Invisible and invaluable - Facilitation as a critical transdisciplinary process in collaboration, consensus building and co-production

‘Building consensus is critical to effective collaboration, but can be difficult to achieve…a professional facilitator..who has no vested interest in the content of the discussion, is better able to help collaboration... [ view full abstract ]

‘Building consensus is critical to effective collaboration, but can be difficult to achieve…a professional facilitator..who has no vested interest in the content of the discussion, is better able to help collaboration members build consensus' ( Keast, R. & Mandell, M. 2012). The use of community and governance forums with mixed groups of stakeholders to build and inform public policy, and to co-produce and deliver service outcomes has grown, and with it the need to recognise the value of the skilled facilitator. To facilitate means to ‘make an action or process easy or easier’. Facilitation of groups is often perceived as an easy action – ‘anyone can do it’. Nothing is further from the truth. A failed facilitation exercise has ramifications which may be detrimental across a range of indicators. This is a key role - but not always recognised or rewarded. Within the public administration discourse, it is not well researched nor is it regarded as significant for its criticality in collaboration and co-design. By generating and holding the space between researchers, public sector and community stakeholders – the borderlands - the facilitator enables the process to reach desired goals.(Gray, B. 1989).
This paper explores the practitioner as the facilitator of collaboration, consensus building and co-production in the public policy and practice domain. It positions facilitation as critical to successful collaboration and co-design. The facilitator is the actor who enables diverse opinions and perspectives from people to be tabled and discussed. It is not an easy role to play and has emerged from the training room into the strategic policy arena. The paper explores the literature of the transdisciplinary process of facilitation, highighting its criticality and the capabilities and attributes required in this space. It uses public sector case studies to show the application of the thinking and practice. This paper bridges the collaboration and network with the researcher and practitioner streams at the IRSPM conference. It will be presented as a paper at one, and demonstrated in practice at the other.