Facilitation vs Animation (it's a French thing)

 

I've been working a lot in France recently, doing workshops etc for Orange/France Telecom. It's been a lot of fun, and hard work. One of the things the French ask me when they first meet me at these workshops is: "Oh, are you the animator?" or "Will you be animating the workshop?" At first I found this amusing especially as I do some drawn animation in my spare time: link.

But when I asked about the use of the word, I found it is used as we would use "Facilitator". So I was there to "animate" the workshop.

I've grown to really like this term  and now use it more and more in English to describe the activity of running design workshops. I seems to me that facilitation is too passive a word for what we do as designers in workshops with clients and users. Facilitating feels a bit like opening doors for people, handing them pens etc. But to animate a room of people you need to give them confidence, not just pens. I can be doing micro coaching, counselling and sketching lessons all in one session with the group and individuals.
For me animating is about bringing things to life, whether that is a group of jaded (undead) attendees or the ideas themselves.

I'm sure many of us try not to say they are "facilitating". I'm not suggesting we call ourselves animators but we can use the word to describe what we're going to do. So can I suggest that we start to describe what we do in workshops as "animating" (might need some explanation) and see ourselves as "Animators of workshops and ideas". It seems more descriptive and it feels more exciting.

So, get animating!

Comments

[Erik]

Hi,

First of all, thank you for your writings on your blog (following for quite some time now).. really love to read them, although never really replying to it. Sorry..

This one only tricked me, because in the past (I had the same confusion amongst people). While working with Flash at the time and animating a lot, people tend to ask here (in the Netherlands) "What are you doing?". If you then would reply "I am an animator", things could get blurry in the meaning of the word (if the person in question not having a idea of animations / etc). It seems here too (as in French) to be meant "Facilitator" as well.

Albeit in a more simple way it is used as profession to animate kids on campsites. Regarding to this fact I found it difficult in a conversation to completly change the vision / idea / knowledge / assumption of the other person from "the guy who is animating kids on campsites" to the "the guy who is making drawings / graphics which are changing in time".

I like your thought of: "For me animating is about bringing things to life, whether that is a group of jaded (undead) attendees or the ideas themselves.".

But (and this is dependent on the knowledge of your audience) if I would say that I would be the "Animator of workshops and ideas", things would get the same confusion, I guess.
Now I would have to change the thought of the party involved from "the person who's making drawings / graphics which are changing in time (or better: bringing things to life)" to "the person who's giving / leading / supporting the workshop".
But that's off course completely dependent on the terms and vocabulary of your audience.

[Matt]

Great post, Rory. I too have wondered about the term "animation" - for example the editorial teams who make a website change and engage with an online community can also be animators. I love the idea of "animating kids on campsites" btw :)

What makes it a strong term is the promise of unpredicatbility. Once you've breathed life into something - be it a room full of executives or a campsite full of kids - there's no knowing how it will end. The animator's job is to provide the spark and fuel the process but not control it.

When a workshop goes well, everyone - the "animator" included - comes away having discovered something they didn't expect to find when they entered the room. When that doesn't happen, participants may feel they've been short-changed.

[Rachael West]

Lovely! The word facilitation is bandied about so much that it's easy to forget what it actually means. Having a new name is a nice reminder to stop and reflect on that.

I'll be running a workshop in Lille in March called Through a Clown's Eyes - the art of facilitation and communication. A big focus is getting in touch with your own energy in order to create a session that is engaging and, well, animated.

http://throughaclownseyes.eventbrite.com/

[Viv McWaters]

Hi there

Found your site via twitter. I think this is a useful term to use and has a lot of benefits over the word 'facilitator' - it's novel, so people are likely to stop for a moment and ponder what that means; it suggests movement; and it breaks the mould of 'facilitator as person making it easy' or 'facilitator as time keeper' or 'facilitator as MC' or 'facilitator as neutral' - all of which I think somewhat undermine the role of facilitation. And often people have no idea about the role of a facilitator (hence the above misconceptions) so I have no problem replacing the word with another that might even creates curiosity, instead of cynicism.

Cheers

Viv