STUDENT ORGANIZATIONS
Planning and Running Meetings
Planning and Running Meetings
  • Announce and advertise meeting schedule.
  • Develop an agenda and review it with your advisor prior to the meeting.
  • Publish the agenda in advance.
  • Start meetings on time.
  • Conduct one item of business at a time.
  • Remember that participation is both a right and a responsibility.
  • Encourage discussion and initiate ideas.
  • Assign follow up actions and responsibilities after each meeting or during the meeting if the instructions are short.
  • Summarize accomplishments.
  • Try to limit meetings to one hour.
  • Replace members who do not produce; But, do so only after every alternative has been exhausted.
When you talk, you can only say something that you already know. When you listen, you may learn what someone else knows.
Thomas Drier

Downloads

General Agenda and Minutes Form - examples are included

Group Facilitation Skills

"The primary role of facilitators is to create an environment that allows group members to learn easily."

(Stewart, 1991 as cited in Komives, Woodward & Associates, Student Services, A Handbook for the Profession, 1996)

Roles of a Facilitator
Pay Attention to the Nonverbals
    (Taken from Ford, "Facilitator Training for Process Leadership")
  • Tone Setting: Energy, Seriousness, Sensitivity, Passive/Active Listening
  • Handling the Group Dynamics:
    • Increasing Group Participation
    • Handling Someone who Dominates a group
    • Protecting Partial or Badly Stated Ideas
    • Redirecting a Group Question
    • Preventing Put-downs
    • Preventing Ignored Statements
  • Information giving: Fill the group in on what you know
  • Modeling and Self disclosure
 When leading a group discussion, you must attend to much more than just the verbal exchange that happens between members. Things to observe include:
  • Level of trust among group members
  • Level of commitment of group members
  • Conflicts between group members
  • Strong alliances between group members
  • Attention-seeking behaviors
  • Who talks to whom
  • How often each group member speaks
  • Members who dominate the discussion
  • Members who are silent

Helpful Hints for Harried Facilitators


IF THIS HAPPENS:

FACILITATOR RESPONSES:

1) Interrupting: jumping in 1) Remember what we said about one person speaking at a time and listening when another person is talking.
2) Two people talking at once 2) "Can we hear from Mary, and then John?"
3) No response to idea offered 3) "Does anyone want to add anything? Then wait for a response. If no one responds, share one of your thoughts and then ask again."
4) One person "wiping out" another's idea and becoming judgmental 4) "Each person experiences things differently and has different value systems, it´s important to respect one another even if you see things differently.
5) Strong feeling expressed, especially negative 5) "It sounds as if you feel strongly about that and that's O.K." or "I'm glad to know how strongly you feel about that."
6) Member remains silent throughout session 6) "You've been listening intently; is there anything you'd like to add?"
7) Repetition of same ideas 7) Summarize main points expressed by person: "That's helpful: maybe we could hear from someone else."
8) Several different opinions expressed 8) "If I've heard everyone correctly, it sounds as if there are two or three different opinions being expressed." Summarize them.
9) Wandering from topic under discussion 9) "To bring ourselves back to the topic, we began discussing…."
10) One dominant person 10) "I understand that you feel strongly about . . .Can we hear from other people?"

Tips When Facilitating Discussion.

Your role during a group discussion is to facilitate the flow of comments from participants. Although it is not necessary to interject your comments after each participant speaks, periodically assisting the group with their contributions can be helpful. Here is a facilitation menu to use as you lead group discussions.


1. Paraphrase To validate the speaker. To summarize what has been said.
2. Check for meaning Check for understanding of a participant"s statement or ask the participant to clarify what he/she is saying. (Ex. I´m not sure that I understand exactly what you meant. Could you run it by us again?)
3. Give Positive Feedback Compliment an interesting or insightful comment. (Ex. That"s a good point. I"m glad that you brought that to our attention.)
4. Expand Elaborate on a participant"s contribution to the discussion with examples, or suggest a new way to view the problem. (Ex. I see where you were coming from. Here is my take on the situation.)
5. Increase the pace Energize a discussion by quickening the pace, using humor, or, if necessary, prodding the group for more contributions.
6. Devils Advocate Disagree (gently) with a participant"s comments to stimulate further discussion. (Ex. I can see where you are coming from, but I"m not sure that what you are describing is always the case. Has anyone else had an experience that is different from Jim"s?)
7. Relieve Tension Mediate differences of opinion between participants and relieve any tensions that may be brewing. (Ex. I think that Susan and Mary are not really disagreeing with each other but are just bringing out two different sides of this issue.)
8. Consolidate Pull ideas together by showing their relationship to each other. (Ex. Our discussion seems to focus around this theme.)
9. Change the group process Alter the method for obtaining participation. (Ex. Break into smaller groups.)

This material is adapted from the book "101 Ways to Make Meetings Active."

Ten Methods for Obtaining Group Participation

Active meetings cannot occur without the involvement of participants. There are a variety of ways to structure discussion and to obtain responses from participants during a meeting. Some methods are especially suitable when time is limited or participation needs to be coaxed. For example, you might use subgroup discussion and then invite a spokesperson from each subgroup to serve on a panel.

1. Open Discussion Use to welcome comments from anyone in the group.
  • If you are worried that the ensuing discussion might be too lengthy, say beforehand, "We have time for four or five short comments. Who would like to begin?"
  • To encourage several participants to volunteer comments, ask, "How many of you would like to comment on this matter?" Then note who wants to participate and establish an order of participation.
2. Subgroup Discussion Use subgroups when you have sufficient time for discussion.
  • Form participants into subgroups.
  • This is one of the key methods for obtaining everyone"s participation.
3. Partners Use partners when you want to involve everybody, but do not have enough time for subgroup discussion.
  • Form participants into pairs and ask them to discuss and problem solve together.
  • Enables every participant to talk about an issue
  • May be especially helpful with large groups
4. Response Cards Use response cards to save time or to provide anonymity for personally threatening self-disclosures.
  • Pass out index cards and request that participants record their comments or ideas on the cards.
  • Cards can be used to brainstorm.
5. Polling Use to gather responses from a large group quickly.
  • Ex. Short survey, Written Survey, Verbal Survey, Raising Hands
6. Go-Arounds Use go-arounds when you want to obtain something quickly from each participant. [Ex. Sentence stems (for example, "One idea to raise money is.")]
  • Avoid repetition, if you want, by asking each participant for a new contribution to the process.
  • In large meetings, use go-arounds for only a portion of the group (for example, all new members).
7. Calling on the Next Speaker Use this method when you are sure there is a lot of interest in the discussion or activity.
  • Call on people by raising hands
  • Request that the present speaker call on the next speaker (rather than the facilitator doing so).
8. Panels Use panels when time permits to generate a focused exchange of ideas. Rotate panelists to increase participation.
  • An informal panel can be created by asking for the views of a designated number of participants who remain in their seats.
  • Invite a small number of participants to present their views in front of the entire group.
9. Fishbowl Use fishbowls to help bring focus to large-group discussions.
  • Ask a portion of the group to form a discussion circle, and have the remaining participants form a listening circle around them. Rotate new groups into the inner circle to continue the discussion.
  • Although time-consuming, this is the best method for combining the virtues of large-group and small-group discussion.
10. Games Use an enjoyable activity or a quiz game to elicit participants´ ideas, opinions, and knowledge.

This material is adapted from the book "101 Ways to Make Meetings Active."