7 Best Facilitation Training Courses to Sharpen Your Facilitation Skills
If you're leading a group or team, then you know how important it is to have great facilitation skills.
Every people leader, whether in HR, People and Culture, or Team Leadership, is expected to be able to facilitate a group.
It’s how you ensure you lead productive meetings, workshops, or team sessions, and that everyone feels included and engaged.
For many people, facilitation is a skill learnt on the job after landing a management or leadership position, and it can be useful to undertake formal training to sharpen your facilitation skills.
The following 7 facilitation training courses will help you sharpen your skills and become a better facilitator.
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Interested in facilitating some fun team experiences - check out these game options or sign up here.
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1) Facilitation Certification (Voltage Control)
Cost: $5000
Let’s start with a program that packs some serious transformative power.
Voltage Control's immersive Facilitation Certification program gives executives, team leads, chiefs of staff, product managers, trainers, and other leaders the skills and confidence to lead ‘for now, and what’s next’.
This intensive certification is 12 weeks long, gathers in a supportive live cohort, covers facilitation core competencies, offers self-paced video electives, and culminates in a portfolio project.
This is a program for leaders who are ready to take their facilitation skills to the next level.
What you'll learn in the course
Ways to tailor facilitation methods to different organizational contexts, leading to more effective problem-solving and strategy implementation;
To cut down decision-making time and improve the quality of decisions through facilitation.
Facilitate in a way that promotes diverse viewpoints and consensus-building.
Increase the success rate of projects through streamlined communication and stakeholder engagement.
Gain access to a community of like-minded professionals for best practice sharing and staying ahead of industry trends and innovations.
Cultivate a versatile leadership identity, to get you recognized both within your organization and in the broader professional community.
2) Team Facilitation: The Core Skill of Great Team Leaders (Udemy)
Cost: $55
Team facilitation: The Core Skill of Great Team Leaders is another budget friendly Udemy course and teaches leaders the art of helping teams work together effectively.
The course focuses on teaching you how to create a positive working environment where people feel invested in their work and impactful actions can happen, and how to use practical tools like checklists, SMART goals, and decision trees so your team members know what needs doing when they need to do it.
What you’ll learn in the course
To gain an understanding of the essential skills and behavior of effective team leaders.
To practice those behaviors that lead to optimum participation and commitment to action by team members.
To learn the critical listening skills that are essential to all personal communications and to team leadership.
To understand when and how to use each of three decision-making styles: command, consultative and consensus.
To learn how to both give and receive feedback, or “straight-talk”, in a manner that leads to learning and continuous improvement.
To learn the critical skills of effectively leading virtual teams to perform at their best.
3) Workshop Facilitation Masterclass (Udemy)
Cost: $20
This Workshop Facilitation Masterclass course is divided into three sections:
The first section focuses on teaching you how to prepare for a workshop, including preparing your materials, developing an agenda, and, for those facilitating in person, ensuring that the room is set up in the best possible way. It also covers how to create a sense of community between participants.
In the second part of this video series, you'll learn how to conduct workshops by walking through several different types of facilitation techniques that can be used in any type of meeting or event.
You'll learn about some common mistakes that facilitators make during these events so you can hopefully avoid them yourself!
What you’ll learn in the course:
Through this course, you’ll learn how to:
Design and facilitate engaging workshops which deliver results
Use basic tools - flip charts, post-its etc along with a special ‘secret weapon’ - to make workshops go with a zing
Use advanced workshop structures such as backcasting
Avoid difficult situations and deal with any that do occur
Help others make better decisions, which they will implement
There is also a bonus lecture on ‘How to facilitate a virtual workshop’, for those working digitally
4) Facilitation Skills Online Certificate Course (Courses For Success)
Cost: $180
The Facilitation Skills Online Certificate Course is designed for people who have a regular need to present to groups, and want to be able to professionally and with comfort and ease.
It's taught by an experienced facilitator who will help you learn what they describe as the five key aspects of facilitation:
Communication
Planning and preparation
Delegation and management of time
Conflict resolution, and
Team-building skills
The idea is that after 4 weeks you'll have some helpful theory to fall back on in each of these areas, as well as some practical applications and tips that will increase your confidence in facilitating meetings.
What you’ll learn in the course:
By the end of the course, you should be able to:
Define facilitation and identify its purpose and benefits
Clarify the role and focus of a facilitator
Differentiate between process and content in the context of a group discussion
Provide tips in choosing and preparing for facilitation
Identify a facilitator's role when managing groups in each of Tuckman and Jensen's stages of group development: forming, storming, norming and performing
Identify ways a facilitator can help a group reach consensus: from encouraging participation to choosing a solution
Provide guidelines in dealing with disruptions, dysfunctions and difficult people in groups
Define what interventions are, when they are appropriate and how to implement them
5) Facilitator Certification Program (LUMA)
Cost: $2,900
The LUMA Facilitator Certification Program is a 3-day workshop designed to help you become a better facilitator and leader. Unlike some of the other courses in this list, the LUMA program provides certification in their style of facilitation. This can be a great way to lend some authority to your skills as a facilitator, and also looks great on your LinkedIn.
The program is designed to help you develop your facilitation skills, and learn how to use them in a variety of contexts.
It includes workshops on:
● How team members work together as an effective team;
● How to facilitate meetings effectively;
● Conflict resolution techniques.
What you’ll learn in the course:
As a LUMA certified facilitator, you’ll be able to:
Demonstrate the key attributes of a LUMA facilitator
Help individuals and teams develop key behaviors that support innovation
Plan agendas for effective work sessions and prepare by prototyping
Run effective sessions that empower participants and energize the group
Communicate session outcomes and evaluate the results to refine future efforts
6) ToP facilitation training- Martin Gilbraith
Cost: On request.
Martin Gilbraith is a world-renowned facilitator and trainer.
He has trained thousands of people in his over 30 years as a professional facilitator, coach, and trainer.
ToP facilitation training is based on his extensive experience, so you can expect it to be highly effective at improving your facilitation skills.
He offers a range of different delivery modes for his facilitation training courses- online-only, online or in-person, and in-person only.
These are the courses available online-only:
Introduction to Facilitation Online – introducing the role of the facilitator and the ToP approach, plus some key tips & tools – 2.5 hours
Introduction to Producing Virtual Events – build your knowledge and confidence to play the technical support role of Producer role in facilitated virtual events – 2.5 hours
Facilitating Virtual Events – learn and practice ways to make online events participatory, engaging and productive – 7 x 2 hour sessions plus homework
7) ATD (Association for Talent Development)- Facilitation Skills Certificate
Cost: On request
The ATD (Association for Talent Development) is an international organization that provides certification, workshops, and training for facilitators.
In order to become a certified facilitator you must complete training courses and an exam.
The Facilitation Skills Certificate course will teach you how to use your skills effectively so that everyone has a safe and productive experience at meetings or conferences.
What you’ll learn in this course:
Define desired outcomes for the facilitated session.
Recognize group dynamics and behavioral styles.
Apply techniques to demonstrate confidence and command attention.
Ask appropriate probing and thought-provoking questions.
Apply idea-generating and decision-making tools and methods.
Apply conflict/difficult dialogue strategies.
Sharpen your facilitation skills
There are many different courses and certifications if you are looking for facilitation training and ways to sharpen your facilitation skills.
One of the most effective methods is to take a facilitator training course - with many different courses available requiring different time commitments and at widely varying cost.
Whether you just want an introduction to facilitation or you are looking to take your facilitation to the next level - there’s a course for you.
FAQS
What are the best facilitator training online free courses?
High quality free facilitator training courses are hard to find. Udemy has one free short course, however, it is only rated 3.3 out of 5. It is generally recommended to pay for a course to improve your facilitation skills.
What is a certified master facilitator?
A master facilitator is a person who has been certified by an organization or institution as having the necessary skills to lead facilitator training courses.
How do I get facilitation experience?
You can attend facilitation training, volunteer to facilitate meetings or events, or even sign up to Loumee and practice leading games and activities for your friends and family.
You can also learn by observing other facilitators and studying facilitation techniques. Practice and experience go a long way in developing your facilitation skills.