The Power of "Masterminds"

Mastermind - Drawing from the experience and knowledge of others to grow your business. A mastermind group is a group of people who meet on a regular basis to exchange ideas, seek the advice of the group and solicit feedback from. It is a resource center of new ideas.

I have been involved in several masterminds. Most recently an online exchange between women speakers around the world, which I started, and the other one is an in-person meeting, which I was invited to participate in. Each of these have taken my business to a new level and I have made some wonderful friends.

Highly successful mastermind groups work best when you follow these guidelines:

1. Choose people who have specialized knowledge you lack. Enlisting people with very different outlooks strengthens a mastermind group.

2. Make a time commitment and stick to it. Once a month generally works best. When you make the commitment, don't allow anything except serious emergencies to interfere with your date.

3. Create an agenda to follow. This creates a sense of order during your meetings. Sample agendas might include open discussion at the beginning of the meeting and then focusing on individual challenges for, let's say 20 minutes each. My in-person group (of 6) focuses on one member's challenge each meeting with the others offering their feedback or advice. Each member gets his or her turn to share. This is very powerful because each of us learns something from the other's challenge. My online group meets in a "chat room" and we each ask a question (there are 5 of us). Then the other 4 offer their responses. We meet for approximately one hour. We have open discussion at the end of the meeting if there is time.

4. Our in-person meetings are fun. We meet in a different place each month, and it has become as much a social event as an educational opportunity.

5. You can invite an occasional guest. Your group can become an event that guests ask to be invited to. However, be careful with this. Guests may inhibit the open exchange that has been created.

6. Keep it Small and Simple. Groups of 5 or 6 work best. More than that and you may find two meetings going on at the same time.

7. Discuss and Decide a policy for disclosure in the very beginning. My in-person group openly discusses details of our company with the understanding that our "inside" "secrets" are never discussed outside of our group. The online group is not as open online. If we have a serious issue, we will make a point of calling each other and discussing our issues off-line.

8. You might want to consider a facilitator to keep the group on target and on task. You learn to facilitate by doing it.

Follow this simple guideline; you will have a highly successful mastermind group and you will see your business GROW!



Excerpted from The PMS Principles - Powerful Marketing Strategies to Grow Your Business © 2005 - Heidi Richards