Vilvoorde (B) invites Belcompetence/Constellation for second group facilitators training weekend.

[Jan Somers]

This past weekend Veronique and I both facilitated the training weekend for a second group of community facilitators for the city of Vilvoorde.

The two days happened in a great learning and SALTy way. The participants of this small group were very eager to learn, to experience, to share and to brainstorm.

At one stage during the training weekend we asked the participants to go out on the streets and have SALT conversations with people on the streets about their dreams for Vilvoorde. This exercise enriched their experiencing SALT and their own individual and group dreams.

Most participants could and did formulate their "points of attention for evolution" after the participants wrote practices for community facilitators.

Practice 1: I apply salt attitude where possible.

Practice 2: I give at least one appreciation per conversation I do.

Practice 3: I ask people for their ideas.

Practice 4: I check and double check , parafrasing.

Practice 5: I bring people together.

Practice 6: I have attention for everybody in the group.

Practice 7: I help a group with their steps towards implementing their dream.

Practice 8: I stimulate thinking, reflecting.

Practice 9: I help people to become aware of their strenghts, possibilities, ...

Practice 10: I involve everybody in a group for actions.

Practice 11: I organize and safeguard the flow of a meeting (context, agreements, atmosphere, catering :-) )

Practice 12: I let loose and give away (not sticking to title, my idea, my project, ...)

Practice 13 I guard the proces to help a group.

Practice 14 I safeguard a safe context for open communication.

Practice 15: I bring enthousiasm into my network.

Practice 16: I practice by example.

The participants did a "silent auto-evaluation after composing these practices .

At the end of the training weekend, the participants were asked to hand out the training attendance certificate to each other (rather then the trainers giving those). We also asked to add some verbal words that accompanied the handing over of certificates. This turned out to be a very SALTy and deepening experience for everybody.

We are grateful to have met this eager group of facilitators.

[Rituu B. Nanda]

Hi Jan, thanks. How was the experience of asking people on the streets their dream for the city? What was their reaction?

Interesting exercise!