Refreshing your monthly updates

I was recently told by a forum moderator: “Our update quality is varied from member to member, with more of them becoming travelogues, rather than getting into the heart of the emotional impact and significance.”  The moderator asked how to reframe and refresh their updates.  Following are a few ideas:

• Set the tone that forum updates are about the issues and challenges you can’t share anywhere else (what we sometimes call the top 5% and bottom 5% of your life). The acronym that summarizes this is MITy WISE:
  • Most Important Things
  • Why it’s important
  • Impact personally
  • Significance for you personally
  • Emotions you are feeling
• Especially appropriate for the beginning of a new year: Try annual, instead of monthly updates. See this earlier blog post for more details.
• Flip the format of updates: Ask that members start with the emotion they are feeling, then why the emotional feeling is significant and important, and only then share the facts.
• Do another round after completing your standard updates. See this blog post for the prompts to use.
• Try a different update format such as those available in the Alumni Forum Services Resource Library.

Dealing with an urgent issue – you don’t need to wait until your next scheduled meeting

When a forum member has an urgent issue to present and the group’s next meeting is not scheduled for sometime, consider arranging an emergency meeting.

Some guidelines:

• Since the purpose of the meeting is only to have a single presentation, it will be shorter, somewhere between 30-90 minutes long.
• It may be held either in person or via conference call.
• Because the meeting is scheduled on short notice, and in order to work for the presenter, attendance is optional, and missing the meeting does not count as an official absence.
• You can still follow the standard presentation format in this special meeting (e.g., coaching if time allows, communication starter, presentation, Q&A, experience sharing)

In the four years my forum has been in existence, we have had two emergency meetings of this type.  Both were arranged as conference calls on Saturday morning at 8:00 am because that was the time when we could get the most members.

Bob Halperin

Once a year – try ANNUAL, instead of monthly updates

Every month we come to our Forum meetings, prepared to give an update on what’s happened since the last meeting and what’s coming up.  We strive to share what’s meaningful and significant, the really tough dilemmas or unresolved issues we may not be able to share outside of Forum.

Once a year, consider an annual, instead of a monthly framing of these updates.  In place of the standard format, ask everyone to reflect upon the “best and worst” of the last year, and the “dread and anticipate” of the upcoming 12 months. Then take extra parking lot time and try to think about issues from the yearly perspective. This may help you step back and look at important but not urgent issues in a new way.

As another aspect of this annual update, ask everyone to touch on learning and updates from the presentations they had done during the last 12 months. 

One forum shared with me that, after taking this new approach, they voted to make this an annual practice!

Bob Halperin

Updates – one more round

To help foster good and trusting relationships in your Forum, consider doing one more round after your Forum’s regular monthly updates.

Go around the room and invite members to complete the following sentence:

“The one thing I don’t want to share with my Forum is…”

or

“The one thing I have not yet shared with my Forum is…”

A core principle of Forum is “Be the first to share.”  These prompts invite members to go deeper, perhaps to share a forgotten item or an important issue inspired by what another member has shared.

Bob Halperin

Forum Exercise: What Motivates Us

Listening to the lifelines presented at a Forum orientation, one is struck both by the differences – and similarities – in our lives so far. In this exercise, we explore what our individual histories suggest about our different fundamental motivations.

Steps in the exercise:

1. (Optional before the meeting) Ask members to think in advance about why people do things important to them and what are important drivers for how you live your life today.
2. The moderator or a member of the Forum facilitates a discussion, identifying possible “motivations” that could drive how we and others live and make choices in our lives. (See the list below of possible “Seeking Motivations” and “Constraining Motivations” which the Forum can use to jumpstart its discussion.)
3. One member of the Forum serves as the focal point/presenter, discussing their motivations and how that relates to their life so far.
4. Other members take turns sharing what they believe have been their motivations and how they are reflected in their life so far.

~~~~~~~
Possible motivations

We may be seeking…

• Autonomy – Be My Own Boss/Work Alone
• Lifestyle Freedom (defined as time to pursue other important activities)
• Altruism – Feeling I am Giving
• A Supportive Family
• Be the Boss
• Affiliation – Part of a Team/Community
• Directing/Managing People
• Create and Raise My Children
• Working/Being with Other People
• Power & Influence
• Intellectual Challenge/Stimulation
• Want to be a Star
• Creating Something New
• Security
• Support My Spouse
• Financial Gain
• Want to Keep Doing Different Things
• Positioning for Big Thing Later
• Doing Something Important
• Prestige
• Want to Win
• Parents’ Expectations

We may be constrained by…

• Risk Aversion
• Shame of Who We Are
• Fear of Loosing
• Wanting to Work/Be Alone
• Fear of Rejection by Others
• Family/Community Expectations

Adapted from an exercise suggested by
Rick Williams, Member
Harvard Business School Club of Boston Alumni Forum