FacilitatorU Faculty

Steve Davis

FacilitatorU Founder

Steve Davis, M.A., M.S., is an Facilitator's Coach, Infoprenuer, and free-lance human, helping facilitators, organizational leaders, educators, trainers, coaches and consultants present themselves confidently, access their creativity, empower their under-performing groups, enhance their facilitation skills, and build their business online and offline.

Steve spends most of his time building and running FacilitatorU.com. He also publishes a weekly ezine for facilitators called, the Master Facilitator Journal, continues to write ebooks and design teleclasses, and maintains a part-time coaching practice. His breadth of experience spans business, corporate management, engineering, teaching, spiritual psychology, and wellness, offering a pragmatic yet creative coaching foundation.

To learn more about Steve, visit his website at www.livingmastery.com or click here contact him.

Marion Franklin

Professional Life Coach

Marion Franklin, M.S., a Professional Certified Life Coach, coaches individuals and groups regarding personal and professional change, focus, human relations, and conflict management. Marion has coached managers at major corporations including PepsiCo, Toys’R’Us, and Reader’s Digest. Marion, a former high school teacher, created and teaches a unique 30-hour coach training program and her mentor coaching groups offer ICF CEU's.

She conducts and helps clients design workshops and presentations and is the co-author of '7 Simple Secrets to Successful Workshops' and has co-facilitated "Designing Dynamic Workshops from Scratch" based on her book. She has been a featured presenter at meetings, retreats, and an ongoing Women’s Workshop Series, has been cited in The Wall Street Journal, and has appeared on Cable Television.

To learn more about Marion, visit her website(s) at www.lifecoachinggroup.com and www.successfulworkshops.com. Contact her at: marion@lifecoachinggroup.com

Sue Walden

Founder and Director of ImprovWorks

Sue Walden is the Founder and Director of ImprovWorks, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to building Life Skills through Improvisation. Her experience includes a BA in Education and 26 years of teaching, performing and adapting and widely applying the techniques of improvisation. She approaches improv training as a powerful and joyful way to peel away constraints, restraints and inhibitions, allowing the naturally expressive, collaborative and creative self to emerge.

Sue is a skilled teacher in ImprovWorks' public workshop program, a dynamic corporate facilitator, an engaging speaker, an author (Working with Groups to Enhance Relationships, Whole Person Assoc.), the delightful "Playmeister" of both the public and corporate Recess! programs, the director and a regular performer with San Francisco's longest-running improvisational theater company, "Flash Family". She has been a member of the Specialty Staff for the year-long Co-Active Leadership Program since its inception eight years ago.

Her current passion is training trainers and consulting on how to design powerful experiential workshops. Sue promises that, in any of her programs, while the learning may be challenging, it will also be fun!

Dee Kelsey & Pam Plumb

Authors, Facilitators, and Trainers

Dee has been facilitating groups since her teenage years. She turned her early interests into more formal work both as a trainer and personnel representative at Hewlett Packard and as a mediator and trainer of mediators for the city of Palo Alto, California. In addition to her work with Great Meetings! Inc, she has been principal of Dee Kelsey and Associates since 1985. She has worked nationally to provide organizational development, facilitation, process consultation, mediation, and training services to hundreds of clients ranging from small work groups to large corporations.

Pam discovered during her years as a City Councilor and Mayor of Portland that effective meeting planning and facilitation made a big difference in meeting outcomes In 1991, she created Pamela Plumb & Associates which serves a wide range of non-profit organizations, businesses and government organizations with process design, facilitation, training and organizational development. She is known internationally for her process work and training in municipal governance.

Contributors

The following contributors have graciously offered their time and expertise in the form of expert interviews conducted over the telephone, recorded, and posted in our expert series library. If you are interested in becoming one of our expert contributors, please contact us and let us know what unique perspective you'd like to share.

Patricia Clason

Speaker, trainer, consultant, writer

Patricia has been a professional speaker,
trainer, consultant and writer for over twenty-five years. She is now the Director of the Center for Creative Learning which offers programs for personal and professional development at offices in Milwaukee and Madison, and Detroit. She has traveled across the continent doing over 3,000 presentations for corporations, associations, government agencies and non-profit organizations since 1975. Patricia has written many articles, training programs and personal growth seminars and has been a sought-after guest for radio and television.

Currently she is the owner of three businesses, the Center for Creative Learning, Great Ideas! Speakers Bureau and Accountability Coaching Associates. As a consultant and coach to other businesses, large and small, in the areas of start-up, marketing, and management skills, she guides people to manifesting their dreams. Her articles often appear in business and trade publications and her column Ask the Coach appears regularly in the Employment Times. Patricia is the co-host of “A Woman’s Point of View” on WRRD Radio, Milwaukee.

To learn more about Patricia, visit her website at www.lightly.com. Contact her at patricia@lightly.com.

Bert Stitt

Speaker, Trainer, Consultant

Bert Stitt is practiced in the art and skill of facilitating the evolvement of community whether it is in city, town or village, or company, organization, or agency. He has often been on the front lines of turning things around by helping groups examine the basics of Shared Values, Shared Vision, and Shared/Individual Accountability.

Bert received his Bachelors in Liberal Arts from Wayne State University, Detroit. He is an active member of the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2) and has received the IAP2 Practitioner Certification. He has also received Land Use Mediator Certification from the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, Cambridge, Massachusetts as well as Senior Facilitation Certification from Interaction Associates, San Francisco, California. To learn more about Bert, visit his website at www.bertstitt.com. Contact her at bert@bertstitt.com.

Penney Peirce

Speaker, Consultant, Author

Penny Peirce is an internationally recognized, gifted intuitive with deep psychological understanding. She specializes in intuition development, perceptual skills training, and dream work. A popular lecturer, counselor, trainer, and author, Peirce works throughout the United States, Japan, and Europe as a trainer and counselor to business executives, psychologists, scientists, other trainers, and those on a spiritual path. Her ability to present complex ideas in a common sense, easy-to-understand way has enabled her to assist many in the art of "skillful perception." Her books include The Present Moment: A Daybook of Clarity and Intuition and The Intuitive Way: A Guide to Living from Inner Wisdom. Check out her website at www.intuitnow.com.

Susan B. Wilson

Facilitator, Speaker, Author

Susan B. Wilson, MBA, CSP is the author of several books including:
Gourmet Meetings on a Microwave Schedule, Goal Setting, Your Intelligent Heart, Facilitate to Invigorate, and Speaking Success at The Speed of
Sound, and contributed to Chicken Soup for the Woman’s Soul," and Magnetic Leadership.

Susan is the owner and lead facilitator of Executive Strategies, Inc., a firm that specializes in providing specific creative strategies that motivate people to accomplish extraordinary goals. She is also the president of Fast Team Solutions, providing valuable products and resources for teams in the areas of meetings management, team building, facilitation, strategic planning, and conflict resolution. Visit www.fastteamsolutions.com or call Deanne at (641) 792-2041 for more information.

Margaret E. Wall

Adult Educator and Learning Specialist

Margaret E. Wall, BA, M.Ed. is an adult educator and learning specialist with over 14 years experience in training and employee development. She formed Integrated Learning Solutions in 1999 and has been providing instructional design, career coaching, leadership development, facilitation, and assessment services to both public and private sector clients. Marg has designed and facilitated workshops and courses for face-to-face, teleclass, web-based and blended learning environments. Marg is well known for her supportive and collaborative style, her ability to conceptualize and develop complex and challenging learning programs, as well as her ability to mentor and inspire others to achieve their creative potential. Marg lives, learns and works in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada.

Ellen Britt

Speaker, Trainer, Author

Ellen Britt, PA-C, Ed.D. is a SUN coach as well as an experienced speaker and workshop presenter. Ellen is co-founder of Primal Waters, specializing in digital media relaxation products and she produced the company's Telly award winning video, The Fifth Season. She also directs Primal Waters' six month intensive distance learning program, the Stress Resiliency Coach(tm) Certification program. She holds a doctorate in biology from Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana and is currently completing degree requirements for a Ph.D. in clinical psychology through the Fielding Graduate Institute, Santa Barbara, California. Ellen lives and works in Atlanta, Georgia and the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York.

Izzy Gesell

Author, Trainer

Izzy Gesell delivers entertaining, informative and blatantly practical information through keynote speeches, customized trainings, group facilitation and individual coaching and mentoring. Clients include NASA, Hewlett-Packard, Chrysler, the Internal Revenue Service, & office staff of the US House of Representatives. The author of PLAYING ALONG: Group Learning Activities Borrowed From Improvisation Theater, he is among the first to successfully bring the concepts of Improvisation Theater into the business world. Izzy has a BA in psychology, an MS in education, and a P (that's 1/3 of a PHD) and is the originator of INTERNATIONAL MOMENT OF LAUGHTER DAY, celebrated each April 14.

Judi Richardson

Facilitator, Speaker, Author and Trainer

Judith Richardson, B.Ed., M.A., works with International Organizational Development across North America, Europe, Jamaica, Denmark, Sweden, Israel and Russia. Using a variety of processes (our facilitation and coaching techniques are based on sound research and years of experience), she facilitates development within groups and organizations, inviting others to recognize their own inherent qualities and emerge them. "We utilize processes as an objective mirror to help our clients assess the current state, as a catalyst assisting them in defining and creating a compelling view of the future, and the courage to go for it. Open Space Technology is a natural as one of our processes!" Learn more about Judi and her work by visiting her websites at: www.ponoconsultants.com and www.emergentfeminine.com.

Jim Rough

Consultant, Speaker, Seminar Leader and Author

Jim Rough is the originator and principal seminar leader for Dynamic Facilitation Skills. He's been leading public seminars and evolving the concepts of Dynamic Facilitation and Choice-creating since 1990. Jim is the author of the new book (2002) Society's Breakthrough! Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People. The book describes how these ideas promise new solutions to many long-standing problems, and how they offer the opportunity to revitalize democracy. See details at www.SocietysBreakthrough.com.

Since 1980, Jim has been a faculty member at the annual Creative Problem Solving Institute in Buffalo, N.Y. He has spoken at many conferences, published numerous articles and is working on a new book about Dynamic Facilitation. Before founding Jim Rough and Associates, Inc. in 1985, Jim worked as an internal consultant within Boeing, Xerox, and Simpson Timber Company. His education includes a B.A. in physics from Occidental College, M.S. and M.B.A. degrees from Columbia University, and many years of independent study in Jungian psychology.

Tom Atlee

Author, democracy innovator, and founder of the Co-Intelligence Institute

Tom Atlee is founder and co-director of the non-profit Co-Intelligence Institute. Recently his work has focused on developing our capacity to function as a wise democracy, so we can turn our social and environmental challenges into positive developments for our society. His social change vision is based on new understandings of wholeness which recognize the value of diversity, unity, relationship, context, uniqueness and the spirit inside each of us and the world. Co-intelligence theory also acknowledges many facets of intelligence (like head and heart), wisdom, and the higher forms of intelligence (natural and sacred) that move through and beyond us. Although Tom and the Institute focus on very practical issues of group, social and political dynamics, co-intelligence has many esoteric dimensions as well.

Ann Fry

Author, Speaker, Trainer and Founder of HumorU.com

Ann Fry has been a psychotherapist for over 20 years which certainly prompted her to balance her life with humor. She has, for the last 10 years, been a corporate trainer and professional speaker, specializing in Stress Management and Team Building Through Humor. In both her coaching and training, she helps people be more productive, through having a healthy sense of humor. She is committed to making the world a happier place and believes that in the workplace, "a happy employee is a productive employee." She helps people manage their stress, build their people skills, balance their lives and most importantly have a healthy sense of humor. Ann is the co-author of the book, "When Was The Last Time You...?", as well as the co-author of "139 Ways to Lighten Up the Workplace.

Richard Ross

Transformational mentor, coach, spiritual counselor, and facilitator of personal healing

Richard has a successful practice working with individuals and groups across the US, Canada, and in over twenty other countries, in person and via telephone. Over the past ten years, he has actively facilitated his clients' personal growth and transformation, most recently as a personal and spiritual mentor. As a trained practitioner of Thought Field Therapy [TFT] (Levels I & II) and Emotional Freedom Technique [EFT] (Professional and Advanced Training), he's drawn upon these and many other disciplines to create a new and unique transformational work that is both fast and powerful. He offers this treatment to those who want to experience cutting edge tools for personal and professional development.

His professional background includes 15 years as a successful entrepreneur in the environmental systems field. He is a Nationally Certified Bodywork Therapist, Avatar course facilitator, and has completed training in BSFF and PRYT. He has appeared on national television and radio news and talks shows to discuss his work. Since transitioning into the coaching and personal development fields in the early 90's, he draws upon both his business expertise and spirituality to help his clients create happy and successful lives. Visit Richard's website at www.emotionalfreedom.com.

Tom Weber

National memory trainer, author, and speaker

National Memory Trainer Tom Weber has taught thousands of professionals and students how to turn their memory into a powerful tool. Today, he will be teaching us how to remember names, his most requested topic. Professional, dynamic, and witty, Tom knows what it takes to connect with an audience. His clients span virtually every industry and include such companies as American Express, State Farm, Baird & Warner, ReMax, Harley-Davidson, and Wells Fargo. Visit Tom's wekbsite at www.WinningTheNameGame.com.

Keith To

Facilitator, trainer, author, trainer, and coach

Keith To has been facilitating for more than 10 years, helping organizations getting faster and easier results, and at the same time, developing as a better organization.