What’s Next?

Thoughts and predictions about the future of virtual facilitation

By Jim Cain

“History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.” -Sir Winston Churchill

Predicting the future isn’t in my job description, but then neither was converting everything I knew about real-world facilitation and transferring it to virtual space. If I’m right, years from now people will say I was clairvoyant—perhaps even a genius; and if I’m wrong, well, nothing wrong with obscurity, I guess. So, knowing the risks and fully embracing them, I’d like to share my thoughts and predictions about the future of virtual facilitation.

Photo: © Can Stock Photo / ra2studio

“A mind once stretched by a new idea never regains its original dimension.”

--Oliver Wendell Holmes

The above statement by Oliver Wendell Holmes implies that individuals tend to move forward, explore new technologies and methodologies, and expand their horizons to grow. I believe that virtual technology will improve, adding features and opportunities to connect even remote individuals in new and interesting ways. Facilitators—always ready to embrace the use of a tool or technique showing promise—will learn to use even the most obscure details of this emerging technology. The future will not be a return to the past, but rather present an even greater variety of opportunities that facilitators, teachers, and trainers can select, based upon the needs of their audiences.

Virtual facilitators will no longer be viewed as a local resource, but rather as a world resource. Virtual facilitators will be able to work and play with audiences anywhere in the world, not just locally. In fact, the word locally will need a new definition in the virtual world. Glocal? Lobal? With an internet connection, individuals anywhere in the world can show up side by side with participants who are in the same ZIP code, or even in the same building as their facilitator. Sure, there will be challenges (like time zones, language translations, video competency and etiquette), but once these are mastered, the possibilities are endless.

Facilitators who can “build” virtual resources and props will be valued. In order to lead some of my favorite teambuilding activities, I need some basic pieces of equipment, such as a Raccoon Circle, a few index cards, a tennis ball, and a piece of rope. In much the same way as facilitators obtain these items in the real world, they will need to create them in the virtual world if that is where their audience is located. The good news is creating props and equipment in virtual space is reasonably inexpensive. The bad news is it can be extremely time-consuming. My advice? Start with props and resources that deliver the best outcome for the least amount of effort.

Facilitating In Virtual Space

“What you must learn is that these rules are no different than the rules

of a computer system. Some of them can be bent, others can be broken.”

--Morpheus to Neo in The Matrix

Some things are possible in virtual space that simply cannot be replicated in the real world. Things like gravity, time, and the basic laws of physics can all be modified to match the needs of the facilitator or the group. Activities and simulations can be repeated indefinitely or modified with each presentation. Imagine playing volleyball where each player is in a different country. Read the book Ready Player One by Ernest Cline (or listen to the audio recording with Wil Wheaton narrating), and imagine your next virtual meeting with everyone connected via a haptic suit. Maybe such things aren’t available today, but someday they will be.

The transition will be hard. No one said this was going to be easy. Rapid growth can be an extremely uncomfortable and even painful experience. Keep trying. Improve. Get better. There is no shortcut here. The way to get from where we were to where we need to be isn’t going to be easy or fun, but it will be worth it.

Photo: © Can Stock Photo / ShutterM

There is no finish line. At no time in the future will we say, “OK, we’re done. Virtual facilitation has gone as far as it can go, at least for now.”

In 1966, Warren Smith published a book entitled Modern Optical Engineering. Even decades later, students were using this same textbook in university classes around the globe. Optics, it seemed, was a fixed subject matter. All that could be done had been done, or so we thought. Then Narinder Singh Kapany invented the fiber-optic cable and set the optical engineering world on its ear. Suddenly, what had seemed both fixed and finite had become infinite again. It will be the same for virtual facilitation.

Everyone has homework to do. Remember what it was that thrilled you about facilitating groups in the first place. Then see how you can create that kind of feeling again, in the virtual world.

It Can’t Be Done

“The world is moving so fast these days that the man who says it can’t be done

is generally interrupted by someone doing it.”

--Harry Emerson Fosdick (in the early 1900s)

As more and more facilitators become familiar with virtual methods, there will be more usage of this technology and development of new technologies to assist with all the things that currently can’t be done. Many of these new ideas will come from facilitators working in the virtual trenches.

High Tech Demands High Touch

When John Naisbitt wrote in his 1982 bestselling book Megatrends, he suggested that, in a world filled with technology, people long for personal, human contact. Not even a global pandemic can alter this reality, although an expansion of the word contact may be required.

Group facilitators will continue to have value, especially in the virtual world. The ability to work and play with groups, to form bonds between the members of a team, to provide insights and impart skills to a group, to teach, train and inspire, these things will endure.

Jim Cain of Teamwork & Teamplay is the author of nearly two dozen books filled with team- and community-building activities from around the world. His real-world workshops are legendary, and he is getting better at the virtual stuff with each passing day. For more information, visit: www.teamworkandteamplay.com.

This article, and many more, are part of the book The Learning Curve – The Transition from Facilitating in the Real World to Facilitating in a Virtual One, from the American Camp Association bookstore.