Facilitation

MOVING FORWARD FASTER

Important issues and tough problems demand lively debate, honest sharing of thoughts and collaboration. Navigating this process is hard work, and trying to participate in the process while also managing it is nearly impossible. Sometimes you just need a third party to facilitate the conversation for you.

Our Capabilities


As skilled outside facilitators, we offer sound consensus-building and decision-making processes to promote the most effective communications among your team. Through professional facilitation, we provide our clients with the means to focus squarely on the issues that matter, when they matter most. The result is a better, clearer path to the ultimate objectives of your organization.

Our Approach


Our team is comprised of multiple professional facilitators with a broad cross-section of industry knowledge and decades of experience helping clients work through the process and get to where they need to be.

Whatever your goals, we are confident our approach to facilitation can assist you in getting there. Whether it involves reviewing organizational documents, interviewing relevant stakeholders to gather background information, or the actual facilitation of sessions to promote clarity and remove barriers to communication, our process is one that will apply itself to match the needs of your organization, regardless of the challenges or key issues you may face.

Want to learn more about our approach to facilitation? Let us know.


Our Experience


LOUISIANA HOUSING CORPORATION
Creating Consensus Among Stakeholders to Drive Action

Challenge
After the devastating blows dealt by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, the Louisiana Housing Corporation (LHC), formerly known as the Louisiana Housing Finance Agency, entered into the national spotlight as legislators and housing advocates alike demanded a fair and efficient dispersal of housing funds to expedite the state’s shortage of housing affordable to low-income families. LHC, realizing it would need a robust strategic plan to carry out its mission and target its efforts appropriately, enlisted SSA to help create consensus among its board of commissioners through the development of a strategic plan to support the agency’s mission and shape its future direction.
Approach
To ensure a successful strategic planning process SSA worked closely with the agency’s key and administrative staff to outline expectations and define roles and relationships. At the same time, SSA also facilitated a public meeting to solicit input to guide the strategic planning process with the needs and suggestions of the people LHC serves front and center. The SSA project team compiled comments from public input received at the meeting into a written document that would serve as a critical input into the planned board of commissioners retreat at which strategic planning would be the primary focus. SSA facilitated the retreat, drafted a proposal of the agency’s strategic plan, and submitted it for the board’s approval.
Impact
The public forum served a critical input to this process by soliciting input from the people in the housing communities, resulting in key feedback from nearly two dozen stakeholders about their individual and collective needs as well as recommendations about how LHC could best accomplish its mission through the strategic planning process. With this forward-thinking strategic plan in hand, LHC Board of Commissioners were able to codify strategy into a set of LHC policies that would guide all staff efforts over the next five years, helping to bring Louisiana closer to an equitable future in which all families have a safe, affordable and desirable place to call home.

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