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1. The choice of meeting site will affect
who shows up. Look for a place that has familiarity, accessibility, and that
is comfortable.
2. Set a meeting time that will be convenient for most of those that want to
attend.
3. Prepare an agenda for the meeting. Some items will just be reports. Other
items will require the group to make decisions about what to do and who will
do it.
4. Call potential participants to remind them about the meeting. Even if
people already know the date and place, you will be surprised how many more
come if you make the calls.
5. Let those you call know about the agenda items. As you talk with people,
you may need to revise the agenda, to incorporate their ideas.
Facilitator or Chairperson's role
1. Unless it is a very small group with just
two or three people, there needs to be someone responsible for moving the
meeting along.
2. Start the meeting on time and work to end the meeting on time. Meetings
over an hour and a half become less and less productive as time goes on.
People like short meetings.
3. Set basic ground rules such as one speaker at a time, no side
conversations, and everyone gets a chance to speak.
4. Make sure the group respects everyone's rights. Encourage shy people to
speak. Try to calm the domineering.
5. After the group has a good chance to discuss an agenda item the
facilitator summarizes the conclusion the group seems to have come to,
asking the group members if they agree by saying something like, "Then, have
we decided to....?"
6. The best facilitators listen to and respect the thinking of the group.
Facilitators, who use meetings to ram through their own ideas end up
facilitating very small meetings.
For more facilitation tips see
http://www.gsanetwork.org/resources/facilitate.html
Beginning of the meeting
1. Start with introductions. Make sure
everyone knows each other.
2. Appoint someone to take minutes of the meeting.
3. Do something to gather people together, such as asking everyone to
briefly mention good things that have happened lately to them, or saying why
they came to the meeting.
4. Review the agenda. Before the meeting write the agenda on large sheets of
newsprint so that everyone can see, or on single sheets that can be passed
out. This is the groups chance to add to or modify the agenda. After the
agenda is set, the group needs to stick to it.
The meeting itself
1. Try to start with something that is easy
to deal with. This will give the group a sense of accomplishment and energy.
2. Finish each item on the agenda before moving on to the next. If a
decision is needed, try to get the group to focus and make the decision.
Sometimes finishing an item means deciding to simply gather more information
before a final decision.
3. A big item may need to be broken into several different parts to discuss
one at a time to make it more manageable.
End of the meeting
1. Review for the group the decisions that
have been made and the responsibilities undertaken by members of the group.
2. Have a period for announcements.
3. Have a brief evaluation. This can be simply asking each person to state
both a frustrating thing and a good thing about the meeting.
4. After the meeting the person who took the minutes needs to write them up
and, if possible, send them out to those who attended, or who usually
attend. The minutes are a record of the decisions that were made. Every
point in the discussion does not have to be written
down. Having minutes saves a group from re-making decisions, because you
have a record of past decisions. Minutes are also valuable when it comes to
making the next agenda.
Decision making process
Although majority vote is the most familiar
way to make decisions, many groups use consensus or "sense of the meeting".
Consensus means that the group takes actions that everyone consents
to. This does not mean that everyone is in perfect agreement, but that
everyone can live with the decision. In rare instances a person
decides to block agreement because an action would violate one's principles.
(This concept is tricky. A group can sometimes rethink something when
someone states strongly that "this is wrong." But the concept of blocking
consensus can be used for manipulation. Generally members should strongly be
urged to accept the group's judgment.
Ideally, decisions made by consensus have the support of the entire group.
The best thinking of the group has been incorporated into decisions. The
process encourages creative ideas.
Remember
People get very frustrated by meetings that
don't accomplish anything. People like groups that follow through on
decisions that get made.
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