SessionLab

Looking for a little meeting-wrecking inspo? 😈 Here are 5 ways to make your meetings worse: - Turn up with no agenda: surprises help build character - Have zero outcome in mind: let the conversation wander! - Invite everyone, but send the calendar invite… the morning of the meeting - Schedule it at the most inconvenient time possible. 7am before the coffee hits is ideal. Or 4.45 pm with a note saying it will only take 15 minutes 😈 - End with “let’s circle back” and no next steps If you’ve ever sat through one of these, you’re not alone. What would you add to the list? (Bonus points for painfully real stories.) #Meetings #Facilitation #WorkshopDesign #Leadership #RemoteWork

You've booked the workshop. The facilitator is great. The session goes well. And then… not much changes. This is one of the central tensions the 2026 State of Facilitation report uncovered: over 70% of facilitators reflect regularly after sessions, but only one in three track whether anything actually shifted in the long run. The gap rarely comes down to facilitation quality. High-impact facilitation is a shared responsibility between the people designing and running sessions, and the people commissioning and supporting them. In response to the challenges highlighted in the State of Facilitation report, we’ve put together a practical guide to help you reflect on and strengthen the impact of your work. The guide covers three connected dimensions: ⚡ Designing for impact: facilitation should not be seen in isolation. This section looks at scoping conversations and how to co-create sessions designed for impact, not just vibes. 📊 Monitoring impact: what changed? Compared to what? How do we know? How can we measure the unmeasurable and count the uncountable? 📣 Communicating impact: so the value of facilitation reaches beyond the people already in the room, and becomes visible inside the organisation. What stories will you tell and how? Whether you're a facilitator looking to strengthen your practice or a leader who wants to make the most of the sessions you invest in, this is a practical read. Download it here: https://lnkd.in/dXmV7tDb If it resonates, pass it along to someone who'd find it useful. #Facilitation #LearningAndDevelopment #Leadership

When people talk about culture, it can come across a bit vague: values on a wall, a slide within a strategy deck, some nice words that perhaps aren’t put into practice or revisited. Team culture is something everyone agrees is important, but hard to actually implement or change. What we love about Gustavo Razzetti’s work is that he makes culture practical. Culture becomes something you can map, explore and work on together in a session, through tools like: Culture Design Canvas → to understand and shape your team culture https://lnkd.in/eijzrqUk Core Values Canvas → to define what really matters (beyond the nice words 😇 ) https://lnkd.in/e3nBcbDW Team Purpose Canvas → to align around why you exist as a team https://lnkd.in/edhCdFWc Uncover the Stinky Fish → to surface the things no one is saying https://lnkd.in/eN5aqfZS Map Participation Styles → to understand how people actually show up https://lnkd.in/eThkSiGb The canvases and instructions give structure to conversations that are either avoided, rushed or left unclear. If you’re working with teams on alignment, navigating an organisational change or improving your ways of working, these are worth exploring. 👉 Explore Gustavo’s methods in the SessionLab Library: https://lnkd.in/en5UZr7h Have you used any of these? How do you make culture tangible in your work? If Gustavo’s work has helped you design better sessions, share your appreciation in the comments!

Can you think of a learning moment you still remember because someone told a story? A trainer might open their session by sharing a personal story, something from early in their career, maybe, when they made some blunder or rookie mistake. The room probably laughed. And everyone immediately understood the point. That’s what good stories do: they help people connect ideas to situations they recognise. But many trainers and facilitators struggle with: - finding the right story for the moment - structuring it so it flows naturally - telling it in a way that lands with the group If that sounds familiar, join a free 2-hour masterclass on March 31, 3 PM CET / 10 AM ET with trainer of trainers and epic storyteller, Mirna Smidt You’ll explore the core elements that make stories memorable, see practical examples, and leave with tips you can use in your next workshop, training, or talk. RSVP here: https://lnkd.in/eyE_fkCM

Good storytellers can take something abstract and make it feel familiar. You could explain a concept clearly, step by step. Or you could describe a moment people recognise, the tension, the uncertainty, the small details that make it real. In facilitation and training, stories help bridge the gap between ideas and real situations. They make content easier to relate to, reflect on, and apply. We’re hosting a free 2-hour masterclass with Mirna Smidt on March 31 (3 PM CET / 10 AM ET). You’ll explore what makes stories memorable, see practical examples, and leave with ideas you can use in your next workshop, training, or talk. RSVP here 👇 https://lnkd.in/eyE_fkCM

Finding facilitation activities just got a lot easier. 💚 You can now explore author profiles in the SessionLab Library. That means you can: ✨ Discover methods and templates by creator Looking for two wins and one wish from Jan Keck’s methods to melt the ice? Improv-inspired activities from Erica Marx? Want to explore team-building templates from MeetingMakers or tools from Hyper Island? You’ll now find individual methods and ready-to-use templates in one place, connected to the people and organisations who created them. ✨ See clear attribution, upfront Every public method and template clearly shows who created it. That means better credit, more visibility for facilitators and clearer context when you reuse and share their work. ✨ Build your professional presence Publish methods and templates in the Library and turn your author profile into a searchable portfolio. A place where people can explore your approach and the work you’re known for. Want your work featured? Create your author profile and start publishing to the Library. Here’s how 👇 https://buff.ly/qPw5QIR #Facilitation #SessionLab #WorkshopDesign #LearningAndDevelopment photo credit to Silvia Bobariu - showing the excellent team of facilitators from IAF Romania team who organised the IAF EME - Why I love Facilitation conference in 2025.

When you picture a corporate meeting, what comes to mind? A big table. Laptops open. People talking (but not always listening) It doesn’t have to be that way, as facilitators, we know there are many ways to make a bland meeting feel engaging. Play isn’t separate from the “serious work”. It’s often what helps people think more openly, see things differently, and actually take part in the meeting! That’s the idea behind Gamestorming—and now Gamestorming 2.0!—founded by Dave Gray and Sunni (Sun) Brown They have co-created a collection of structured, play-based facilitation methods designed to help teams explore challenges, generate ideas and move forward together. Gamestorming is one of many method collections in the SessionLab Library. We curate techniques and tools from practitioners and organisations, so you can find and reuse them easily. Gamestorming’s methods are not “games” for the sake of it, but practical tools that help teams think and work better. Adding play can help people develop skills and view problems from a different perspective. Here are a few activities from Gamestorming 2.0 that we love: - The Anti-Problem → surfaces ideas by flipping a problem on its head. - I Notice, I Wonder, It reminds me of → turns ordinary objects into a starting point for reflection and conversation. - Let’s Count → turns a simple counting exercise into a reflection on participation, leadership, and how groups coordinate without saying much at all! - Cover Story → a creative approach to help teams imagine success and align around a shared future. - Mission Impossible → breaks the rules to uncover unexpected solutions. Each method is simple to run and easy to adapt to your goals. Why not bring a little structured play into your next session? 👉 Explore more of Gamestorming’s methods here in the SessionLab library: https://lnkd.in/eDvrpa2T If you’ve used any of these activities, what worked for you? We’d love to hear your experience. And if these have helped your team, give Gamestorming some love 💚

Neurodiversity Celebration Week feels like a good moment to reflect on a practical facilitation question: Who are our sessions easiest for? Too often, participation still depends on processing speed, confidence, sensory tolerance, or comfort speaking in public. The Inclusive Facilitation Exchange’s Facilitator Guidelines offer a stronger design lens: design for difference, not around it. A few reminders that stayed with us: - silence can be cognitive space, not disengagement - speaking is one route to participation, not the route - prompts and instructions should stay visible, not disappear - the room itself is part of the method - sound, lighting, pacing, breaks, transitions - challenge matters, but it should stretch thinking without putting people on the spot What we like about this guide is that it does not frame inclusion as a nice extra or a special accommodation. It frames it as better design. When we assume difference is the norm and create multiple ways to participate, more people can stay engaged and more perspectives can shape the work. Thank you to the Inclusive Facilitation Exchange group and to the contributors acknowledged in the guide - Jenny Martin, Jane Livesey, Matthew Bellringer, and Prof. Amanda Kirby MBBS MRCGP PhD FCGI - for sharing work that facilitators can apply directly in practice. Check out their website, where you will find information on the Inclusive Facilitation Exchange event happening in London on March 20th. It has a roster of amazing speakers including Dr Sallyann Freudenberg, Vivian Acquah CDE®, Mehdi En-Naizi, Aino Vonge Corry, Jan Keck, Parul Singh, Jen Kingsmill, Nichole Brown PM, Seun Opanubi BEng and more To download the full guide, sign up for their newsletter at: https://lnkd.in/dCEAkH2s What’s one thing you’ve changed in your facilitation to better support a wider range of ways of thinking and contributing? Let’s share in comments, and if you have methods or practices that help, add them to the SessionLab library with the hashtag #inclusion so others can build on them.

At our recent SessionLab team retreat in Krakow, we spent some time talking about our relationship with AI. What about it makes us curious and excited about what might be possible? Where do we feel uneasy about its impact on work, creativity, attention, or younger generations growing up with it everywhere? And more practically: what parts of our workflow are we actually happy to hand over to AI, and where do we want to keep our own thinking, judgement, and creativity firmly in the loop? These conversations feel important to have. Facilitators are already navigating this question in their own work. According to the State of Facilitation 2026 report, 38.7% of facilitators say they now use AI tools often in their workflow, while 20.6% are still experimenting with them, and 15.2% say they never use AI at all. That tension feels healthy. At SessionLab, our goal isn’t to replace the thinking, creativity, or human connection that makes facilitation powerful. It’s to build AI tools that support facilitators in their workflow—helping with things like structuring agendas, drafting activities, or adapting session designs—without getting in the way of the craft. If you’re curious, you can try the AI assistant in SessionLab and see how it fits into your own design process. So, a question for you: What part of your facilitation workflow would you happily automate? And what part would you never want AI to touch?

“Learning to describe facilitation’s impact in meaningful and accessible ways might just be the most impactful thing the industry can do.” In this year’s State of Facilitation report, we focused on the impact of facilitation - including how we communicate its value. The data tells an interesting story: 51.4% of facilitators rely primarily on word of mouth or informal sharing. 39.3% communicate impact only inside their organisation. In that context, it’s not surprising that the value of facilitation rarely becomes visible beyond the immediate circle of people who already believe in it. So what do we actually know about good facilitation storytelling? What works when communicating impact clearly and effectively? Judy Rees https://lnkd.in/e-kVSWD recently shared thoughtful advice on developing a sharper ear for how clients and teams describe their needs. The International Association of Facilitators (IAF)'s Facilitation Impact Awards have also been collecting powerful impact stories for years: their gallery is full of inspiration. Who do you know who’s especially good at communicating the value of facilitation? Tag them below so others can learn from their example. At SessionLab, we’ve been thinking deeply about how the choices made in the workshop room translate into real-world outcomes. We’ve put together practical top tips in the third instalment of our impact infographic series - and we’ll soon be packaging everything into a downloadable PDF guide on facilitation impact. If you’d like to get it first, sign up for SessionLab’s newsletter here: https://buff.ly/iwytm7P