The Goal Isn’t to Eliminate Tension

Context

There’s been a bit of a disconnect lately.

The federal government sets ambitious goals and fast-tracks approvals, but concerns about implementation remain.

First Nations chiefs didn’t feel their meeting with Carney on the Building Canada Act was a success and the 68 communities that’ll host nation-building projects may lack the necessary skilled workers to begin construction.

The mood appears to be one of heightened federal-provincial tensions mixed with cautious cooperation.

It’s had us reflecting on the role conversational architecture plays in bridging ambition and execution.

“As a facilitator, I’ve seen firsthand how the quality of a conversation can shape the outcome of a decision. When I read about implementation risks like these, my first thought isn’t about governance—it’s about dialogue design.”
—Kate Rootman, Senior Strategist, Opus Group

Insight

When communication breaks down under complexity, strong facilitation holds the conversation together.

A good facilitator knows that the goal isn't to eliminate tension, it is to make it productive.

Facilitation is a critical, often under recognized function in public systems, especially in high-stakes situations that require engaging multiple groups with different interests.

We see it as the art of running good meetings, when in fact it is about developing conversational architecture for all levels of critical communication, and especially for negotiations.

Better facilitation helps when:

• Cross-sector collaboration doesn’t stick
• Stakeholders are disengaged
• Meetings feel performative
• Teams spin in ambiguity

Insight in Practice

To make room for strategic facilitation, start with awareness of what usually prevents it:

• Leaders are in the problem.
  Leaders are part of the system they’re trying to change. It’s hard to both contribute and facilitate at the same time. An external facilitator brings neutrality, distance, and structure.

• No one takes the time to design the container.
  Great facilitation requires careful design — clear purpose, structured flow, and intentional framing. Most teams are too deep in delivery to step back and design that architecture.

• Facilitators need to listen without defending.
  In high-pressure roles, it’s hard to truly hear feedback or opposition. When you’re focused on protecting your position, you can’t fully process what others are saying.

That’s why, when change needs to happen fast, governments and mission-driven organizations often bring in neutral third-party facilitators to guide high-stakes conversations.

But however you choose to approach facilitation, building it into big, ambitious plans can be the difference between successful and unsuccessful implementation.

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Perspectives

Big plans require collective intelligence, and it turns out the smartest groups aren't the loudest, but the most balanced.

An MIT Center for Collective Intelligence research found that groups have a measurable "collective intelligence factor" that predicts performance across diverse tasks. Among the main predictors was the distribution of conversational turn-taking, a crucial part of effective facilitation.

“Like individual general intelligence, group collective intelligence is important for predicting the group’s future performance.”—Anita Williams Woolley, Evidence from a collective intelligence factor in the performance of human groups.

Effective facilitation is possible even in large-scale meetings.

When ManagerJam organized a 48 hour meeting of over 8,000 managers in large global technology companies, they made sure each of six simultaneous forums were supported by its own facilitation team.

Facilitation teams were carefully trained and organized by small groups. During the event, facilitators were supported with real-time coaching to maintain focus and energy.

In the case study, you can find guidelines for effective team facilitation of very large-scale meetings, and design implications for meeting support systems.

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Question to Consider

Where in your work could better facilitation improve the process and speed up progress?

Quote of The Week

“Facilitation is about helping people stay with the discomfort long enough to discover something new.”
— Jennifer Garvey Berger