Facilitate 2025: What; How; Who; Why.

Facilitation happens everywhere, in meetings, conferences, and events, but it also happens in youth work, community engagement and schools.

Facilitators are always supporting others to grow and change, but this conference is a space for your own development. A chance to meet others you can learn from, look at different tools and techniques to improve your skills, and to grow your business.

Everyone interested in facilitation is welcome, whether you are brand new to this work or have been doing it for years, whether you work in-house or externally and whether you facilitate some or all of the time.

What to expect in 2025

Over the two days you can expect workshops, talks and time to connect but also plenty of stationary, the infamous raffle and of course an organised dine around. Always a fan favourite.

We want to create a space to get curious, explore, question, challenge, and most importantly learn and develop - so will be delving into the What, the How, the Who and the Why of facilitation, the difference it can make, and how we can ensure our facilitation practice reflects the challenges faced by many in our society today.

Sessions will be an invitation to dive into the What; How; Who and Why. More details to follow...

Being anti-racist 2025 and beyond.

As part of the 2025 programme there will be a thread on anti-racism and what this means for us as facilitators.

Leading up to this year's conference

There will be a number of facilitation training courses being offered in the same training venue the day before the conference. You can check them out here (please note some courses are still in planning and will have furtehr details shortly).

THEMES FOR FACILITATE 2025 - The What; The How; The Who; The Why.

WHAT - Are the Foundations for Facilitation?

What do we mean by facilitation? – What are the foundations needed for effective practice?

This track is about getting to grips with or refreshing some of the basics. When is facilitation most helpful? what questions do I have? When is it appropriate to challenge and move beyond my own biases?

Questions we might ask ourselves include:

• What facilitation might mean in different roles?
• What is expected of me as a facilitator?
• What don't I know that I need to ask? What questions do we have?
• What is distinctive about facilitation compared to training and coaching?

HOW - Do We Balance Changes in Facilitation Practice?

From flip chart, post it notes and sharpies to Artificial Intelligence - how is facilitation embracing innovation (or not), what works well and why? How do we know what works well and why? How is facilitation blending old and new - in relationship with each other?

Questions we might ask ourselves include

• How do we balance the old with the new!?
• How do we integrate technology and AI into our facilitation practice?
• How do we avoid chasing the new stuff when the old stuff would have been just perfect?
• How do we keep groups engaged?

WHO - Is in the room when we facilitate (and why)

Equity, Diversity Inclusion have been important themes for conference over the last few years. Our community is growing in diversity and we recognise that as we diversify our thinking, community and practice, we need to challenge ourselves further.

Questions we might ask ourselves include:

• How do we navigate power dynamics?
• What do we need to do to empower young people?
• What is Public Engagement?
• How do we invite people to things?
• Are we noticing (aware of) who is in the room?
• Who are we as facilitators? Are we aware of our own biases etc…
• Facilitation techniques for different groups, are we adapting facilitation for participant needs in the moment?

WHY - Do we facilitate (in the first place) What's the F'in Point? (Facilitating Point!)

Why - do we do this? What is the world we want to create and how do we know we are there?

Questions we might ask ourselves include:

• Why is facilitation important in the first place - what impact does it have?
• Why do we need to evidence impact?
• Why does it make a difference?
• Why is it important that facilitation is used to create change?
• Why is facilitation powerful - telling the story?
• Why do we need to challenge ourselves and our practice to impact change?

Anti-Racist Practice and Methods in Facilitation

During 2025 as an IAF Chapter in England and Wales the Leadership Team has decided to run a thread of supporting approaches to anti-racist practice and learning. An initiative the Leadership Team

Therefore for Facilitate 2025 further to the themes above and we are inviting people to include Anti-Racist Practice/Method in facilitation within their session offer, and welcome sessions that also include this as focus or thread.

We are not expecting that all sessions will include this focus.

What? Foundations for facilitation. When might facilitation help teams to address anti-racism?

How? How might we adapt and develop the way we facilitate? How do we facilitate groups where anti-racist content needs addressing?

Who? Facilitation techniques for anti-racism. Challenging perceptions and biases in the moment.

Why? Why is anti-racist practice important for facilitators? How will we know we are making a difference?

Interested in leading a session?

To submit and expression of interest please complete this form by 15th January. This is not a guarantee you will end up running a session, but will help the organising team in building a suitable and varied programme.

We are keen to have a broad mix of expertise from both “old hands” and new faces. As part of our facilitation community we’d like to invite you to offer a session either by yourself, or co-facilitated with others.

Any questions about this then please email us at [email protected]

Please note this is a volunteer run event, and all participants, including those running workshops are required to register and pay to attend.

Last years conference Facilitate 2024: Growing Together brought together 120 individuals from across the world of facilitation. There were 24 sessions over 2 days exploring every part of this work.

Lots of people said some very nice things....

" An energising and inspiring day surrounded by friendly, supportive and knowledgeable colleagues in the facilitation field"

" Amazing! Friendliest conference ever"

" New tools. New connections and reinforced connections. Increased profile (and confidence) amongst my peers."

" The general vibe was fantastic. It felt a very safe place for learning and I hope it felt so for newcomers. I liked the main room especially because it allowed flexibility of movement, which helped the vibe. Dinner being organised was excellent."

We have a number of pricing options available, more information below:

• EARLY BIRD* - Full conference 2 day ticket : £170
• EARLY BIRD* - 1 day ticket : £110
• Full conference 2 day ticket : £220
• 1 day ticket : £150

ALL tickets include lunch and tea/coffee/refreshments (and biscuits of course)

EARLYBIRD* tickets are limited availability and will sell out so grab them early!

Financial Support: For those experiencing financial difficulty at this time we are offering a pay what you can approach. Please note there are a limited number of pay what you can places, so please only use this option if you are unable to cover the full cost of the ticket price. If you are unsure please contact us at [email protected]

Members discount: If you are an IAF member you can get an additional 25% discount on your early bird or full price ticket price using the members promo code at the checkout (see or email [email protected] for your promo code, if you haven’t received it).

Amendments and cancellations: All tickets must be purchased by 2pm Monday 21st April 2024

If you cancel your registration before midnight on Thursday 10th April, we will provide you with a full refund, less Eventebrite fees.

Cancelations after this time will not be refunded, except in exceptional circumstances on a case by case basis. Please contact [email protected]

Please note that we also reserve the right to cancel with no less than 7 days’ notice, without liability for any consequential or indirect loss. In this case, we will let you know by email and refund all tickets in full, less any associated fees.

Host or Publisher IAF England & Wales