Choose people you identified as program staff, current clients, “alumni,” potential program participants, colleagues in related or complementary fields of work, support staff, vendors, and community members who have an interest in your field. You’ll want at least 12 to15 people, so invite 30–40. Include people who surfaced in the questorming because this time you will be looking for:
• Potential partners
• Elements to add or subtract from your initial project design
• Barriers and gaps that need attention
• Community resources to augment your project
• History of what does and doesn’t work locally and in other communities
• Perceived benefits of your proposed effort
• Community supporters
• Prospective funding streams
By now you know the steps of holding a productive meeting, but let me add a few additional suggestions because this will be a larger group and you‘ll need to be a bit more organized.
- Phone, email, or otherwise personally invite each person. Follow up a verbal invitation with a written notice that includes the estimated time (90 minutes for this group) and purpose of the meeting.
- Reserve a room and arrange for a recorder. If you have invited 40 people, set up the room for 30 and have spare chairs handy. It’s better to have every chair filled than to have large empty rows or a single person at a table with eight chairs. You also want everyone to participate easily so if you expect more than a dozen, arrange for two recorders and/or someone to tape the session.
- Plan to have some kind of refreshments. You are building relationships, as well as gathering information, so prepare as if you are inviting people to your home. If you serve coffee, make arrangements for tea, add bottled water to a selection of soft drinks, and show that you are attentive to individual differences by your choice of food.
- People may not know each other (so nametags will probably be appropriate) and they will undoubtedly arrive at different times so I suggest you begin with the kind of flexible, interactive activities that Eva Schindler-Rainman called “raggedy beginnings.” Start a graffiti wall and invite people to respond to posted words and phrases or build a group mind map surrounding your proposed project. Pass out forms for people to interview someone to introduce later. Even do a silly party ice breaker that can be easily stopped when most of the group has arrived.
- Thank everyone for coming. Remind them of the purpose of the meeting (to help the agency collect ideas and resources about XYZ). If the raggedy beginning didn’t involve interviewing someone else, ask everyone to introduce themselves and answer one specific question related to the topic of the day. (Give your name, agency or job title, and one service that would make life better for homeless/elderly/young people in our community. Or, tell us how you would benefit if we expanded the music academy.)
- Restate the purpose and expectations of the meeting • once again and review or teach the four basic guidelines for brainstorming:
- Criticism is ruled out.
- Freewheeling ideas are welcome.
- Quantity is wanted.
- Combination and improvement are sought.
- Decide which of the eight possible outcomes (potential partners; additions or subtractions from your project design; barriers and gaps; community resources; history of what does and doesn’t work; desired benefits; community supporters; and prospective funding streams) you want to elicit through group process and which you want to collect through personal observation.
- You may want to brainstorm more than one question, but limit the number to three. If you used the graffiti wall as a raggedy beginning, start with one of those topics and add suggestions. Look at the questions from the questorming session to see which ones might be applicable.
- Expect a pause after a rush of ideas. Be patient and give people permission to dig deeper for comments they think are silly or impractical. You’ll find someone brave enough to make a suggestion—and then the ball will get rolling again.
- If there is time and you want help in setting priorities, ask people to rank the suggestions that have been made. An easy way to do this if ideas are posted on newsprint around the room is to give each person three colored stickers to affix to the three suggestions they think have the most merit, should be implemented first, or another ranking criteria you select. If ideas were taped or are not easily accessible, distribute half sheets of brightly colored paper and ask people to list three answers to the ranking question you raise. (Brightly colored paper is as an important ingredient as the choice of refreshments, since it’s another detail that says you put time and energy into planning this day and you will find and appreciate the feedback they provide.)
- Ten minutes before you said the meeting would end, ask if there are any final comments, summarize the main contributions, and thank everyone for coming. Stand by the door to say thank-you and good-bye to everyone as they leave.
- Clean up and transcribe the notes. Condense them to one page and send them with a thank-you note to everyone who attended. Also send them with a note to the people who didn’t attend saying you missed them and wonder if they have anything to add to the group’s feedback.
