Cultivate | Questions

Interactive Training

Page 1 of 1

When leading a Good Soil seminar, how do you get out of a discussion that has turned into a debate?

Before You Get Into Those Situations:

The first thing to do is to try to avoid those kinds of situations as much as possible. Think about the kinds of potentially emotion-charged topics that might spawn a debate and prepare ahead of time for them. When you approach a topic like that, “frame it” with disclaimers and lots of humility.
Example: We approach the Good Soil scale with disclaimers such as—it’s only a humanly constructed model so it isn’t infallible, etc.
Use a “Questions Board” and, from the very beginning of the seminar, direct people to place their questions on that board, along with their names. That allows you to decide if you want to answer the question in a private setting or before the entire group.
Be aware that many of these kinds of issues have been addressed in the resource articles in the Supplement section of the notebook, or on the Cultivate blog-forum site. Be familiar with these sources and direct the person who asks the question to those resources. That’s one of the major reasons that we’ve created those resources—to keep emotion-charged issues out of the general discussion forum of the class, without simply dodging them.
Example: Be familiar with the “Affirmations and Disclaimers” and “What Must I [Really] Do to Be Saved” articles, as well as the many FAQs and blog articles on http://Cultivate.GoodSoil.com.

When You Find Yourself in Those Situations:

If the issue isn’t crucial, say something like “Thanks for sharing your view on that.” and then move on with the seminar.
If the issue is important, state your position and invite the person to discuss it further later, outside of the main sessions.

Recommended Resource: Dealing with Difficult Participants by Dave Arch (Order from Amazon.com)

Page 1 of 1