Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: facilitators role in meeting.

[Rob Sandelin (robsan]

 Catherine McCarthy  wrote: One of my personal biases here
would be to find someone who is knowledgeable about the issues you are
facing - facilitators can be extremely useful sources of information or can
conversely not understand many key issues and not be as effective as they
could be.


I have wondered about this.  In what little I know of facilitation I 
always thought the facilitator was in charge of the meeting Process so 
the participants could focus on the meeting Content.  I also learned 
somewhere along the way that facilitators need to be 100% nuetral on 
the issue on the floor or their personal bias jepordizes their role.  
If the facilitator holds important information on the topic wouldn't 
this set them up for bias and therefore put them in a position of 
taking sides?  I  have worked with outside facilitators who had no idea 
of the subject and they very capabily ran the meeting process.  I have 
also worked with facilitators  who came from within and which I felt 
pushed a group towards a certain direction and in so doing, created a 
trust problem.

Comments?


Rob Sandelin
Sharingwood