Falling Off the Horse
Send photos and examples of successful layouts and equipment in advance Everyone needs to hear and see everything that happens-more microphones, multiple projections screens, and rolls of “tapestry” paper for long wall charts can really help with large groups Arrive at venues with enough extra time to fix problems
How to run it
- Amplify or affirm tangible insights and successes; briefly try to redirect people than have missed the point (it is easier to affirm success than fix)
- Be comfortable with differentiating the quality of insights. Brilliant contributions will bounce around the room from group to group. No one person or group will drive all the action.
- Be sure to record top insights and actions in your proceedings. Make them visible on wall "tapestries." Their contribution to making progress may not be immediately apparent.
- Ask, “Have we plumbed all the depths and explored all the peaks?” “Do we need to dig deeper or come back to this topic?”
- ) Moving Forward Without First Looking Back
- My fourth most common mistake is NOT taking time to debrief what just happened… or what happened well before the current interaction.
- GETTING BACK IN THE SADDLE: Make time for short debriefs as you go
Run this exercise live
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Prompts to use +
Amplify or affirm tangible insights and successes; briefly try to redirect people than have missed the point (it is easier to affirm success than fix)
Be comfortable with differentiating the quality of insights. Brilliant contributions will bounce around the room from group to group. No one person or group will drive all the action.
Be sure to record top insights and actions in your proceedings. Make them visible on wall "tapestries." Their contribution to making progress may not be immediately apparent.
Ask, “Have we plumbed all the depths and explored all the peaks?” “Do we need to dig deeper or come back to this topic?”
My fourth most common mistake is NOT taking time to debrief what just happened… or what happened well before the current interaction.
GETTING BACK IN THE SADDLE: Make time for short debriefs as you go
Run this with your AI assistant +
Works with Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, or your own local model: paste this prompt and your AI will co-facilitate this exercise with you.
Adapt this exercise for my exact room. Exercise: Falling Off the Horse. Readiness: Publishable Draft. Core moves: Amplify or affirm tangible insights and successes; briefly try to redirect people than have missed the point (it is easier to affirm success than fix); Be comfortable with differentiating the quality of insights. Brilliant contributions will bounce around the room from group to group. No one person or group will drive all the action.; Be sure to record top insights and actions in your proceedings. Make them visible on wall "tapestries." Their contribution to making progress may not be immediately apparent.; Ask, “Have we plumbed all the depths and explored all the peaks?” “Do we need to dig deeper or come back to this topic?”. Return a concise facilitator script with timing, wording, safety notes, and remote/in-person adjustments.
Origin unverified
- Where we observed it: The strongest current observations come from Liberating Structures; aggregators are listed as additional observations, not origin proof. (1 source observed, including Liberating Structures.)
- What that means: we track where an exercise has been observed in public sources. We do not claim to know who created it, or how popular it is.
- No efficacy claims: appearing in this library is not a claim that the exercise is proven effective. Facilitator judgment and context decide whether it works for a given room.
- Corrections: if you have evidence of an earlier or more accurate source, read our methodology and trust boundary and tell us.