Contracting: Deciding Whether and How to Work with a Group

This chapter discusses the contracting stages that a facilitator and his/her clients go through to develop an agreement about whether and how one will work together to help the group accomplish its goals. For each stage, it talks about the issues that often arise and how to address them. A facilitator and the client begin to develop a working relationship by exploring these questions, and reach an agreement about whether and how to work together. The contracting process establishes an effective relationship between the client and a facilitator and greatly increases the chance that the facilitation will be effective. The five contracting stages are making initial contact with a primary client group member, planning the facilitation, reaching agreement with the full primary client group, recontracting during facilitation, and completing and evaluating the facilitation. Many problems that occur during facilitation are caused by ineffective contracting. Ineffective contracting creates problems later in the work.