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Conference Workshops

1. Scaling with Purpose: Building a Thriving Facilitation Brand in the Age of AI with Bola Audena

Facilitators today face both opportunity and noise: more ways than ever to reach clients, and more pressure to stand out without losing authenticity.  This interactive session invites participants to clarify their facilitation brand, articulate the value they bring, and explore how AI and digital tools can support purposeful, sustainable growth. Rather than focusing on hype or tactics alone, the session centers on aligning growth with values, credibility, and real human impact.

Through guided reflection, small-group dialogue, and practical frameworks, participants will explore how to position their work in a changing marketplace and design a facilitation practice that scales with intention. The session emphasizes clarity, choice, and balance—helping facilitators grow their reach while staying grounded in what matters most.

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2. Make Your Business Development Meaningful Not Mechanical with Carly Chomer & Kim Fredrich 

Business development doesn’t have to feel salesy, forced, or inauthentic.  In this interactive session we invite you to reframe marketing and sales as a human-centered act of service.   Designed for facilitators and purpose-driven professionals, the session helps participants align how they communicate their work with how they build relationships that lead to real opportunities.

You will explore how to articulate an authentic brand voice, better understand their audience, and build consistent, trust-based relationships.  The session also introduces thoughtful ways to use AI as a support for clarity and connection, to make business development effective and sustainable.

Learning Objectives:

• Clarify their authentic brand voice and develop a narrative for sharing their work with confidence
• Identify audience needs and pain points to strengthen marketing and relationship-building efforts
• Explore practical, human-centered strategies—including selective use of AI—to support business growth

3. Clarity, Curiosity and Connection: Coaching Through Polarization & Communicating Across Differences with Christine Gerson & Eboney Dixon-Crump

In polarized environments, whether in organizations, communities, and personal relationships, an indicator is escalating conflict.  Often a deeper examination of values, identity, and fear can expose the roots and provide avenues for addressing the conflict itself.  This interactive session introduces coaching-based tools that help participants slow down reactive patterns and engage others with curiosity rather than conflict.

You will practice simple, repeatable techniques drawn from coaching and facilitation, including open-ended inquiry, reflective listening, and values-based communication.  The session emphasizes connection over persuasion, helping participants navigate difficult conversations with greater awareness, empathy, and effectiveness.

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4. Find the Beat: Using Musical Techniques to Reduce Polarization and Navigate Group Conflict Jennie Toner-Algin

Polarization and heightened emotion can quickly derail group conversations, especially during moments of conflict or change.  This session introduces music-informed facilitation techniques that help facilitators regulate energy, establish trust, and guide groups toward alignment.  No musical experience is required; the focus is on using sound, rhythm, and voice as tools for collaboration.

You will explore how the facilitator’s voice shapes psychological safety and group tone, then engage in a simple, scalable musical activity that blends rhythm, melody, and harmony.

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5. AI and Facilitation: Asking Not What It Can Do, But What It Should Do with Mike Burns

Many facilitators have a nagging question about AI.  Not whether it works, but whether using it compromises something essential about what they do. Led by a facilitator and technologist who works at the intersection of AI and strategic planning, participants will explore where AI genuinely supports facilitation work and where it doesn't belong.

This facilitated working session tackles that question head-on.  Led by a facilitator and technologist who works at the intersection of AI and strategic planning, participants will explore where AI genuinely supports facilitation work and where it doesn't belong.  Drawing from real-world engagements, we'll look at how AI can strengthen what happens before and after the room, like discovery, pattern recognition, and follow-through, while elevating human connection and meaning-making where they matter most.

Together, we'll surface shared principles for ethical, human-centered use of AI, so you leave not just with new ideas but with a practical framework for articulating your unique value in an AI-enabled world.

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6. Building Bridges in Conflict and Uncertainty with Applied Improv with Nikki Frias

In uncertain environments, facilitators are often asked to help groups stay engaged and move forward together.  This interactive workshop draws on applied improvisation principles—such as “yes, and”, active listening, and gift-giving.  Participants will engage constructively across differences and model how to navigate moments of tension with greater confidence and flexibility.

Through experiential exercises and guided reflection, participants will practice shifting conversations from adversarial to collaborative. Rather than avoiding conflict, this session equips facilitators with practical, repeatable tools for working with it.  Knowing how to help groups build resilience, connection, and forward momentum even when outcomes are uncertain are of paramount importance.

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Knowledge Cafe Sessions

1. AI and Facilitation — A Human/Robot Partnership with Lauren Green 

Participants engage in a brainstorming session around AI and facilitation, considering ways that AI and facilitation work hand-in-hand across several key facets of facilitation—agenda design, data consolation and theming. Content generated will be consolidated using AI for the purposes of building a knowledge compendium.

We suggest that participants bring their laptops and play with AI tools during the session. Please note that this is not considered an AI training but more of a conversation for those who are already using AI and want to learn from others. Not written with AI.

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2. Get Hired with a One-Sentence Pitch with Maggy Sterner 

Many experienced facilitators lose out on work because they can’t clearly explain the problem they solve or the value they deliver. In this session, you’ll learn how to describe what you do in ONE sentence that attracts potential clients and makes it easier to get hired.

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3. Block, Shift, or Embrace: Tools for Polarization with Sharon Kniss  

When polarization occurs, what’s your response? Do you freeze? Or block those who are stuck and work with those who are moveable? This session will explore two tools – one from conflict resolution and one from polarity mapping, which will give you more options to use when facilitating.

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4. Negotiate Better Now! with Susan Borke  

How great would it be if you could walk into any negotiation feeling confident and leave satisfied that you had the best possible outcome? Susan Borke will teach you two effective techniques to improve your negotiations with managers, team members, clients, contractors, vendors, and even friends or family.

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5. Exploring the Human-Technology Relationship in Facilitation with Gina Barber

We’ll explore when facilitation benefits from the use of technology (e.g., Generative AI) and when the human element is the key success factor. We’ll also identify how facilitators can ethically use technology in their facilitation.

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6. Close the Listening Gap with Eduardo Villavicencio-Vizcaino  

Explore how listening intelligence elevates facilitation. In this interactive session we will examine diverse listening styles, and practice a few strategies that deepen understanding and group connection. Participants leave with practical tools to strengthen engagement, reduce miscommunication, and create effective and inclusive conversations.

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