In the entire world, there is nothing so boring as a report out at the end of a small group discussion. Now, I’m all for small group discussions. They are both necessary and useful - we need more small group discussions. But report outs should be abolished.
The value of a small group discussion is in the discussion. It gives the members of the group an opportunity to hear other view points, to learn from the articulation of one’s own view (see We Learn When We Talk) and to build or deepen relationships with others. None of those reasons require a report out.
As far back as I can remember, I’ve never learned anything useful from a report out. Here’s a typical one – see if it’s familiar. When it’s his turn, the self-appointed reporter of the small group starts,
“In our group we talked about maturity, growth, and development. We all agreed that you need to define a clear goal to work toward, but you also need to stay flexible so that you can adapt to changes in the environment. Without a clear goal you can’t measure progress and without measures you don’t know if you are reaching the goal. Measuring is critically important. In my company we use a dashboard, red, yellow and green. The green means you are on target, everything is fine and there is no need for action. Yellow means ….(you can guess the rest as the reporter continues).
Let’s examine what is learned from that report out. First, we learn what topics were covered. That would be helpful if we learned anything about the thinking behind these topics, but the typical cryptic phrase or single word does little to inform us. Take “Growth” for example, Growth at the expense of quality? How much growth? Are their limits to growth? We learn nothing from a list of topics or cryptic phrases.
Secondly, the one topic that is elaborated, clear goals, is so couched in generalities that it is useless. None of us would question that having a clear goal to work toward is helpful. But is this comment insightful? Is it news to anyone? No! How is it helpful to report out generalities that everyone already knows?
I’ve sat through so many report outs that I consider myself something of a connoisseur. (I was once in a meeting in which 20 groups reported out, one after the other – it was deadly. We were cautioned to keep it to no more than 5 minutes - but that is an hour and a half! We reported out longer than the small group discussion!). That aside, based on years of experience I’ve been able to classify all small group reporters into two broad categories, The Cataloger and the Ego Centric.
The cataloger feels duty bound to report out every idea that any one raised during the small group discussion, no matter how mundane. The cataloger usually ends this recitation by turning to the group and asking, “Did I leave anything out?” Which unfortunately, opens the gate for yet more trivial items.
The Ego Centric, on the other hand, reports out on his own ideas disregarding anything the group said. Group members listen in puzzlement to this recitation thinking, “I don’t remember discussing that!” My example above tends toward the Ego Centric with the reporter’s speech on what the dashboards they use in his company.
There is, however, an option to report outs – POPCORN! Here’s how it works. When the small group discussion time is over the facilitator gets the group’s attention. Then she says, “Let me give you a minute to reflect on the discussion you’ve just had. Think about what stood out for you.” And then the facilitator actually quits talking for a whole minute! Then the facilitator says, “I’m interested in hearing a few comments. What stuck with you?” Then the popcorn begins. Not right away of course, you have to wait a bit before the corn begins to pop. But within a minute someone raises their hand and the popping begins.
There are several valuable learning outcomes that are achieved when you do POPCORN, that just don’t happen with report outs.
1) The facilitator asks for what was learned not what was said – and actually gives the participants time to reflect on that. What I learned is so much more insightful than what was said. There are a dozen questions that could be asked, “What stood out for you?”; “What was new for you in the discussion?”; “What did you learn that you didn’t know before? – all focus on what was unique or significant to you personally.
2) Participants are responsible only for speaking their own thoughts. Participants can be a great deal more accurate, not to mention shorter, when articulating their own learning, than when trying to be fair to everyone’s comments.
3) The facilitator asks for “a few comments,” signaling to the group that not everyone needs to speak. But the few you get, are often choice! It’s amazing what participants will say if you ask them to think rather than recite. And those thoughtful insights inform the thinking of the other participants and add to the collective understanding by providing new perspectives.
4) Even with only a few comments, the facilitator is able to gain a “sense of the room” in terms of their understanding and she often learns something as well.
* Trish Silber gave me the wonderfully descriptive term, Popcorn
