Facilitation is a critical means of supporting creative processes in teams. Previous studies have shown that neutrality is central to effective facilitation but no clear conceptualization of neutrality has been provided to date. The aim of this paper is to explore how neutrality is enacted by facilitators, what its key elements and mechanisms are, and how it is perceived in the creative facilitation context. We adopt a theory building mode and conduct an in-depth case study, following an innovation project in the IT sector with a series of facilitated creativity workshops. Our results show that neutrality is a multi-dimensional construct that interacts with several outcome dimensions of facilitation, i.e. people, process, and product. We introduce a pro-active neutrality framework, which explains the mechanisms of neutrality in facilitation and thereby extend theory on both neutrality and facilitation. We further outline a number of propositions that could be explored by future research as well as provide important creativity management implications that will enhance creativity and innovation in the workplace.

Facilitation is important to supporting teams in the creative process during innovation, yet our understanding of the underlying mechanisms of facilitation and its effects on team processes is still limited. This paper addresses this gap by investigating how group facilitation (both internal and external) shapes team processes with respect to teamwork, taskwork and affect. We use a case study approach coupled with protocol analysis to examine the effects of facilitator's actions on team processes as well as interactions between those processes. Our results reveal a distinct distribution of teamwork and taskwork between the facilitator and the team, such that the facilitator guides the teamwork while the team focuses on the taskwork, yet with dynamic shifting in responsibilities between facilitator and team across the duration of the process. Further, we show how a facilitator uses positive affect to mediate interactions between taskwork and teamwork during creative workshops. We contribute to theory on facilitation and team processes in innovation management by offering a novel description of how team processes are structured in a facilitated creativity setting and provide important practical implications for facilitators and managers.

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Facilitation style appears to be an important determinant of design team effectiveness. The neutrality of the group facilitator may be a key factor; however, the characteristics and impact of neutrality are relatively understudied. In a designed classroom setting, we examine the impact of two different approaches to group facilitation: (i) facilitator’s neutrality expressed as low equidistance and high impartiality and (ii) facilitator’s neutrality expressed as high equidistance and low impartiality, on team trust, trust to the facilitator and team potency. To do this, we conducted a repeated-measures experiment with a student sample. Our results indicate that facilitators expressing neutrality through low equidistance and high impartiality had a greater positive impact on team trust. The two approaches did not differ on team potency and facilitator trust. These results contribute to developing theories of design facilitation and team effectiveness by suggesting how facilitation may shape team trust and potency in group design. Based on our findings, we point to the need for future work to further examine the impact of facilitator’s process awareness and neutrality, and show how facilitation methods may benefit teams during creative design teamwork.