Facilitation
Running a design session that reaches a decision.
5 to work through
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beginner
Two teams meet for 60 minutes to agree who will own a shared notification capability. Everyone is prepared and the discussion is civil, and the meeting ends with "let us take this offline". Why does naming the decision-maker before the session change the outcome mechanically rather than politically?
2 min answer -
intermediate
A cross-team design session for a shared capability produces no decision after ninety minutes. What went wrong in the facilitation?
2 min answer -
intermediate
A design session with twelve participants produces no decisions and everyone leaves frustrated. What should the facilitator have done differently?
2 min answer -
advanced
A nine-person cross-team session reaches a decision at minute 48 of a 50-minute slot and it is recorded the same afternoon. Two days later two attendees have separately told their own teams they disagreed, and by day four one team has stopped work on it. What failed, and which design of the session made it possible?
3 min answer -
advanced
Two teams disagree strongly about where a service boundary should be. How do you run the session that resolves it?
2 min answer
3 terms in this topic
Facilitation
Running a discussion so that a group reaches a decision — a distinct skill from having the best answer.
practiceFacilitation Neutrality
Separating the role of running a discussion from the role of advocating within it, because one person cannot do both credibly.
practicePre-Read Alignment
Speaking to the two or three people whose objection would block a decision before circulating the proposal, so the session confirms a decision rather…
Neighbouring topics
Architecture Communication
General material on communicating architecture.
Architecture Diagrams
Choosing an audience and refusing to mix levels of abstraction.
C4 Model
Context, container, component and code as four separate diagrams.
Context Diagrams
The system as one box, with its users and external systems.
Sequence Diagrams
Ordered message exchange, and walking the failure of each arrow.
Data-Flow Diagrams
Following the data across trust boundaries rather than the calls.
Deployment Diagrams
What runs where, in which zone, behind which boundary.
Communicating Threat Models
Making risk legible to people who will fund or accept it.
Writing Decision Records
Context, alternatives and consequences, written once and never edited.
Technical Proposals
A written argument circulated before the decision feels made.
Architecture Reviews
Reviewing early enough to influence rather than to veto.
Presenting to Executives
Decision first, cost, risk, and what happens if we do nothing.
Presenting to Engineers
Mechanism, alternatives rejected, and what you are unsure about.
Explaining Trade-offs
Naming what was given up, and the condition that would change it.
Handling Disagreement
Arguing from consequences, and escalating in the room.
Negotiation
Trading on interests rather than positions, with priced options.
Documentation Practice
Keeping documents close to the code and honest about staleness.
Presentation Skills
Structure, pacing and the slide that carries the decision.
Written Communication
Writing that survives being read without you in the room.