How Can Authenticity Transform Facilitation and Workplace Culture?

A conversation with Renita Joyce Smith, Executive Coach, Master Certified Facilitator, and CEO of Leap Forward Coaching & Consulting

In this episode of the Facilitation Lab Podcast, host Douglas Ferguson interviews Renita Joyce Smith, CEO of Leap Forward Coaching and Consulting. Renita shares her journey into facilitation, emphasizing the importance of authenticity, humor, and humanity in meetings. She discusses how facilitation bridges structure and human connection, offers practical techniques for engagement, and highlights the transformative impact of skilled facilitation on organizational culture. Renita also explores the role of technology, the value of adaptability, and the need to prioritize human connection in the workplace, leaving listeners inspired to lead with empathy and authenticity.

Show Highlights

[00:01:23] Renita’s Turning Point: Seeking Authenticity in Meetings
[00:06:34] Authenticity in the Workplace: Risks and Rewards
[00:12:40] Facilitation as a Bridge Between Structure and Humanity
[00:17:29] Facilitation Across Contexts: Corporate, Leadership, and More
[00:21:34] Connection Activities: Personal Histories and Emotional Check-ins
[00:29:48] The Deeper Impact of Facilitation
[00:35:21] Current Transformations: AI, Project Overload, and Workforce Resilience

Links | Resources

Renita on LinkedIn

Renita on the web

About the Guest

Renita Joyce Smith is an Executive Coach, Master Certified Facilitator, and CEO of Leap Forward Coaching & Consulting. With 23 years in management consulting, she helps leaders and organizations tackle burnout, transform culture, and make work suck less by making people matter more.

An AI enthusiast who believes technology should amplify humanity, she blends storytelling with practical tools that leave leaders braver and more grounded. Renita serves her Dallas community through The Dallas (TX) Chapter of The Links, Incorporated, Junior League of Dallas, The Senior Source, and UT Austin’s Forty Acres Society. Her superpower? Calling people back to their humanity, even in chaos.

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Transcript

Douglas Ferguson (00:05):
Hi, I’m Douglas Ferguson. Welcome to the Facilitation Lab Podcast, where I speak with Voltage Control certification alumni and other facilitation experts about the remarkable impact they’re making. We embrace a method agnostic approach, so you can enjoy a wide range of topics and perspectives as we examine all the nuances of enabling meaningful group experiences. This series is dedicated to helping you navigate the realities of facilitating collaboration, ensuring every session you lead becomes truly transformative. Thanks so much for listening. If you’d like to join us for a live session sometime, you can join our Facilitation Lab community. It’s an ideal space to apply what you learn in the podcast in real time with peers. Sign up today at voltagecontrol.com/facilitation-lab. And if you’d like to learn more about our 12-week facilitation certification program, you can read about it at voltagecontrol.com. Today, I’m with Renita Joyce Smith, CEO of Leap Forward Coaching and Consulting, where she helps leaders navigate the messy middle of change with clarity, courage, and heart. She’s a strategic alchemist, master facilitator, and advocate for making work suck less and people matter more. Welcome to the show, Renita.

Renita Joyce Smith (01:21):
Thank you. Thanks for having me. I’m super excited.

Douglas Ferguson (01:23):
Yeah, looking forward to chatting. So let’s get started with the origin. You described in your alumni story a turning point for you when you asked yourself, “Is this it?” after years of efficient agenda-driven meetings. Can you take us back to that moment? What was happening internally that made you start questioning the way you were working?

Renita Joyce Smith (01:46):
Absolutely. So as a backstory, I am a career management consultant, started off at Big Four, right out of college. I was the kid that actually looked forward to having business meetings, which was unusual. So when I got into corporate, they were all ran the same. You have your agenda. You’re super professional. And then midpoint in my career, at the same time, I was really leaning into my own authenticity of I want to actually bring my personality to work and not just be one of these out of the box wearing black and blue and brown consultants. And I was like, how can I make this a bit more fun as we’re having these meetings for strategy or technology? And the more I started to infuse personality and humor and just making people feel seen and human in these meetings, folks would respond of like, “You run really great meetings, and it’s fun to come to your meetings. And you’re a really great facilitator.” And I was like, “Well, is that an actual thing?” We all run meetings, so is it really a net new skillset that’s here?

(02:49):
But the more I started to listen to people and they would say, “No, you are really good at this.” And as any kind of type A personality of like, okay, if this is a skillset, there has to be someone out there that’s teaching how to do this extraordinarily well. Right now, I’m making it up as I go along. And so, I really wanted to understand the psychology of how do you have really great meetings and facilitate where you get things done. And so that was the biggest turning point is just that desire for more learning and more information to push this skillset even further.

Douglas Ferguson (03:21):
And how has that shift impacted you? What’s been the revelations and the developments since you’ve started to focus there?

Renita Joyce Smith (03:28):
Oh, gosh. So first of all, my favorite word I’m always using is container. That’s the one thing of I’m always trying to build a container for a meeting. And whether I am doing a workshop or a strategy session, my first mind goes to how am I creating a container so that people can show up in their best selves, and we actually hit these outcomes as well. And we’re not wasting people’s time. And so, that is the heart of my business, whether it’s a one-on-one coaching session or I’m doing a workshop or an executive retreat, having the mindset there of how do I make this a magical meeting versus let’s just get in here and get the work done.

(04:09):
So when people are showing up, they are actually like, “Well, wait a minute, A, we got things done that we said on the agenda. It was efficient. We had fun, and we actually learned something about each other.” It just revolutionized, again, how I am approaching just work, getting work done with people and just showing people a net new way that we don’t have to just be so boring in all of this within corporate and our nonprofits. We can have fun and engage one another and create something different.

Douglas Ferguson (04:39):
And speaking of which, you told a story about running a meeting, that C-suite strategy meeting.

Renita Joyce Smith (04:45):
Yes.

Douglas Ferguson (04:45):
Yeah. Tell us a little bit more of the humor and humanity in that story.

Renita Joyce Smith (04:50):
So this was super interesting. And Douglas, this is one of the ones where I’m like, I’m going to either get fired or this is going to go really, really well. We’re going to risk something here. So I was a director of strategy at the time, and we had a big project coming down the pipeline. We needed to engage the full C-suite. Now these meetings were going to be a beating because we’re trying to do all of our priorities for the upcoming five years and going through each department. And as we were building this, I was like, well, what would it look like to open up with the dad joke at the beginning of these meetings? Or what would it also look like to put a meme or a JIF in these emails and to add maybe a little bit of a gaming as we’re creating these?

(05:32):
And so, I would start infusing those in the agenda. Now, mind you, again, full C-suite that are on these calls plus VPs, and here I am also a director of like, “Hey, here’s the dad joke of the day before we go and take a break.” And then hearing them laugh, and they kept showing up to meetings. Now, mind you, it’s notoriously hard to get a C-suite into a meeting, but to have them say, “We actually look forward to coming to yours because they are fun and engaging.” And even beyond that, I had the CFO at the time, she came to me when I was leaving that company, and she said, “Renita, because of the way that you were showing up authentically and being funny, you allowed me to give myself permission to also show up and be more human and show my personality.” So it’s kind of one of those things where yes, we have these containers of facilitation, but we never know the impact that we’re going to have on people just for us to show up as who we are, giving others permission to do the same.

Douglas Ferguson (06:34):
Yeah. This showing who we are and showing up with authenticity can be powerful.

Renita Joyce Smith (06:40):
Yes. Do you ever find that there’s kind of a lack of authenticity now, or do you find that we’re kind of moving more towards it? What’s your pulse on it?

Douglas Ferguson (06:51):
Yeah, it really depends on where you look. Some teams are all in on being real, like where my wife works at the Natural Gardener here in Austin, where everyone says exactly what they think for better or worse. Others are still wrapped up in that layer of corporate armor. I think what’s challenging is that we’re realizing authenticity isn’t just a vibe, it’s a practice. It’s about designing spaces where people feel genuine, where it’s safe to disagree, laugh, and to admit you don’t know. That’s what makes teams work, not the polished scripts, but the honest conversations.

Renita Joyce Smith (07:26):
Yes. And I think I’ve experienced the opposite of it, and I almost have it as a personal mission now of, if I come in with, again, adjusting for the environment, I’m not going to come out with full level 10 personality in a super buttoned up environment. But I’m going to go probably a good level five.

Douglas Ferguson (07:45):
Yeah.

Renita Joyce Smith (07:46):
And if people can start to laugh a little bit more and joke within that container… I just finished up a women’s leadership development program at a utility. Mind you, utilities are very buttoned up. And by being in that program, we set out to say, “Okay, we’re going to be super authentic, super personable, a little bit unhinged, a little bit funny.” And that was also a risk. But at the end of it, folks are like, “Well, wait a minute. By watching y’all be human and again, funny and have personality, I didn’t know that was possible in a corporate setting.” So now they’re a lot more open. So this is from the participants all the way to our stakeholders. So I think there’s also that thing of people just need to see an example that it can work, and it can still be effective. And it can still be professional, but we don’t have enough of those examples in the room. But if we can be that, it’s just another way being able to imagine another way of doing it. And that is so powerful.

Douglas Ferguson (08:48):
Yeah, being that north star for folks.

Renita Joyce Smith (08:50):
Absolutely, absolutely.

Douglas Ferguson (08:52):
That reminds me of a story that you shared around this moment of deciding to wear braids to work for the first time.

Renita Joyce Smith (09:01):
Yeah. So the journey of a Black woman in corporate America has been, many books have been written on it because it’s a feat at times and even something as simple as hair. So this is probably mid 2000s, and we hadn’t really got into the Crown Act and folks being able to come to work as they are. And I live in Texas. Summers are 105, 100, 105. And trying to come in a full blowout and you’re sweating, walking from the car to the office, and I was going on vacation. I was like, I really want to get braids, but being in consulting, you’re like, “Well, is this going to be okay? What’s the client going to think? Are they not going to think I’m being professional?” And I had a conference call with some of my girlfriends, and I was like, “Okay, can I get braids or not? What’s our decision tree here?” And I took a step back, and I was like, “This is stupid. It is hair.”

(09:55):
And my brain is still functioning the same with or without however my hair is being styled in the moment. And if I am not in an organization where I can show up, at least with my hair in a different style and that be also authentic, I may be in the wrong organization. So one, can I trust myself that I have enough in the bank, and my value is still the same regardless of my hair? And then two, can I trust my company enough too? And if this also creates an opportunity to challenge some biases that people have around hair, so be it. I’m a change agent in so many parts of my life.

(10:33):
And it was an invitation for me to do something different and to make a shift and kind of break the mold a bit, and it ended up turning out fine, which is like most things as you were kind of talking about, organizations that are inauthentic. I think it’s because folks have this worst case scenario of what’s going to happen if we do, but you have to try and go see and get the data. And then you can confirm is your story true or not. But until you do, everyone’s just making assumptions all the time.

Douglas Ferguson (11:01):
Yeah. Isn’t that interesting? It reminds me of organizations that are in highly regulated spaces. Oftentimes, they exist in this belief that they need to do certain things or behave in certain ways because of the regulations, but that’s been a story they’re telling themselves. They made the regulation worse than it is because they’ve kind of calcified this understanding of like, “Oh, we can’t talk directly to customers because of healthcare. We’re in the healthcare space, and we’re regulated in ways that we can’t do that.” But if you go look at the regulations, they don’t actually state that. That’s just some lawyer decided to take an overly critical reading of it, and then someone else interpreted that. And someone else built a policy on top of that and then off top of that, and then it got more and more calcified to a point where people were debilitated. They couldn’t move.

Renita Joyce Smith (11:49):
Right. And if you think about it’s like, wait, so you’re saying you can’t talk to the patient in healthcare? Let’s all just take a step back in how we’re doing all of this. It makes no sense. You’re not making widgets. You’re actually dealing with people, so it may be helpful to talk with the person. And I think what I’m finding now, especially just our whole environment as a country and just the atmosphere of how can we come back together and just start engaging each other as humans again. So regardless of all the rules, regulations or policy or I think I’m not supposed to talk to you or whatever else, let’s pause it, and we can start just getting back to the place of asking questions and being curious about each other, still staying within regulation. I think we have so much more room to play in engaging with each other than we think we do.

Douglas Ferguson (12:40):
You said facilitation was the bridge between structure and humanity.

Renita Joyce Smith (12:44):
Mm-hmm.

Douglas Ferguson (12:44):
What does that balance look like for you today when you walk into a new engagement?

Renita Joyce Smith (12:51):
Facilitation is one of those pieces where you come in as a neutral party. And at the same time, the mindset that I have is what am I here to create for these folks? They brought me in for a reason and a purpose. And so, if I can bridge the gap between the outcome that they want and their humanity, coming up with a structure to be able to do that is kind of what facilitation is. And so some people think, “Oh, you’re just showing up and talking to us, Renita.” No, there is actually a framework that’s behind all of this and how to architect this container and architect the moment for it. And so, facilitation is kind of that magical piece that’s in the middle of it to create that outcome. And I think having it look seamless and effortless is also one of the best compliments you can get as a facilitator too, of like, well, wait, this was so smooth and looks like you weren’t even trying.

(13:54):
It’s like, no, there’s actually a lot of trying and architecting in the backend of what is the story that this whole session is going to flow in? How do we get people in the right mindset? What barriers could be in the room? How do we make sure we hear all the voices and creating those pockets within the agenda and the exercises and the connection points in it, that is the structure that gets you the result. And so, I think that’s the heavy lifting that facilitation can do in the backend if you’re really stepping into it all the way. And I think that’s something being able to… even learning within Voltage Control of there is a lot more behind the scenes that goes into it. And it’s why I appreciate the programs y’all have too, because it gives a level of meatiness to this role versus just, again, putting a couple items on a Word document and calling it an agenda and just rolling in and saying, “What’s next?”

Douglas Ferguson (14:46):
Yeah, definitely more than an agenda.

Renita Joyce Smith (14:48):
Yes.

Douglas Ferguson (14:50):
I think that’s the pitfall a lot of folks fall into is no agenda, no agenda, these kinds of things. And it’s like, “Yeah, sure.” But has your agenda accounted for the dynamics of the people and the experience we want to deliver, or is it just a list of topics?

Renita Joyce Smith (15:08):
That part. I’m curious on your end too, what was your moment of that facilitation is actually the important thing to lean into and to emphasize?

Douglas Ferguson (15:19):
It took me a long time to get there. I was using a lot of tools. As a CTO at various startups, I was facilitating a ton, picking up these various methods, whether it come from agile or extreme programming or Scrum, later on picking up a lot of design thinking type things that I would bring into my team and utilize, or even just helpful little techniques that I would pick up in workshops and things. And I think I had compartmentalized facilitation as things that folks do at these public workshops that you pay to go to, to learn leadership or learn some new skill. And it wasn’t until working closely with Jake Knapp and the rest of the design team at Google Ventures where I started to realize, wait, this stuff can be embedded in the teams. This stuff can be a leadership skill. And I’ve been doing this organically, but I haven’t really thought of it as a core skill.

Renita Joyce Smith (15:19):
Yes.

Douglas Ferguson (16:21):
And honestly, that transition moment was when I realized I needed to start Voltage Control.

Renita Joyce Smith (16:26):
Yeah. And thinking about it as a core skill, that’s kind of my wish and hope for corporate in general of now look at this as also a skill to develop alongside leadership. And for those that actually enjoy meetings and putting together, inviting them in to know you can go deeper into it. It is such a valuable skillset to have. And again, you’re not just showing up, and knowing that you can, A, save a company money because you’re actually getting objectives done that you need to get done in the meeting. You’re not swirling endlessly week after week on these agenda items and outcomes. That alone is a selling point for A, folks to invest in a facilitator to come and do workshops, meetings, strategy as well. But again, having that in your back pocket just as whether you’re a project manager, a Scrum master, just any role where you are putting these meetings together, making sure you’re focusing on that is so important, so important.

Douglas Ferguson (17:29):
Yeah. And speaking of leadership, you’ve worked on a lot of different projects ranging from corporate strategy to leadership development and lots of different things between. What have you noticed about how facilitation shows up differently or even similarly across those different contexts?

Renita Joyce Smith (17:45):
It’s funny, I was thinking about this the other day. I finished a C-suite executive retreat, and there was heavy misalignment within the four members of the executive team. And I had also just finished up another event where I was talking about generational gaps within a workforce for an all staff retreat, very different topics. But the core thing that remained the same in both of those was you cannot take the human out of this. And I know I beat that drum consistently, but every single time I’m like, “Hey, by the way, there is another whole human that’s next to you [inaudible 00:18:30], but their experience, their lenses, their preferences, their own communication styles, all of these pieces of the container that’s there. And once you can lift that up in facilitation, then you get to the outcomes.”

(18:43):
So I think the thing that is consistent and that I build into every workshop, every experience is a connection moment where folks can actually begin to experience each other. Because once whatever begins to melt of an assumption they had about the other person, they can be more comfortable talking to each other. They can be more transparent. They can be more honest and vulnerable, and then you get things done. And so, one of my principles now that I really lean into is you cannot skip the human stuff. That’s my very businessy way of saying that. You can’t skip the human stuff to get to the business outcome. It’s impossible. We’ve tried our best the past decade or so of just driving and treating people as resources, but we have never been this burnt out, this inefficient, and people are at their breaking point. And it’s like, well, let’s go back and get back to this humanity piece of it to try to ease some of that up. And so that, again, the most consistent thing across when I facilitate bringing it back to the person.

Douglas Ferguson (19:50):
Yeah, it’s been longer than the decade that we’ve been doing that. I’d argue that the last decade, there’s been a lot of people trying to unwind some of the stuff that’s been put in place by Taylorism and a lot of the industrial military complex where so much of the work we do is influenced by military type of structures, and those need to be rethought.

Renita Joyce Smith (20:11):
Yeah. And I use this example at times, and thank you for reminding me of the Industrial Revolution there, where back in the day, if you were working at Ford and making a car, you’d need to talk to the person next to you to put on the next tire. It was coming down the assembly line. And so, there was not any need for collaboration in that. You knew what you were doing. There is so much collaboration that’s needed now, and I continue to be in awe that people just do not talk to each other. And so I will consistently get into these rooms, and I was like, “Oh, so you need this information. Have you talked to them?” And they’re like, “Well, no, I assumed. I didn’t want to bother them, or I thought that they knew. They had it all together, or I thought they had enough information. Or I thought, I thought, I thought.”

(20:59):
And it’s like, but the person’s right there. How about we talk about it now? Five minutes later, the amount of clarity that comes. And so yeah, being able to introduce people even back to conversation because it’s just not happening in our hallways or Zoom screens anymore. Folks, again, just showing up, “What do you need from me? I’m going to bounce out,” versus, “Let’s actually talk about this and connect and work through it.” We’re not just putting tires on a car anymore, so we need a little bit extra support in this.

Douglas Ferguson (21:34):
So tell me about the connection activities that you typically like to embed.

Renita Joyce Smith (21:38):
Yes. So one that I’m loving right now is personal histories. And so being able to ask folks, going back to your childhood, were you the oldest, middle, youngest sibling? Where did you grow up? What was the environment like, and what was the challenge of your childhood as well? And so, this works extraordinarily well for folks who don’t know a lot about each other, even though they work with each other for years. And it’s a low enough threshold so that where people are a little bit extra guarded, they’re not having to be overly vulnerable in it, but just enough, 10% more vulnerable and transparent. And watching people’s eyes light up, it’s like, I didn’t know you were the oldest kid, or I didn’t know you grew up in Idaho. My grandparents were in Idaho. And then now they have this whole conversation topic, again, with the person they’ve been sitting next to for the past five years.

(22:33):
So being able to introduce these moments of, you can share more about yourself without, again, telling all your business, that has been eye-opening for people. The other part that I love doing is some type of, how are you doing today on an emotional side? And so as adults, we’re kind of afraid of emotion wheels of, nope, I don’t want to actually know how I’m doing or how I’m feeling today. But introducing people to, if you were the weather today, how are you showing up in the room? Sunny, stormy, cloudy, foggy, and going around a room and having people hear each other of like, “Oh, I’m foggy today,” or, “Oh, I’m rainy.” Folks are like, “Oh, I heard you were foggy. Is everything okay? Can I support you?”

(23:21):
And being able to mirror of, you can do this within your meetings, so you just kind of know how your team is doing. Again, you don’t need to know what’s happening at home or the backstory, but getting a good gauge of why Anne may be showing up a little bit down today. Her saying it’s rainy, could be again, that connection and getting that support, and so, those are two that I love leading into.

Douglas Ferguson (23:43):
Very nice. You also mentioned using technology to help structure and drive creativity in your virtual spaces. How’s that enhanced your facilitation practice?

Renita Joyce Smith (23:54):
Yes. So learning how to use a virtual mural board that I learned within the program here at Voltage Control, which has been an amazing tool. So instead of, again, people just looking at the screen, having them go in and do a live sticky note so they can see their idea on the board, and you’re moving things around. And again, people are locked in, and it gives them a way to be tactile because sometimes, especially virtually, folks can zone out and go check email or do something else. But if we have them actively clicking on a virtual whiteboard, it gets their attention even more, and they feel like their ideas are being captured. And it’s not just, no one heard me. Nope, we heard you because you have these three stickies right here, and so your ideas are being brought into a room. So that’s one angle that I love to use virtual whiteboards as technology.

(24:48):
In my own backend process, I love using AI. And I know it can be a little bit controversial nowadays with, wait, is AI going to replace people or whatever else? My position on AI is that it is a value multiplier for how I can be even more effective for a workshop. So I can take my initial ideas for crafting an experience and say, “Here’s my audience. Here’s what we want to get done. Help me really refine this exercise to meet the needs of this audience and workshop.” And so my ideas are better with using AI in the backend. The agenda is smoother. I’m able to also give out handouts with exercises that mirror. And so, I have kind of a facilitation partner in the backend with AI that has quantum leaped my workshops, just being able to have that as a partner.

Douglas Ferguson (25:40):
What AI tools are you leaning into?

Renita Joyce Smith (25:42):
Oh, goodness. That’s a whole… I can jam out for days. I am a Claude girl nowadays. Still, ChatGPT is my old school there for a good workhorse and refining an agenda, that’s there. But Claude for getting the in between of exercises and really getting that tone right for slides and transitions I’m falling in love with. Those two I have in my hip pocket consistently. And then, if I’m ever trying to do any kind of thought leadership, I’m using some automation in there to refine ideas as I go along. But between Claude and ChatGPT, I can go a very long way in facilitation.

Douglas Ferguson (26:24):
Yeah, fantastic.

Renita Joyce Smith (26:25):
Are you weaving in AI in your practice anywhere?

Douglas Ferguson (26:28):
Yeah, I use it daily. Big fan of ChatGPT. I use Claude some. If I’m writing code, I’ll use something called Cursor, heavily using the AI capabilities inside of Miro. We built a ton of stuff on that and launched it at Canvas this year, which is pretty exciting. So also, I’ve been experimenting with tools like Gamma for creating presentations.

Renita Joyce Smith (26:52):
Yes.

Douglas Ferguson (26:53):
Yeah. And have even been using Zapier to automate a lot of stuff. So the things that I was doing by hand with AI, I’m having AI do in the background. So I don’t even have to take the time to prompt it anymore. The stuff’s just waiting for me when I sit down to work on it.

Renita Joyce Smith (27:09):
Absolutely. And Gamma is a fantastic tool. And I continue to be in awe just on the leaps that these tools are making by the week. And so, even just trying to catch up and stay in lockstep with it. But I think having the perspective, especially as a facilitator of what can you have in your back pocket to just make things more efficient and more effective so you can focus your time on the experience versus just the punching of the keyboard. So figuring out how to weave it into your workflow is so important right now.

Douglas Ferguson (27:39):
Yeah, absolutely. And you talk about wanting to build a bench of facilitators in Dallas. What kind of culture or mindset do you hope that group will embody?

Renita Joyce Smith (27:49):
Oh, goodness. So I have a business partner that I work with a lot as well. And we were talking about this the other day of, as we kind of expand our bench, there is a mindset of, can you also be authentic and vulnerable and present in a room and engage? So this is not you showing up and reading off of the script, which there’s nothing wrong with that. There are some trainings and facilitators that are very much of, I need a full binder of facilitator notes. Those aren’t [inaudible 00:28:20] I’m looking for. I’m looking for people that can have an outline and knowing what beats you need to hit, but also have the intuition to know what’s in the room and to be able to pivot and to flow and to engage the audience where you’re almost one with the material versus having to say, again, that scripted workflow that’s there.

(28:42):
So it’s a little bit of an X factor in it of what does your stagecraft look like? And I think that’s one of those little pieces of facilitation that I don’t know if we talked about enough that sets you apart even as a more masterful facilitator. How are you just working in this, like it’s an audience while you’re also facilitating the room. And so that’s what I’m looking for. And what I’m talking to other facilitators or asking, “How are you just so good with the people?” I tell them, “Go take an improv class.”

(29:15):
Improv has been the other biggest game changer for me in my practice. I’ve been doing it for four years, and nothing teaches you how to stay in the moment and be able to respond to what’s in front of you like improv does. So right now I can step into any room and anything can pretty much happen, and I’m like, “Okay, yes, and what’s next? Yes, and we can pivot.” If someone has a weird question, I have a response. I can be in this moment with you because I can deal in the uncertainty and ambiguity because I learned how to play with it in improv.

Douglas Ferguson (29:48):
What do you wish more people understood about the deeper impact of facilitation, especially the impact it can have on teams and organizations?

Renita Joyce Smith (29:57):
I think one thing I wish people understood about the impact to facilitation is that it’s not a nice to have, it’s a critical component. Your facilitator can make or break your meeting and experience. If you’re investing thousands of dollars in the venue, thousands of dollars of man-hours of people showing up, stepping away from their desk to be in a room to get something done or to connect or to build, thinking about the facilitator last or oh, I can do it myself, which again, can have good results. But the impact of having a specialist in the room when you are investing all of those resources is critical for, again, the outcomes that you want to have.

(30:48):
So what I love seeing now is if people are starting to make this shift of, “Hey, we have this coming up. We need to call in a facilitator.” That’s now becoming the second thought versus, “Oh, we’ll just do it ourselves.” And seeing the results, again, of having that expertise in the room helps people just to know that it is a valuable thing to invest in as well. And also just for the people that are putting on the meeting, you get to experience the meeting with your team. You don’t have to be on. You can be a participant and create with your peers. And so, it gives you a chance to also rest and be a part of it versus having to facilitate and organize, and, and, and. Nope, you get to sit in a seat and know that you are kind of just being held in this container.

Douglas Ferguson (31:39):
Yeah. So looking ahead, what’s your next frontier in facilitation?

Renita Joyce Smith (31:45):
Oh, goodness. My next frontier in facilitation is I really want to be on the edge of thought leadership for facilitation. And as you heard across this whole interview, it is really pounding home just the humanity of it all. And so, I want to lean into creating more experiences where that is present. And fortunately, going into 2026 here, that’s already starting to show up because people are responding to, “Oh, I saw what you did over here. Can you bring this to my organization?” We need to lighten up. We need to connect. We need to get some things done, but we don’t know each other.

(32:25):
And so, what’s on the frontier for me is one, again, sharing that this can be the way that it can look like. It can look fun. It doesn’t have to be stuffy. It doesn’t have to suck. That’s in there. And you can walk out with an outcome and a net new connection. And so being able to beat that drum there. And then the other part I’m looking forward to in facilitation is it being my Trojan horse of me getting into organizations and facilitating that change. And so, as we were talking about earlier, so many organizations are inauthentic. And so, if I can Trojan horse my way in and add a little bit of that fairy dust of, nope, y’all can connect. It’s okay. And so, that’s my way of leaving organizations better than I found them as well.

Douglas Ferguson (33:11):
Love that. Leaving organizations better than you found them.

Renita Joyce Smith (33:15):
And so, knowing that, oh, they experienced Renita. They experienced Leap Forward, and now the team is better. They’re closer. They’re getting things done in a net new way. Burnout has decreased. And you can say, “Wait, Renita, all that’s from a facilitation? Come on now.” But in reality, planting those seeds and breaking that ice and breaking down those barriers has exponential results in ROI going forward. And so, I will spread a seed and be a gardener. And that is my inherent purpose, and I love it.

Douglas Ferguson (33:51):
And when you think about the types of organizations that you’re hoping to work with going forward, are there new problems or new types of organizations that you’re hoping to lean more into?

Renita Joyce Smith (34:02):
I think organization-wise, I’ve been really enjoying taking some of the old stuffy organizations that are in the middle of transformation, knowing they’re like, “Hey, we’ve done things this way for the past two decades. We have net new blood coming in, but we don’t know how to turn that corner. We know that we need to turn a corner, but we need some help in doing it.” And so, I am drawn to the chaos of that. I’m also drawn to organizations that, even if they’re not in the transformation, they’re like, “Well, we know just something has to be different because our people aren’t experiencing the company like we want them to experience it. We aren’t showing up the way we want to show up. And so, can you show us a net new way of doing it?”

(34:49):
So I am drawn to the organizations that are ready for a change and to experience something different, even if they don’t know quite what it is yet. And the more chaotic and broken, the better for me because it’s just kind of ripe for being able to build that up anew, yes. And then having that consulting background, you can drop me into a Fortune five or a nonprofit that just started, and the Swiss Army belt’s there of tools is the same.

Douglas Ferguson (35:21):
What sorts of transformations are you mostly seeing folks dealing with these days?

Renita Joyce Smith (35:26):
So one is AI. Folks are really trying to understand how do we get people in the mindset of using these tools and the change management of it as well. And so, being able to couple my pro side change management with the facilitation and the professional development aspect of it and getting people’s minds ready for AI, reinvigorating that curiosity again in folks, and then where it can fit in the business process. So that’s one aspect of change.

(35:54):
Another is, there are so many priorities and projects that companies are dealing with, and it is compounding. Nothing is slowing down. And so, how do we hold all of this work that we need to get done and be able to sequence it in the right way where people are talking to each other? So that’s another big transformation aspect there of just helping to, again, organize the chaos of it all and create alignment in there.

(36:22):
And then the third type of transformation is we’ve had either an influx of workforce, or we’ve had to lay people off. And we need someone to come in and just help our people be more resilient because they are burnt out, and there’s so much going on. So can you come deal with the heart of people in the transformation? So it hits those three buckets of AI, project and work, and then the resiliency of the actual workforce.

Douglas Ferguson (36:49):
So I want to invite you to lead our listeners with the final thought as we wrap up today.

Renita Joyce Smith (36:54):
So the final thought that I would have for everyone is, it won’t come as a surprise, but do not forget the humanity of who we are. There is so much goodness in being able to connect with someone. And so, whenever you have the opportunity to create a connection point, whether that is a small icebreaker at the beginning of the meeting, asking someone how they’re doing in the break room, inviting someone to lunch, to coffee, to get to know them better, offering something about yourself, being able to inject more of that connection within whatever you’re doing, that is such a powerful aspect to lean into. And so, that’s what I would invite folks to do, is just find one extra way to connect with someone in all the containers that you’re a part of. And we’ll start seeing that ripple go through our community, and it is so needed right now. So don’t forget the human stuff.

Douglas Ferguson (37:55):
Awesome. Thanks for that important reminder. And just want to say thanks for being on the show. It was great chatting.

Renita Joyce Smith (38:01):
Absolutely. Thank you for having me. It was a lot of fun.

Douglas Ferguson (38:04):
Thanks for joining me for another episode of the Facilitation Lab Podcast. If you enjoyed the episode, please leave us a review and be sure to subscribe and receive updates when new episodes are released. We love listener tales and invite you to share your facilitation stories. Send them to us on LinkedIn or via email. If you want to know more, head over to our blog where I post weekly articles and resources about facilitation, team dynamics, and collaboration, voltagecontrol.com.