Myriam HadnesFounder and CEO, workshops.work · Behavioural Economist | workshops.work | Host of the Unprofessionalism & workshops work Podcasts

Is it our Job to Make Things Easy? #shorts

26 Jul 2022 · 1 min

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0:48

In this YouTube short, the speaker clarifies a common misunderstanding of facilitation. Although the word "facilitation" derives from the Latin "facile" (easy), the speaker argues that a facilitator's role is not to eliminate difficulty but to deliberately introduce modest, well‑scaled challenges. These challenges help groups achieve their objectives, grow beyond individual contributions, and retain what they learn. The speaker likens this to learning processes, video games, and child development, where a small, appropriately difficult obstacle makes an activity engaging without causing frustration. Consequently, facilitators are portrayed as "challenge makers" who add just enough difficulty to keep work interesting and productive.

Chapters

Just because facilitation means making it easy, from the Latin word facile, doesn't mean that it's our task to make everything easy. It's actually in the challenges that we help the group to achieve the goal and to grow larger than their parts. It's like in learning: if we're just receiving everything very easily, then we won't retain the content. And it's the same in video games or in any games that we play. That's how children learn. It's the small challenge that is just difficult enough to make it interesting and not too difficult so that it will remain frustrating. So facilitators are actually challenge makers who add a little bit of difficulty.