S02 Ep89 Facilitation Tool: Equity Sticks

Meetings are a great way to communicate with large groups, but sometimes they exclude something important to share.

Here's a solution borrowed from a teacher

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Welcome to Ever Better Today: the daily podcast for creating your optimal business, career, or overall life in ten minutes or less. I’m Lisa Conners Vogt, Executive and Leadership Coach and founder of Ever Better Coaching and Consulting. Let’s jump in!

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I value diversity and inclusion and strive to include as many voices as possible in meetings that I facilitate. I learned about equity sticks while working with the SEED School of Maryland’s leadership team.

Equity sticks are a tool frequently used by teachers. Sidenote…Teachers are the greatest facilitators in the world! I’ll be looking for more tips from them!

 

Here are some of the disadvantages of having a different skin color in society I observed throughout the years:

• As the meeting starts, each person writes their name on 3-5 craft sticks/popsicle sticks. you can also use index cards, pieces of paper, or another tool.
• The sticks are collected and the facilitator holds them in a cup.
• As opportunities to participate arise, the facilitator picks a stick from the cup and calls on that person. that stick is then placed in a separate cup.

The sticks set the expectation that everyone in the meeting will participate. This eliminates the common challenge of one or two people dominating the conversation and helps to ensure that all voices are heard equitably.

When we encourage each other to share their thoughts and stories, every voice has a chance to be heard and our perspectives are enriched.

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