Facilitation

Steve Epner is a highly qualified workshop facilitator who is capable of assisting groups in gaining the most value from meetings and retreats. The best facilitators are almost invisible, helping a group to identify and resolve differences, reach consensus (where appropriate), and establish goals, tasks, deliverables, and execution plans.

Retreats can be for strategic issues (identifying the big questions and proposing responses) or for innovation (finding ways to get around roadblocks in the marketplace). Group meetings can help resolve differences, create alignment within management, or work on organizational structure. Steve has had experience handling each of these types of issues and many more.

If you need to have an important discussion with one of your teams, Steve can help you plan a successful meeting or retreat. Meetings can last a couple of hours or a couple of days. Steve has expertise in Open Space as well as small and large group meetings.

Strategy sessions are based on Steve’s MBA program, Corporate Entrepreneurship. The goal is to encourage successful entrepreneurship within organizations. It often starts with a detailed look at who you are, where you are, where you want to be, and then working on how to get there successfully.

Five-step methodology

The methodology has five main steps, which will vary in total duration depending on the complexity, urgency, and external forces that have created the existing situation. The five steps are:

• Review of your business history and the definition of the situations to be attacked.
• Interview key members of the team to gain perspective.
• Prepare an innovation meeting and invite appropriate personnel with an explanation of what will be expected of them.
• Conduct a facilitated process of discovery to diagnose the problems, prioritize the issues to be worked on, find solutions (from simple to creative to unique), and establish plans to manage them to success.
• Provide follow up and follow through assistance to insure success.

For the small and medium-size businesses with new challenges, innovation can result in business growth and competitiveness. When done during profitable times, it can lessen the impact of any changes in the market place. Innovation can reduce, or even eliminate, situations that might otherwise cause disruption and business stress.