Podcast

In this episode of Control the Room, I had the pleasure of speaking with Hassan Ghiassi about his almost 20 years of experience holding space to help people improve their ability to communicate effectively, think critically, and at the same time increase cultural and emotional intelligence.  He shares what it’s like to facilitate collective conversations across different cultures. We then discuss why his goal is to help others improve their communication skills and take the mystery out of creating engaging conversations. Listen in to hear why it’s important to create a dialogue habit in your life.  

In this episode of Control the Room, I had the pleasure of speaking with Tricia Ratliff about her years of enterprise experience leading innovation initiatives, nuances of facilitation, and commonalities of successful shifts in the way people work together. She also shares how the pandemic shifted the objective of her work. We then discuss how to virtualize a program, accidental innovations, and the importance of norms, values, and ground rules. Listen in to hear why it’s important to listen to objectors of transformation efforts.  

In this episode of Control the Room, I had the pleasure of speaking with Jenny Theolin about her journey becoming a facilitator, entrepreneur, and design and education consultant. We talk about her side project curating the best business, design, and organizational change tool boxes built by some of the most influential companies, institutions, and thinkers in the world. We then discuss setting up client briefs for success, how participants should leave a session, and why she’s sick of the word ‘workshop’. Listen in to learn why Jenny wants facilitators to be the energy they’d like to see in the room.

In this episode of Control the Room, I had the pleasure of speaking with Carlye Lauff about her experience working at LUMA, prototyping, and teaching at the University of Minnesota.  We talk about her new book called Design Innovation Methodology Handbook - Embedding Design in Organizations.  We then discuss the difficulty of building Prototyping capacities within organizations.  Listen in to learn how to use prototyping to build empathy with users, the curse of knowledge, and failing better.

Control the Room Podcast: Douglas Ferguson speaks with Jennifer Reil about her experience working at IDEO, metacognition, and teaching at the Management School at the University of Toronto. We talk about her new book Creating Great Choices: A Leader’s Guide to Integrative Thinking. We then discuss the difficulty in building the capacity to think about what we think about and opposing modals of thinking. Listen in to learn how to build empathy, the curse of knowledge, and failing better.

Control the Room Podcast: Douglas Ferguson speaks with Darren Chait about his experience building productivity software for teams. We discuss the link between bad meetings and bad cultures, how productivity software has changed in the past 5 years, and his unconventional point of view on the return to work post covid. Listen in to learn about ‘killing meeting sacred cows’, communication bandwidths, and empowering people to work when they’re most productive. 

Control the Room Podcast: Douglas Ferguson speaks with Terrence Metz about his extensive experience as a facilitation practitioner, author, and trainer. We explore concepts like rhetorical precision, consciousness, and competence.  We then discuss the distinction between enterprise vs. community facilitation, consensus vs. unanimity, and stories vs. metaphors.  Listen in to learn questions every facilitator needs to know.

Control the Room Podcast: Douglas Ferguson speaks with Anna Jackson about her experience helping groups work together on what matters most to them, often facilitating collaborative learning experiences, and as a partner for people who want to learn Liberating Structures. We explore why it’s ok to be fallow at times and methods for understanding the needs of clients. We then discuss the differences in group work and individual work. Listen in to learn about the mechanisms of systems thinking, transitional facilitation, and learning partnerships.

Control the Room Podcast: Douglas Ferguson speaks with Matthew Reynolds about building a Diversity and Inclusion Consultancy, what inspired their strong point of view within the industry, and finding a sense of belonging growing up as a gay and multiethnic, same gender, peaceful warrior in rural America. We explore strategies for creating environments of humanity and shifting the consciousness of humanity.

Control the Room Podcast: Douglas Ferguson speaks with Dr. Bre Gentile about her unconventional career path transitioning from Academia to tech to Founder of her own lab. We discuss the amazing knowledge she has gained in trauma and toxic stress research and how she was able to leverage her lived experience to help app designers, UX researchers, and other creatives become more trauma-informed so they build more accessible products.