Improve Problem-Solving and Innovation with Professional Facilitation

Empowerment to unleash creativity is particularly important in group settings because creativity is dependent on the nature of social interactions. It would be great if social interactions that support social needs tend to promote creativity while those that don't support social needs tend to disrupt creativity. But, the relationship between social needs in interactions and creativity is a bit more complex. For example, status and certainty are two important social needs in group settings. Certain forms of status can promote creativity while other forms of status degrade creativity and a level of uncertainty can also promote creativity. An experienced facilitator can manage the complex relationship between social needs and creativity to guide a group to valuable outcomes.

Dr. Patrick became a Certified Professional Facilitator (CPF) with the International Association of Facilitators (IAF) in 2013 and got re-certified in both 2016 and 2019. A professional facilitator offers several benefits to team leaders such as the following:

  • Provides professional management of dysfunctional behavior
  • Enables project or team leader to participate
  • Increases meeting efficiency
  • Increases ROI or the value of the meeting outcomes relative to total costs
  • Drives group to accountability through high engagement

Here are examples of how executives have described Dr. Patrick’s facilitation skills:

  • “Valerie is a brilliant facilitator. I watched her in action several times at the EEB/CBEI and she has a real talent for working with multiple stakeholders in complex settings. Many participants, myself included, were academics who are highly resistant to be facilitated or subjected to any other obvious intervention in their own reflections and debates. But Val always manages to get through the process with no one the worse for wear and improves the outcomes for all.” Mark Alan Hughes, Ph.D.; Professor of Practice, University of Pennsylvania
  • “Dr. Valerie Patrick [is] an experienced and highly effective professional facilitator…. Let me express that I have seen her bring significant value to diverse teams on numerous occasions.” Michael T. Gallagher, Former Head Innovation and Business Growth Strategies, Covestro LLC
  • "Valerie can be counted on to design and facilitate executive workshops that deliver insights of high value to the business. She demonstrated this at Bayer in North America in the areas of sustainability and product innovation. What is really powerful about these workshops is that they lead to lasting thinking and action by participants following the experience.” Greg Babe, CEO Liquid X Printed Metals Inc. (Former CEO Bayer Corporation and Bayer MaterialScience LLC)

Here are some videos to learn more: