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Precencing as the Essence of Facilitation

Francoise Gielen

A fundamentally different dynamic arises in the space where people truly listen and genuinely speak. By engaging in this genuine communication, people align with who they are and what they need—both with themselves and with others. When we reach this level of communication, pure magic happens. The confusion caused by egos dissipates, and the team's energy suddenly flows freely toward creating value instead of becoming entangled in personal or interpersonal conflicts.


As a facilitator, you engage in presencing, a concept from the work of Joseph Jaworski and Otto Scharmer (Theory U), which combines being fully present and sensing into emerging possibilities. By presencing as a facilitator, you open a window that allows everyone to synchronize with each other. This enables the team or relationship to function as a unified whole, maneuvering with the fluidity of a flock of birds moving as one. This is also the moment when you realize you’re no longer alone.


The Liberation of Facilitation (LOF) program provides a powerful space to experiment with guiding leaders and their teams through presencing, helping them become high-performance teams. This guidance begins, as always, with leading by example as a facilitator—what we call Living the Work. For instance, what do you do when the team suddenly takes a different direction than the one you had in mind? Instead of forcing them back into your original plan, presencing allows you to trust that the next step will naturally present itself, which could lead to a completely different agenda. And after all, you don’t want them to force their own agenda on you or each other either.


Presencing requires moving beyond your blind spots and (un)conscious preferences or judgments. It brings you to a place where you can genuinely listen and remain curious about others. From there, you can take a shared creative step forward—not just rationally, but with your whole being. Especially when the other person is different from you.


Let me give you a personal example of how resolving my blind spot created space for emerging possibilities. My dear friend and colleague Beatrijs had been telling me for years that her introverted energy flourished with space and calm. She sometimes found it challenging when we facilitated together. When she would bring it up, I’d feel indignant, as though I had to force myself, as an extrovert, to speak less and create more calm for her. Despite my efforts, my ego still felt like I was sacrificing something, as if I couldn’t simply be myself.


However, these days I clearly see how together we are so much more than the sum of our parts. In the dance between our different temperaments lies exponential richness and possibility, revealing a depth in our relationship that leaves me pleasantly speechless. And how wonderful it is—even for an extrovert like me—to truly hear others and myself without my own noise getting in the way.


As this blind spot became increasingly visible, it also became (sometimes painfully) clear that I still have a lot to learn about presencing. For instance, by slowing down more, counting to ten when I’m quick to interpret or jump to conclusions, and letting go of the fear that I won’t be heard. And also: stepping off my “high horse” and realizing I don’t communicate better than others. Sure, I’m a quick and spontaneous speaker, but Beatrijs is naturally a better listener and a more than eloquent speaker in her own right.


I found in facilitation a wonderful playground to learn and experiment with perfecting this presencing. Standing visibly in front of a group, being in service to them, demands that I am powerfully open, vulnerable and present. If not, I am sure to miss the opportunity in flight.


Presencing beyond blind spots isn’t just valuable in collaboration with my co-facilitator or a magical concept concerning the overall unfolding process; it also has practical implications and benefits in the way you act in the room. For example, to stay with my blind spot regarding my own extroversion, I often prefer paired shares over individual reflection. Another example: I tend to use loud and active icebreakers. I was recently about to launch into one when a participant came up to me and said, “You call it an energizer, but as an introvert, I am usually completely drained afterward.” Oops—never realized that before. When I asked what would energize him, he said, “Taking a quiet walk on my own.” So he and some other colleagues did just that, while I stayed inside with those who preferred more high-energy activities.


Why is presencing so crucial for me as a facilitator? Let me put it this way: if I operate from my own perspective rather than presencing with the whole, how can I make the sum greater than its parts? I can’t. And to me, that is the core of my role as a facilitator and as a human—to contribute to the greater good rather than just myself. Cheesy? Not at all. When applied to teams, for instance, presencing directly enhances the speed of decision-making and execution. They spend less time caught up in noise and conflicts and achieve results more quickly. Either in your presence or having learned to presence themselves, from you.


What can you expect from our Facilitator Development Program, LOF? Learning to facilitate happens in interaction with others, as the above example illustrates. You’ve probably experienced this yourself—provided you can count on the radical honesty of the people around you, giving you ample feedback. And provided that you take the time to reflect on that feedback instead of deflecting it with a joke or a quip. LOF is designed in a way that you simply cannot avoid your blind spots. Through continuous mirroring from the faculty, your peers, and your ever-increasing self-awareness, these blind spots diminish, and your ability to presence grows. This often leads to hilarity—like when you suddenly realize that your blind spot has been “helpfully” co-facilitating alongside you! And then learning how to move past that.


Besides deepening your own facilitation skills, LOF equips you with tools to help your clients uncover their own blind spots and learn how to presence better with themselves and others.

We run LOF once a year. The group for the 2025 edition (starting June 30) is forming. Would you like to improve your presencing with yourself and your participants? Or is there another development goal you pursue as a facilitator of leaders and teams? DM us for a no-obligation conversation. We’d be happy to explore the fit.



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