When I was asked to facilitate the Crisis Steering Committee in 2018 that was convened to provide recommendations to the Colorado Department of Human Services (CDHS) on how to improve and enhance the State’s behavioral health crisis system, the first thing I did was talk with each of the 20 Committee members to understand each person’s point of view on what was working well within the crisis system; the biggest challenges that needed to be addressed; opportunities to improve efficiencies and services; how better, more consistent standards could be set; what data was available; and opportunities to better define and measure success. When the Committee convened for its first meeting, I was pretty candid with them: “It’s really clear that most of you don’t like each other. And that there is little trust. And yet, there is agreement that some improvements can be made. So, we need to figure out how to work together.”

It’s not often that a facilitator will be that blunt. However, I wanted to call it out immediately so we could move beyond that “elephant in the room” and start focusing on the work. My role as facilitator became much more than planning for, coordinating, and leading. I spent hours between each bi-weekly meeting talking with Committee members individually. Some wanted to share their frustrations, some wanted to share their concerns that they were not comfortable voicing in meetings, some wanted to make suggestions on data that should be shared or a specific topic that should be discussed. While we tried to create an environment where people felt safe speaking up and sharing their different (and sometimes contentious) points of view, some were reluctant to do so since their biggest funders were also in the room. The key to success was listening to every single person during those individual conversations. When appropriate, I would share a summary of the conversations I had had. In the end, we successfully developed recommendations that we could all get behind. While people didn’t necessarily agree on every single detail, they could support the general concepts put forth. And sometimes, that is what success looks like: it’s not total consensus. It’s not people supporting every single word. (Side note: read about the hazards of wordsmithing here!) Success is people able to get behind concepts and recommendations knowing that there is still work ahead. And as long as there is commitment to continuing the conversations and working through the details together, you can have robust stakeholder engagement where people acknowledge that they have started to make progress towards the long-term goal.