The word participation took on a new meaning at the recent Franchise Council of Australia NSW conference. The mostly franchisor audience of over 100 people were invited to take part as “franchisees” in a simulation involving a change of ownership of their franchisor.
The workshop, facilitated by
Greg Nathan with help from
Aaron Chowdhury (our newest FRI team member) and
Karli Furmage from Go Global highlighted the importance of trust and commitment during change.
Several interactive learning techniques were used to bring the session to life including story telling, role play and a technique we call a “Group Scoop”. These are regularly used by FRI consultants in their work with franchisors and franchisees to promote engagement, insight and collaboration. Because these same skills are useful when implementing change in a franchise network, the session was really operating on two levels.
Feedback from the session has been overwhelmingly positive.
As part of the session the audience came up with 22 really good tips for implementing change in a franchise network.
“What a huge learning experience for dealing with change!”
Kate Groom, Starfish Consulting