You’re twenty minutes into a meeting and you still don’t know what you’re supposed to get out of it. The conversation keeps moving, but it’s not getting any clearer. You can see that it needs some help.

The catch: You’re not the person running it.

As a workshop designer, you know how much structure matters. But using those skills in someone else’s meeting can be tricky: Is it your place to ask what the goal is? To point out that the person who needs to make the decision isn’t there? At what point does helping become taking over?

IMHO you can step in. It’s your time, too. You deserve to get something out of the session.

But tread with caution. Your job isn’t to replace the organizer or turn their meeting into the workshop you would have designed. It’s to help by offering something useful.

You could ask to clarify the scope. It’s a simple approach, but it’s also a way to contribute without announcing that you think the meeting is going badly.

Are we discussing this one issue or the larger problem behind it? Are we gathering perspectives or choosing a direction? Are we discussing or deciding today?

Rather than jump in and try to provide direction, you can help nudge the meeting by having the host clarify what the group is trying to do and their intention for bringing everyone together.

“Would it help if I took some notes where we can all see them?”

This is one of the facilitation skills I’d like workshop designers to use more often outside their workshops. You don’t need to be running the session to help people see what they’re saying.

Taking shared, visual notes can align participants on the questions being discussed, the options on the table, what’s been decided, and what’s still unresolved.

A shoutout here to Melissa Raffoni’s HBR article, “Stealth Meeting Facilitation from the Rank-and-File.” She recommends offering to take notes on a shared screen, giving the group something it can see, edit, and use to work through the discussion. It’s the part of her article that most directly connects to the everyday use of workshop facilitation skills.

The notes don’t have to be elaborate. A few headings and a clear separation between questions, proposals, and decisions may be enough for the discussion in front of you.

Be careful about what you capture, though. Writing something down doesn’t make it an agreement. Ask, “Is this a decision, or are we still considering it?” Check that your wording reflects what people meant.

You’re offering to make the discussion visible, not deciding what it means on everyone else’s behalf.

I have been told that asking questions is my superpower. I find that one of the best ways to redirect a conversation without assuming ownership of a meeting is to ask clarifying questions. And you can use them to redirect the focus to the topic at hand, to the person who is trying to run the meeting or the goal that was established in the agenda.

I do hate "how might we" questions because I feel that they are often weaponized to shut down conversation or redirect the discussion away from the topic at hand. And the tone can be quite condescending. See Trician Wang’s Fast Company article “Design thinking’s most popular strategy is BS” for more on this.

A good thoughtful question opens, rather than shuts down conversation, can help steer the discussion into a useful direction that benefits everyone and helps the meeting host achieve their goal for holding the meeting in the first place.

This is the boundary to keep in mind: knowing how to facilitate doesn’t make every unproductive meeting your responsibility. (As I like to tell everyone who works with me: Just because you have the skills, doesn’t make it your job.")

You can offer to help. The organizer may welcome it, or they may not. You may clarify one issue without resolving the rest. You may leave with better notes and no decision.

Make the contribution you can reasonably make, then recognize its limits.

Remembering that this is “not my meeting, not my problem” lets you stay out of it, but it doesn’t get you your time back. Equally, taking over isn’t the answer either.

Ask the useful question. Offer to capture the discussion. Use the skills you have, without assuming ownership of a meeting you didn’t organize.

Even if you can’t rescue every meeting, with careful and considerate interventions, your facilitation skills will be able to help redirect off-track meetings even when you’re not in charge.

That’s right! In Workshop Workshop, we use a fictional, sci-fi-inspired case study. Participants will play consultants hired to design a workshop for the team behind the next evil battle station. The previous stations have been destroyed, past design teams have met unfortunate ends, and trust between the engineering and design ranks is at an all-time low.

Participants will receive background information and discovery interview notes, then work through a series of exercises. They’ll choose a workshop type, design key activities, and create a scenario note outlining their facilitation plan.

Through hands-on activities, participants learn how to structure collaborative sessions for different topics, groups, and settings. And we have fun doing it :)

The Workshop Workshop is November 24th at a Europe-friendly time:

08:30am-12:30pm Eastern / 1:30-5:30pm British / 2:30-6:30pm Central European