Your "professional" signs comments

[Joelle Lyons Everett]

Ed--

Count me among those who like making the signs, at the last minute, a
grounding/ centering exercise and an opportunity to "walk through" the
details.  This meets my needs. . .

For the client, I think that the handmade signs give an immediate signal that
something is different here.  As Lisa said, they add a lively visual element
to the meeting space.  For me, they help to underline that this is a simple,
easily replicated process where the people in the room are more important
than the graphics.

When I first started working as a facilitator,  (pre-OS), I used to prepare
flip charts with great care, drawing on my early training in art and
handlettering.  But when I began teaching others to facilitate meetings using
a flip chart, I found that I needed to do some unlearning and make flip
charts with less care for appearance.  Writing on a flip chart needed to look
like something anyone could do!  And I guess I have the same feeling about
signs for OS.  I had a few non-writers in my last OS (one dictated and had a
friend write), and I'm glad that they were not trying to produce session
posters which looked like professional graphics.

I never save signs from one meeting to another, sending them home with the
clients if they want them or throwing them away.  For one meeting I
facilitated which was part of a long series, we made new signs on the spot
for all but the  Law of Two Feet    --that one had the client's actual
footprints in tempera paint, and was used for every meeting!

I would probably not veto a client's request for professional signs, but it
would not be my first choice.

Joelle Everett

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