Forum Theatre In HRD – Developing Learning Spaces
The Role Of The Actor/Facilitator
Working Paper
Rae, Jan
Abstract
‘Life is increasingly becoming theatrical and performative in character’ (Clark 2008 p401) and this
performative approach has made its way into learning and development activities. Using theatre and
drama as a vehicle for organisational development has becoming increasingly popular in
organisations, whether using professional actors for individual role play sessions or using drama to
address wider organizational issues, such as diversity, bullying and harassment and conflict
management.
One oft cited aim of using theatre is to open up a learning or aesthetic space where ‘there is a
suspension of truth or knowledge claims … when participants are able to accept that no view is a
priori authoritative or true [and] managers have no claim to a privileged vantage point’ (Fulop and
Rifkin 1997 p59). Such spaces have the potential to offers an opportunity for creative discourse
involving a range of different perspectives leading to if not a solution, at least an increased
understanding of the issues leading to a change in organizational and individual behaviours.
The aim of this paper is to explore the extent to which the use of Forum Theatre in organisations can
support the creation of ‘learning spaces’ (Fulop and Rifkin 1997) to facilitate organizational change
and development.
It is proposed the use of Forum Theatre may potentially be one method of
enabling such spaces to be developed, but such approaches may also be bounded, setting up
barriers to truly democratic methods. The extent to which it is possibly to develop truly non-hierachical
spaces is explored in this paper, focusing particularly in the role of the facilitator in enabling such
processes. The discussion is supported by reference to findings from a wider piece of research on the
use of Forum Theatre in organisations.
Introducing ‘Organisational Theatre’
Since the late 1980s there has been a significant increase in the use of theatre and drama in training,
development and change management interventions. While Organizational Theatre embraces a
variety of different forms (Meisiek and Barry 2007) the Forum Theatre model is probably the most
discussed and researched category and indeed it can be argued that much of the commentary
conflates Organisational Theatre and Forum Theatre as being one and the same.
Forum Theatre typically uses both performance and interactive drama to explore issues, drawing on
the techniques developed by Augusto Boal (1979). What differentiates Forum Theatre from other
types of theatre based interventions is the role of the ‘active-audience’ (Meiseik and Barry 2007), that
is, those attending such events take on the role of both audience and participant (what Boal terms
the ‘spect-actor).
Forum Theatre in its original form was used with explicit political intent, as a
method of giving voice to marginalised communities, through moving away from the traditional
director led approaches and enabling the ‘spec-tators’ or audience to lead the action. In this form if
translated to the organizational context the workers or employees would be encouraged to reject the
hierarchical order through being given permission to re-enact scenarios and enabling the spec-tator to
‘participate in playing around with the norms, customs, regulations and laws which govern her life in
society’ (Kershaw 1992 p24). However, it is accepted for the purposes of this discussion that Forum
Theatre as practised in organizations follows the techniques of Boal’s original Forum Theatre but
rarely if ever fully subscribes to its original politically charged intent (Clark and Mangham 2004;
Meisiek and Barry 2007).
Organisational and Forum Theatre interventions are designed ‘to promote and support change within
organizations … using diverse techniques to create an awareness of problems, to stimulate
discussion and foster a readiness for change” (Meisiek 2004 p798) and to bring about some form of
change in behaviour either at an individual or organizational level (Schreyögg 2002; Meisiek 2004).
Such approaches aim to promote change through focusing on potentially difficult organizational
1
issues and using theatre as a vehicle for exploring these issues. Generally, a Forum Theatre event
will start with a dramatic representation of the issues to be considered, followed by what are
sometime termed Forum Workshops or interactive theatre, where actors present a brief scene which
leads to some type of impasse and the audience or participants are asked to direct the scene to a
more ‘satisfactory’ resolution. Through the staged improvisation and the subsequent discussions,
participants are encouraged to consider of different perspectives, identify areas of dissatisfaction and
take action on individual and/or organizational basis (Meisiek 2002; Gibb 2002; Meisiek and Barry
2007).
Forum theatre can be a vehicle for organizational learning by allowing the ‘rank and file’ members of
organisations to work on an equal basis with their ‘superiors’ (Coopey 1998): Thus ‘having seen a
staged dialectic, group members enter into a dialogue as equals – through dialogue they become
aware of their situation and of the possibility that their situation could be different’ (Meisiek and Barry
2007 p1808). In this scenario, learning and change becomes a joint venture, rather than one driven
solely by the management perspective. This perspective resonates with the move from management
driven to employee driven approaches to learning and development, through the creation of ‘arenas’
or learning spaces within organisations to facilitate more open ended approaches to organizational
learning and change.
The Nature of the Learning Space
In order to support organizational learning Örtenblad (2002) argues for the need to promote more
democratic approaches to learning and provide opportunities for reflection whether learning is formal
or spontaneous. Fulop and Rifkin see the development of learning spaces as being key to
organizational learning and development and define the learning space as a place where ‘there is a
suspension of truth or knowledge claims … when participants are able to accept that no view is a
priori authoritative or true [and] managers have no claim to a privileged vantage point’ (1997 p59).
Similarly the ‘arena thesis’ Burgoyne and Jackson (1997) offers a pluralist rather than unitarist
approach to learning - in this context the arena is a place where ‘differences ‘meet’, [are] fought over,
reconciled, and reconfigured … and gives voice to the tensions between a pluralistic approach to
[management] learning where participants can observe and become aware of differences’ (p61); thus
the arena is where participants can bring their own issues and debates. However, the extent to which
this approach is encouraged in reality is debateable - training programmes (and by association
learning, development and organizational change programmes) ‘continue to reflect the continuing
influence and power of the institutional beliefs and patterns associated with the traditional educational
sector’ (Scott and Meyer 1994 cited Burgoyne and Jackson 1997), that is the top-down, management
driven perspective. Thus the shift from tight management control or bureaucratic organizational
models to more open-ended approaches has been honoured more in the ‘breach than in the
observance’, and secondly senior management tend towards being over preoccupied with the
distillation of unitarist rather than pluralist values which a more democratic approach requires.
Management learning activities then become instrumentalised, excluding the 'cognitive, political and
symbolic elements of ... development' (Clark and Butcher 2006 p314). Thus in reality ‘people are
denied space in which they can take risks in improvising aspects of self and social relationships
whenever they have few opportunities to make useful contributions to decisions that affect them’
(Coopey and Burgoyne 1998 p186).
This may also be due to the desire to establish legitimacy through promotion of new ideas or fads
(Clark and Greatbatch 2004) and increased business professionalism. Thus for example management
institutes such as the Chartered Management Institute and the Chartered Institute of Personnel and
Development are increasingly imposing their own (often unitarist) standards which leave little room for
the consideration of wider issues or the development of new ideas (Holman 2000; Gilmore and Taylor
2007). Thus there is unsurprisingly a tension between enabling the types of learning events such as
Forum Theatre where the espoused aim is to open up debate and discussion with the potential for
unpredictable outcomes and the desire for learning events to meet clear and stated specific results.
Thus is the notion of Forum Theatre having the ability to de-hierarchise learning no more than an
espoused ideal? In theory, Forum Theatre methods and techniques should be an ideal way of
operationalising non-hierarchical learning – does this happen in reality or is this approach subject to
the same constraints that more conventional approaches organizational development. Drawing on
2
data from semi-structured interviews with participants, commissioners and facilitators from two Forum
Theatre events the second part of this paper explores the extent to which in reality, Forum Theatre
does enable a more democratic and participant/ employee led approach to learning, development and
change.
Managing Learning Spaces
While as noted previously there is a considerable amount of support for creating more open ended
learning events, there is less empirical research into how such processes might be played out in
reality. Burgoyne and Jackson suggest that arenas or open learning spaces can be managed in order
to make such spaces work by ‘increasing the chances that important differences aired’ (1997 p61) but
acknowledge the tension implicit in imposing a structure. The findings from the data clearly showed
that the management of such events is a key issue with the commissioners and facilitators, both in
terms of the putting the event together and the subsequent facilitation. While there has been
considerable discussion in the organizational theatre literature about the process of ‘scripting’ Forum
Theatre events (see Clark and Mangham 2004; Gibb 2004; Meiseik and Barry 2007) less attention
has been paid to the actual facilitation or management of the process. Thus this discussion focuses
on the role of the facilitator and the extent to which the methods employed support and enable the
types of discussions advocated by the organizational studies literature.
The facilitator is a familiar figure in learning events, and in Forum Theatre they have a key role to play
in enabling the type of participation espoused above. It should be noted that Boal used the term Joker
for facilitator; the term is derived from the joker in a deck of cards - just as the wild card is not tied
down to a specific suit or value, ‘neither is the … joker tied down to an allegiance to performer,
spectator, or any one interpretation of events’ (Cohen-Cruz and Schutzman 1994).
Boal’s Forum Theatre does not privilege any particular message but supports a dialogical approach to
change of view with the ultimate goal of promoting social and personal change through critical
thinking and discussion (Babbage 2004), a technique which places considerable emphasis on the
neutrality of the Joker/facilitator. Thus in the organizational context this would need to mean not only
being neutral in terms of working with the scenarios and outcomes, but also in relation the
commissioner’s perspectives. This appears to be the most challenging issue for the facilitators, and
the blurring referred to above might not only be related to the actual role.
This model of facilitation also emphasises the neutrality of the facilitator, which can be problematical,
assuming as it does that it is possible for the individual in this role to leave their previous experiences
behind. Gregory and Romm (2001) suggest this subjectivity needs to be acknowledged and that
rather than attempting to retain neutrality, facilitators are better employed in engaging in what they
term ‘critical facilitation’ through firstly being aware of their own values and belief systems and
secondly being willing to expose their contributions to challenges from others (p457). As Berry
comments, ‘by withholding their personal perspectives on content or process, facilitators may prevent
important information from reaching the group’s awareness (1993 p31).
It should be noted that while the organizational theatre literature advocates that the actors and
facilitators retains an entirely separate role to maintain neutrality, in reality, resource constraints mean
that the actors frequently move between the two roles. Even when there is a ‘separate’ facilitator who
takes no part in the performances or improvisations, the actors, particularly when being directed by
the participants in active –audience situations, by default became part-actor, part-facilitator.
This leads to the question of what background experience is required to be effective in these two
roles. There are two schools of thought as to the extent to which the actor/facilitators need to have a
background in business; one view, that organizational experience is a key requirement is supported
by Taylor and Ladkin (2007) who recommend that facilitators need ‘expertise in both artistic and
organisational worlds’ (p66) arguing that artists - or in this case actors - ‘without experience of
organizational realities can flounder and not make adequate connections between the intervention
and participants comments’ (ibid). The other view is that organizational processes can be learnt and
the focus should be on the skills of the actor to bring the organizational realities to life. The findings
suggest that while an understanding of organizational life may be beneficial, there is a danger that as
facilitators they may feel confident to act as ‘experts’, thus leading participants down routes set by the
facilitators, not by the participants.
3
… “for example we had somebody today suggest that somebody put something into a role play in the
Forum Workshop... the overwhelming majority of the people there today thought would be a good
outcome, never mind. Let’s demonstrate that this idea has no legs {author’s emphasis] and
don’t argue the toss, don’t stand there and argue with the person with this idea show them that it’s not
going to work.” (Actor/Facilitator)
There appeared to be a number of tactics for ‘showing them that it’s not going to work’ – one popular
one was for the actor to exaggerate the suggestion, a move seen as being generally legitimate to
firstly bring in some humour and secondly ‘show’ that this might not be the most appropriate
suggestion.
“And, and sometimes we manipulate it …, that we might do it so badly, they've gone, 'Just apologise!'
And of course you know what they mean and say ' I'm awfully sorry about the situation that you've
found yourself in. However, it's out of my control.' So you just don't go. 'Aaaah' or 'Sorry.' In a way
you're a little bit manipulative.” (Actor)
These tactics did not go unnoticed by the participants:
“I actually secretly felt (the actor) didn’t try very hard to do [my suggestion] …. I felt he kind of
sabotaged it in a way.” (Participant)
There was also an example where the actors specifically stated what they thought should happen
… “and one of the actors said, “Oh no, we don't want you to do that, we want you to go down this
direction.” And you could see half the team [the participants] got turned off, saying, '’this is not true,
this is not real, this is just, make believe.” (Participant)
What also emerged from the findings is the extent to which, perhaps unsurprisingly, the
actor/facilitators were bounded by the commissioners, who have specific outcomes they want to
achieve. Thus there was an expectation by commissioners that while the workshops were improvised
nevertheless needed to proceed in a particular direction. Thus where individual Forum events were
part of an on-going initiative, it seemed to be expected by Commissioners that rather than respond to
participants in the moment, the facilitators could effectively anticipate the responses and shape the
sessions accordingly.
“When the actors are engaged in roles and then they stop and hear the questions from the audience,
it starts to give them a feel for what are their concerns, what are the range of issues and how might
they be answered.” … (Commissioner)
This was reinforced by observations towards the end of an on-going programme which indicated that
the facilitators developed a tendency to ignore suggestions from the audience and make their own
suggestions which were then taken up by the actors. Interestingly this activity was picked up by the
same commissioner who viewed this activity as undermining the learning; it would seem that there are
competing expectations at work making it challenging for the actor/facilitators to meet the needs of
both the commissioners and participants.
...“the facilitator was telling the audience points basically which other groups may have raised, but
giving it to them rather than getting it from them which may have undermined the amount of learning
that takes place – you are starting to tell me what I should be thinking.”… (Commissioner)
Nevertheless it can be established that ‘selective facilitation’ occurs, a similar process to one
described by Greatbatch and Dingwell (1990) in their study of divorce mediators where the mediators,
rather than standing outside the proceedings, ‘regularly exerted pressure in favour of one option and
against others’ (p1) an approach which in Forum Theatre contradicts the espoused aim of ‘the
audience writing the outcomes’.
The Actor as Facilitator
4
It was acknowledged by the actors that the facilitating role was challenging and initially when moving
into the organizational theatre, the one that they found hardest. This differentiation between being an
actor and being facilitator as well as being an individual with their own set of unique experiences. The
extent to which the transition is successfully made may be due to a number of factors - however, if the
transition is not made effectively, there are consequences for the participants. Thus, in the eyes of
one participant there was a distinct blurring of the boundaries which was seen as being inappropriate.
“[the actor] clearly got involved in the discussion about what should be done and so on … and you
started to think hang on, which role/hat is he wearing? If they step in and out of role does it start to
stretch and strain the perception of what they are doing?” (Participant)
The actors saw their role as challenging the participants and opening up debate and discussion but
side by side with these activities was the need to provide control and direction. The following extract
sums up this dilemma that many of the actors articulated.
“I found hardest of all in the first year was making the break between now I’m performing; now I’m
talking to you. Now I’m this character in a role play – I really struggled with it. Because up to that point
I needed a minute to recover from being the character, sorry I just can’t cut off and talk to an
audience, we just don’t do that. So that was a steep learning curve I was on because I knew I had to
get better at that because the biggest learning is that it’s not about the acting. Acting, to the actor, is
the biggest thing, and the most important thing but in {Forum Theatre] it isn’t the most important thing,
the learning is the most important thing, the development or the assessment or the evidence for the
learning… you are the conduit for that to happen. It’s not about how good you are at being this
character, it helps if you are but it’s not the fundamental, important part.”… (Actor/Facilitator)
Thus the actors did struggle with the shifts between acting and facilitating; their models of facilitation
are potentially linked to their acting training rather than specific facilitator training. Although theatre
consultancies did offer facilitation training, the amounts varied between an initial one or two induction
(and sometimes less) to training on a more on-going basis but the actors commented that it was often
difficult to take this up due to the sessional nature of their work which frequently meant that there
were competing commitments.
Conclusion
‘Theatre is a space of possibilities, a space of the possible’ (Steyaert et al 2006) but the creation of
such spaces within organisations is clearly problematical. Theatre in itself is an ambiguous activity;
furthermore, as Clark and Salaman (1996) note, the nature of any consultancy product is ambiguous
– clients are being asked to ‘buy a promise’ (p 91). Thus it is not surprising that there is ambiguity
around the form of Forum Theatre, the purposes of such interventions and the ways in which such
events are managed from the script development stage through to enactment. Thus the more that this
‘promise’ can be managed by setting boundaries through the scripting of the performances, the
setting out the espoused outcomes and the management of the event itself.
.
The focus in this discussion on the facilitators clearly indicate the importance of this role which has
not been to subject to such scrutiny previously. By enabling the actor/facilitators’ voices to be heard,
there is a greater understanding of the dilemmas and issues that they face in enabling such events.
The findings suggest that in spite of initial intentions to enable participants to ‘say anything and do
anything’ (Facilitator/Actor) in reality the event is more closely managed by the facilitators than might
be expected and there is considerable ambiguity in respect of their role. This ambiguity works its way
through to the enactment of the events, most noticeably through strategies employed as the
actor/facilitators move between their two roles. Thus are the actors as facilitators taking an expert
model or process model of facilitation, the ‘sage on the stage’ or the ‘guide by the side’? (Taylor 2007;
Foster et al 2007)? The evidence would suggest that they are unclear, and this lack of clarity impacts
on the extent to which participants engage with the process.
While Forum Theatre is espoused as an emergent Organization Development intervention, with the
assumption that using such a methodology will achieve a democratised space, in reality such spaces
may not be so democratic after all. It would seem that the actor/facilitators are, in this process, likely
to be subject to expectations and pressures which are at best contradictory and potentially conflicting.
5
They are supposed to be operating in a democratic space and yet are expected to contribute to
outcomes which achieve predetermined organizational outcomes. They are briefed by their own
managers on those outcomes and yet have to respond to the live direction of participants during the
process.
Whilst the focus in this discussion has been on how the facilitators perceive and carry out what can be
seen to be a challenging role, it should be noted that the shaping of such events takes place in a
much wider context with a number of other stakeholders influencing the structure and outcomes. Thus
as suggested earlier whilst the participants may well be encouraged to actively engage in Forum
Workshops and be encourage to put forward their suggestions, it is the organizational or
management perspective that tends to prevail in terms of specified outcomes. As one practitioner
commented, ‘We’re never given [absolute] freedom and no organization would give us that’ a theme
that clearly resonates with those responsible for managing Forum Theatre events.
It is noted that this discussion makes the assumption that the creation of arenas or learning spaces is
de facto, the future for organizational learning, development and change activities. It may well be the
case that a more bounded and managed approach is more appropriate but the research also
suggests that even when the intention is to offer more informal and plur-vocal events, without greater
understanding of the facilitation methods employed, even the more free-form approaches that theatre
can offer are likely to be constrained by the over-arching unitarist perspectives.
References:
Babbage F (2004) Augustus Boal London Routledge
Berry M (1993) Changing Perspectives on Facilitation Skills Development Journal of European
Industrial Training Vol. 17 No. 3, pp. 23-32
Boal A (1979) Theater of the Oppressed London : Pluto Press
Clark T (2008) From Metaphor to Practice: The Emergence of Theatre in Organizations in D Barry
and H Hansen (Ed) New and Emerging Approaches in Management and Organization
London: Sage
Clark T and. Mangham I (2004a). Stripping to the undercoat: a review and reflection on a piece of
organization theatre Organization Studies. 25(5)
Clark T and Greatbatch G (2004) The management guru as organizational witchdoctor Organization
Vol 3 85 pp 85-197
Clark T (1995) Managing Consultants: Consultancy as Management of Impressions Buckingham
Oxford University Press
Clarke D and Butcher M Reconciling hierarchy and democracy: the value of management learning
Management Learning Volume 37, Issue 3,
Coopey J and Burgoyne J (1998) Politics and organizational learning Journal of Management Studies
37:6
Coopey J (1998) Learning to trust and trusting to learn Management Learning Vol 29:3
Cohen-Cruz M and Schutzman J (2006) A Boal Companion: Dialogues on Theatre and Cultural
Politics Abingdon Routledge
Foster M, Angus, B and Ryan R (2007) “All in the hall” or “sage on the stage”: learning in leadership
development programmes Leadership and Organizational Development Journal Vol 29 No 6
pp 504-521
Fulop L and Rifkin W (1997) Representing fear in learning in organizations Management Learning Vol
28(1)
6
Gibb S (2004) Arts-based training in management development: the use of improvisational theatre
Journal of Management Development 23:8
Gilmore S and Williams S (2007) Conceptualising the “personnel
professional” ; a critical analysis of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development’s
professional qualification scheme Personnel Review Vol 36 Nos 3
Greatbatch, D and Dingwall, R (1989) Selective Facilitation: Some Preliminary Observations on a
Strategy Used by Divorce Mediators Law and Society Review 23(4)
Gregory W and Romm N (2001) Critical facilitation : learning through group processes Management
Learning Vol 32 (4)
Holman D (2000) Contemporary models of management education in the UK Management Learning
31(2)
Huzzard T (2004) Communities of domination? reconceptualising organizational learning and power
Journal of Workplace Learning 16:6
Jackson T (2007) Theatre, Education and the Making of Meanings Manchester: Manchester
University Press
Jackson A (1992) A Translator’s Introduction in A Boal (1992) Games for Actors and Non-actors
London Routledge
Kershaw B (1992) The Politics of Performance London; Routledge
Meisiek S and Barry D (2007) Through the looking glass of organizational theatre: Analogically
mediated inquiry in organizations Organization Studies 28 (12)
Meisiek S (2004) Which catharsis do they mean? Organization Studies 25(5)
Meisiek S (2002) Situation drama in change management: types and effects of a new managerial tool
International Journal of Arts Management 4(3)
Nissley N, Taylor S, Houden L (2004) the politics of performance in organizational theatre-based
training and interventions Organization Studies 25 (5)
Örtenblad A (2002) Organizational learning: a radical perspective International Journal of
Management Reviews 4 (1)
Schreyögg S (2001) Organizational theatre and organizational change Discussion Paper No 13/01
Institute of Management Freie Universität Berlin
www.wiwiss.fu-berlin.de/institute/.../pdf/unternehmenstheater Accessed 26th November 2005
Steaert C, Meisiek S, Höpfl H, Hjforth D, Hansen H, Bille D (2006) In the wings: on the possibility of
theatrical space Journal of Critical Postmodern Organizational Science Vol 5 Issue 3
Taylor S and Ladkin D (2009) Understanding Arts Based Methods in Managerial Development
Academy of Management Learning Vol 8 No 1
7