My Masterclass on Conference Chairing and Facilitation for Association of Association Executives (AAE) will prepare you to perform well as a Chair or Facilitator.
In the meantime, if you’re planning to do some Chairing or Facilitating for the first time, here are some of the things to watch out for.
Contributing too much: This can show up as a tendency to dominate a panel discussion with your opinions or experience, thereby shutting out the speakers or the audience’s input.
Contributing too little: Your role is to enable others to shine, but you’re not sure how to make it happen. Or you believe that ‘the event/speakers/audience will take care of themselves’. The end result is that you end up being too passive.
Forgetting the team: Chairs have different responsibilities. These include supporting the speakers to shine. And working more closely with the Organiser. Chairs are the link between the Organiser, the Speakers and the audience.
Not expanding your skillset: Your speaker skills will be useful but they won’t be enough. A Chairing opportunity is a chance to grow, expand your experience and skills and make a significant difference to the experience of the speakers and audience.
Seize this opportunity and you’ll see the benefit in other areas of your work and life too. Do let me know how you get on. Feel free to contact me here.