ICA Certified ToP Facilitator Program

The image of leadership is shifting from "strong individuals" who takes charge and makes the hard choices to "facilitative leaders" who enable people to participate in meaningful ways and engage them in decision making.

Participation is rapidly becoming the dominant mode for planning and decision making. Facilitation has spread through business, government, voluntary organizations and communities around the planet. As a profession, it is growing very rapidly.As facilitation grew as a profession, ICA’s around the world created training programs that enable people to learn participatory methods, build skills and cultivate a facilitative style.

The people and organizations we serve seek assurance of excellence. We recognized that people seeking facilitation had few real ways to determine the skills and capacities of facilitators. While people learn facilitation methods and tools in courses, we determined that we needed a way to assess facilitator competence based on evidence of competence in relation to objective standards of excellence.

We decided to, in partnership with ICA’s around the world, develop a way to assess facilitator competence and the specific application of ToP methods. We are dedicated to working with a high level of integrity and we want to ensure that ToP facilitators are able to do the best work possible for our clients.

In the late 80’s, ICA in Canada began this work and developed the first statements of what it means to be a competent facilitator. These initial findings were published as "The Magic of the Facilitator" in Edges magazine.

We’ve learned a great deal from working with the International Association of Facilitators. ICA ToP facilitators participated in developing IAF's "Certified Professional Facilitator" program. IAF’s certification program focuses on the general skills required to facilitate as a professional.

In addition to the general competencies required for professiinal facilitators, ICA's ToP FAcilitator Certification program looks in depth at the understanding of and ability to use ICA’s ToP facilitation methods with excellence. The emphasis is focused on mastery of ToP methods and the integration of participatory values in your facilitation practice.

Successful ICA certification candidates will:

ToP facilitator certification only applies to the individuals who demonstrate excellence in relation to the identified competencies.

There are thousands of facilitators around the world using Technologies of Participation in their facilitation practice. Many people have taken ToP facilitation courses and do excellent work, but do not choose to become Certified ToP facilitators.

ICA Associates does not certify organizations providing facilitation services. Some facilitators certified by ICA may work in organizations with facilitators who have not been certified by ICA.

Certification Links

ICA Associates Inc.
655 Queen Street East - Toronto, Ontario - M4M 1G4
Phone - 416-691-2316 - Canada toll-free - 1-877-691-1422