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JOe, I love this idea, adn it is right in allignment with what I see as an essential need for very small businesses: the need for allies to run things by and get support and feedback from. I get tired of talking to myself, and I often say stuff to others that I really need to hear! I would be interestied in co-faccilitating a group in allignment with what I do: other healers, counselors, speakers or anyone in the human-potential field. Online discussion would be great, since I live a ways from Seattle. But I would like to meet face to face and relax together too... so, now what? Rev. Elke
Posted by Joe Shirley, Seattle, Washington | Mar 05, 2006
Idea for peer coaching groups
Since I've been involved with Biznik, I've noticed how useful it's been to receive feedback from business peers and share ideas as well as frustrations and solutions. I've experienced this both live at meetings and online here on BizTalk. I'd like to suggest a way to make this benefit more directly available to members, and get some input into how to implement the idea.
The idea:
Small groups of 5 to 12 affinity-related peers who meet regularly to support one another in the challenges of building their businesses.
Meetings:
Group members commit to meeting once a month. Members can meet live if that's possible, online via chat or other technology, or over the phone using one of the many conference call services.
Affinity:
Members come together based on their interest in a particular type, phase, or function of business. To take a few examples, groups might form for financial planners, new owners, or members wanting to get better at marketing.
Ongoing Support:
Members support one another between meetings as desired through email, an online forum for their group, occasional phone calls, or other channels.
Accountability:
At the end of each meeting, each member commits to take some action. At the beginning of each meeting, members briefly share results of their actions.
Meeting Facilitation:
Members could take turns being the lead facilitator, or one person could take on that ongoing responsibility. However, all members take responsibility for the meeting being useful to all. Biznik makes suggested facilitation guidelines available. Interested members participate in ongoing discussions to improve and refine those guidelines.
Benefits:
As a member, you get a group of peers who learn about you and your business over time, who can provide feedback that is timely and relevant.
As a member, you gain confidence in your own knowledge by offering feedback that other members find valuable.
Members in far-flung locales can fruitfully engage with other Biznikers without waiting for a critical mass of members to join in their area.
Questions/Needs:
Would people be interested in this? What would you need, to make it useful to you? What kinds of affiliation or focus would attract you to joining a group?
Dan, would you be able to implement the capability for a) chat and b) group-focused forums or blogs if people were interested in using those? Are there other technologies that could mediate meetings and ongoing support?
What other benefits do you see to these groups for yourself? For Biznik?
My Contribution:
I would be interested in contributing to, or even hosting, a live and/or online discussion about this, exploring ways to set up the structure so that people get the most out of it. I'm making this post as a first step.
9 Bizniks have posted replies
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Posted by Rev. Elke Siller Macartney, LaConner, Washington | Mar 06, 2006 -
Posted by Lara Feltin, Seattle, Washington | Mar 06, 2006I like these ideas too. One of the parts of Biznik we want to maintain is that we're event-centric rather than geographic-centric. Facilitating participation in a group via online tools like a chatroom is the best way to include members regardless of where they live.
We have three kinds of events right now: Happy Hour Socials without a structured format that fall between a 3-4 hour window. 1.5 hour lunch Meetings with 5 minute introductions and Q&A from each person present. And 2 hour seminars hosted by members who have a topic they can present that is of interest ot others.
I've been tossing ideas around for a fourth type of event that sounds very similar to yours, Joe. I've been calling them Interest Groups but I like the words "Peer Coaching Groups" and "Affinity Groups" too. Over the years I've been invited to many small group of self-employed individuals - from a group of photograhers to a group of self-employed artisits. Just two weeks ago I was invited to meet with a group of women entrepreneurs. These sometimes referred to themselves as networking groups, but they mainly seemed to be about support and accountability. I've found that many times these small interest groups may meet 3 or 4 times over the course of 4 or 5 months before the members simply stop showing up and the group disbands.
We need to build some tools to let members start these groups and announce meetings. Maybe we need to meet with the two of you, Joe and Elke, and map out what tools you envision being needed to get this rolling.
On a related note, I also believe in inviting the members from some of these existing small groups to all join Biznik. They would have a larger audience to recruit from, the Biznik community would benefit from having more members to network with, and the interest group could use the online tools like the Calendar of Events and Biz Talk for communicating and organizing.
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Posted by Joe Shirley, Seattle, Washington | Mar 06, 2006Yes, yes, and yes. Let's get together and talk. Anyone else want to participate in planning this?
I have an idea for a name: Biz Pods.
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Posted by Lara Feltin, Seattle, Washington | Mar 06, 2006
Love the name!
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Posted by Rev. Elke Siller Macartney, LaConner, Washington | Mar 07, 2006
Biz Pod..how odd...anyway, I like it. Let me know when you might want to chat. Elke
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Posted by Marc Marling, Norfolk, Virginia | Mar 07, 2006I think this is a brilliant idea. One thought is that the pods could bring in subject matter experts for a seminar/talk - perhaps through a webinar or some other online method so the peer group would gain not just from one another but from an outside "expert".
A peer group concerning itself with businesses that are growing might want to bring in a biznik member lawyer to speak about corporate structure or things to worry about as you bring on employees - just as an example.
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Posted by Joe Shirley, Seattle, Washington | Mar 09, 2006
Awesome, Marc. I agree. I envision something a little beyond our current 2-hour presentation/classes, where people with expertise already do share some of that with the community.
I would love to see the pods develop a collective wisdom about how to collaborate in learning with one another. A seminar drawing on this strength would involve new information provided by the expert, interwoven with "break-outs" and other formats where the participants would interact with one another, probing, questioning, brainstorming, joking, and all the other cool things we can do to help one another actually integrate and apply new information.
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Posted by Steve Habib Rose, Seattle, Washington | Mar 15, 2006Great idea, Joe. And, I like the name BizPods as well. The domain BizPods.com is being sold by some "friendly" person who registered it and wants to get some money out of folks who want to use it. The domain BizPods.net (and other variants) is still available -- I suggest that you or Biznik consider ordering it. It could be useful down the line -- if only by pointing it to Biznik. I'm pretty sure some search engines (such as Google) will first find the domain names that include a word like BizPods. So, if the term catches on, they will find BizPods.com and BizPods.net
If you aren't as picky about these things as I am, I suppose just go ahead and use the name informally and wait until you get contacted by the owner of BizPods.com or their lawyer. As mentioned, it appears that their site is not a real organization. If that's the case, they may not have a lawyer, or they may not care, or they may not have a case.
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Posted by Dan McComb, Seattle, Washington | Mar 15, 2006The pod idea is fabulous. Let's have that meeting that you and Elke are talking about having to suss out the details. BizPods, if needed, can be a subdomain of Biznik, as in pods.biznik.com, but I'm not even sure that's the way to do it - probably just make it an attribute of your account. For many reasons (google ranking, ease of remembering, ease of tracking, etc.) we'll want to keep everything flowing through the top level domain of biznik.com.
/dan
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