Who Should Facilitate

the PDM Workshop?

Since the PDM workshop so directly relates to the Volunteers'

community projects and outreach activities, the programming staff

should be involved in the PDM. Best results occur when programming

staff serve as trainers. If they are not comfortable in the lead trainer

role, they might co facilitate and/or be available to help Volunteers

and their Counterparts work on their sample project plans. The

dynamics between Volunteers and Counterparts, the level of their

effort in learning and working together, and the types of projects they

are designing are all important information for the programming staff.

Other choices for trainers include local  training staff,

nongovernmental organization (NGO) or private volunteer

organization (PVO) staff with training experience, Volunteer Leaders,

and outside consultants. Ideally, the person selected to serve in the

lead trainer role should have previously experienced the PDM

workshop as a co facilitator or a participant.

Given the intensive focus on practice planning, the PDM workshop

should be staffed with a team of two trainers (e.g., a lead trainer and

Best results occur when

a programming staff member) for every 20 participants. If the

participant group is approximately 30, then it is advisable to add a

programming staff serve

third person to the training team. For a group of 40 participants, it

as trainers.

may be better to divide the group into two subgroups, assign a trainer

team to each, and run two concurrent workshops with occasional large

group debriefs. Whatever the make up of the team, it is important

that co trainers model the kind of collaborative behavior they hope

to encourage in the Volunteer Counterparts teams.

When new trainers are used to facilitate the workshop, a training of

trainers (TOT) needs to be conducted. Though project design and

management content may be known to most trainers, it is easy to

forget the degree to which the  has its own philosophy,

definitions and jargon.

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