explores common fears that facilitators share during transformation work. We then discuss the nuts and bolts of Lean and Kaizen Methodologies. Listen in for insight that spans industries.

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Facilitation Lab Podcast - Episode 108: Change Imposed Is Change Opposed
play

08/08/22 • 39 min

“But what we don't realize is that it's actually our job to help manage change. And it's our job to give people a vision that helps them get to the other side of change. So, so often we just tell people, you need to change. We never tell them why. And we don't give them a vision for the future. And we don't ask them to come alongside of us and help build that future together. We oftentimes, change feels like it's happening to me and change imposed is changed opposed. So we're going to oppose anything that's imposed on us.” -Natalie Born

In this episode of Control the Room, I had the pleasure of speaking with Natalie Born about her role as VP of Innovation at Territory Global. She shares how an interest in negotiating influenced her career path. Later, Natalie explores topics running from emotional journeys and change, to groud rules and burnout. We then discuss the importance of developing a rest ethic. Listen in to learn all about giving people a vision that helps them get to the other side of change.

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Facilitation Lab Podcast - Nancy Giordano: Strategic Awareness and Leadership in Partnerism
play

02/08/21 • 36 min

“ That playbook is completely outdated, and it's dangerous. If you applied a 20th century mindset to a 21st century world, we're going to be much more hurt. How can we think about a way in which business and society can thrive together? We have to exist in a place of constant learning, a place of much more caring, and a place where we think about long-term value creation as opposed to short-term profitability growth ”

Nancy Giordano is a strategic futurist, an author, and the founder of Play Big Inc. Her focus and vision bleed into PBI’s own initiatives, where they focus on helping enterprise leaders meet the escalating expectations of a fast changing world.

In this episode of Control the Room, I speak with Nancy about updating strategic efforts, machine learning, and the tools meeting planners have at their disposal in bettering their teams’ success. Listen in to hear Nancy break down the importance of bringing a relevant strategy to multi-faceted, complex teams.

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FAQ

How many episodes does Facilitation Lab Podcast have?

Facilitation Lab Podcast currently has 155 episodes available.

What topics does Facilitation Lab Podcast cover?

The podcast is about Management, Podcasts, Self-Improvement, Education and Business.

What is the most popular episode on Facilitation Lab Podcast?

The episode title 'Episode 110: Flourishing In Times Of Transition' is the most popular.

What is the average episode length on Facilitation Lab Podcast?

The average episode length on Facilitation Lab Podcast is 41 minutes.

How often are episodes of Facilitation Lab Podcast released?

Episodes of Facilitation Lab Podcast are typically released every 7 days.

When was the first episode of Facilitation Lab Podcast?

The first episode of Facilitation Lab Podcast was released on Apr 29, 2020.

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