Process Facilitation Basics – Manifesto

Welcome back to another exciting Process Facilitation workshop. Today I am going to do a small workshop with you guys. It is a group exercise and it requires hell lot of communication and brain storming. I loved this exercise and I did it with the groups that I had worked during my internship. It should be done as early as possible in a group. I recommend to do this on the 2nd or 3rd day of a new group. By than people have started to know each other and they are communicating and building a trust among themselves. So it is a nice time to introduce this exercise. The outcome will be a group rule/law/manifesto that everyone will abide by till the job’s done/finished/dusted.

Those who are still interested in defining Manifesto, here it goes!!!

A manifesto is a written public declaration of the intentions, motives, or views of the issuer, be it an individual, group, political party or government.It often is political in nature, but may present an individual’s life stance.

Manifesto is derived from the Italian word manifesto, itself derived from the Latin manifestum, meaning clear or conspicuous.

That being said lets get back to the task at hand. First of all you need to be in groups and if you are a single group than it is fine. The group can be as big as it can be, its not a problem with the quantity. And in my opinion it is better to have more brains, because this way a group can check the leader’s roles, member’s roles, communication, team work, listening to each other, agreeing upon the rules etc. All this can be achieved in one exercise and that is why I like it so much.

Manifesto

All you have to do is to make a manifesto of your own. Write down the key terms and explain these key terms in detail/use images/more terms so that everybody can understand them.

If you are a big group you can divide yourself in smaller groups. In smaller groups first of all think about it individually and write down key terms and if it is possible define them so that others can understand your terms. Time is a key factor here, if you are running short of time you can give this initial phase of individual thinking maximum of 10 to 15 minutes. Next come back in your smaller groups and share your terms and explain them to the group ( take 15 min). Speak one at a time and no judgment at this stage. Once every one in a group has shared than try to agree upon 2 or 3 most valuable rules ( take 10 minutes). After this all the groups can sit together and share there important terms with the rest of the group (take 15 minutes). After sharing the final step is to finalize the terms. These might be 5 to 10 depending upon the groups and job at hand.

There you go in no time you have a manifesto now for your group. Hang it on the wall where every one can see it during the whole project and this way no one will go on his own and make his own rules and the group can achieve much more in less time.

Here are some of the rules my groups made.