How to form a group at your organization

During my field placement, I have had the great opportunity of forming a peer-support group for our student veterans that may or may not have a disability. It has been a challenge in learning how to form a group and run a group. I thought (with Kelly’s help) it would be a good idea to share what I have learned about forming groups to you! So…without further ado…let’s get cracking!

GOALS:

After reading this blog, it is my hope that you will:

1.       Explore the benefits of forming a group at your organization.

2.       Learn how to create a group

3.       Understand the potential challenges to forming a group.

Let’s get started!!!

Benefits to forming a group 

Groups have been around for a long time in the efforts to help individuals navigate through tumultuous times and empower them to be the best “them” they can be. Groups also are a great way to help connect individuals with similar life experience and to help “normalize” those life experiences within the social constructs of our world. Some of the most common groups we hear about are those that are formed to support individuals that have:

•  Experienced Trauma
•  Specific diseases or mental health disorders
•    Lost loved ones
•    Experienced sexism, classism, racism, and ageism.

Groups are not formed just for individuals that are experiencing diseases and hardships, although that may be the stigma affiliated with groups. Groups are forming all around us and for great reasons. There are craft groups, parenting groups, motorcycle groups, etc. These groups are forming because they have something in common not necessarily because they have a disease!

With that said…groups are very beneficial for connecting people to one another and connecting them to a network or resources that can benefit them in some way. One of the most notorious of groups is Alcoholics Anonymous (AA).This group has a long and interesting history. If you have time, visit their website and learn about the challenges this group faced and learn about its success.  http://www.aa.org/pages/en_US/aa-timeline

HOW TO FORM A GROUP

Forming a group certainly has its challenges but here are some steps that I have identified to forming a group.

                Step 1 – Brainstorm -You will need to determine if your organization could benefit from a group and consider the population you want to support. Are there enough people to form a group? What size group are you looking for? And what are the goals/objectives to forming this group? Are you offering incentives to come? What are those incentives?

                Step 2 – Buy-in -Similar to Olivia’s presentation, you will want to get support for your group or “buy-in”. Talk with your supervisors, your co-workers, and others to see if you are supported in this effort. It’s also important to get the feedback from the individuals you are hoping to serve. For my change project, I continuously used different social mediums to engage with my stakeholders.  I created a discussion forum about forming a group and asked for input. I also asked students in the hall, in meetings, over the phone, etc. When I got a sense that a group “might” be successful and that it was supported, I moved on.

                Step 3 – Planning - After you have determined if a group is a good idea and that you might have some participants, it’s important to start planning. The planning process is the most important part, in my opinion, to forming a group. The more time and consideration you put into the planning, the more successful your group may be in forming. One could easily break-up the planning step in to three different parts: Input, Logistics, and more input.

·         Input – depending on the circumstances of your organization and weather this group is “mandatory” or not, you will want to consider getting your stakeholders input for best times and dates. You can do this, again, with creating polls/surveys, writing e-mails, creating discussions either online, in-person or over the phone. Once you have an idea of what dates/times work best you will want to save-a-date. Once you have saved a date, you will want to begin the logistics part of planning.

·         Logistics – It’s important that you reserve a space to have your meeting in. Furthermore, it is important to consider the environment / space you are planning to hold your meeting in. Is it accessible by all? Is it safe? Is there parking? Is there enough room? Once you have a space set, you may want to consider if you are going to purchase refreshments / food and how you are going to arrange your space.

·         More Input – There are a few times through-out your entire forming of the group that you will want to consider what YOU would like the group to look like and what you are willing to commit too. For example; how often is this group going to meet and for what duration of time? Can you commit to those times? Is this going to be an open group or a closed group? Does this group have a curriculum to follow? If so, what does that curriculum look like? Depending on your organization and your flexibility, this step may be accomplished in the brainstorming step, in the planning step, and/or in the actual first meeting with your group. During my field placement, I wanted students to have ownership over their group and left most of this planning up to them.

Step 4 – Promote – Once you have planned for your group’s first meeting, you will want to begin promoting your meeting. Create a colorful PDF flyer with the time, date and the group’s name on it. Make sure to include a brief description of what the purpose of your group is. Place your groups information on your organizations website; include it on the organizations calendar; place information on the digi-screens if you have them. You may want begin contacting people again through e-mail, phone, and through any discussion forum you have accessible to you. Talk with those in your organization and ask for their help in promoting your meeting as well. If you have funds available, place an advertisement in your local paper or call your local radio station. Some radio stations promote community calendar events for FREE!

Step 5 - Run Group– After you have done all the planning and promoting, it’s time to sit back and see what happens! Running a group is a whole other series of steps but some things to consider for your first meeting might be:

•  Doing a creative introduction activity
•  Establishing group goals.
•  Establishing norms and ground rules.
•  Discussing how often the group wants to meet.
• Discussing how the group feels about being an open or closed group
•   Discuss if the group participants want to take turns facilitating the group?
•  Going over what group process is (forming, storming, norming, performing).
•  Ensuring everyone’s voice is heard

Challenges for Forming Groups

Having the numbers - One big challenge that you may encounter is having enough people in your group for it to run successfully. After all your hard work, there is a chance that you might only have a few people come to your group or none at all. This is okay and don’t be discouraged! Groups are hard to form and eventually you will make it happen.

Negative connotations/Stigma - Picking a name for your group can be challenging. There are some negative connotations with certain words like; group, club, peer-support, etc. It’s important that you think about the population you are planning to serve and the verbiage you are intending to use. For example, at my field placement working with veterans, I knew that students would be less likely to attend a “peer-support group” because of the military culture and stigma associated with mental health. In the end, my group was called “student veterans community”.

Technology - As technology advances, organizations are finding it difficult to organize and run groups. There are many online support groups that have their benefits but also have their draw-backs. Here is a link to an Oxford journal article that discusses some research on how online support groups are both beneficial and not so beneficial. It is a long article, so please just read a little and get a feel for the pros/cons. http://her.oxfordjournals.org/content/16/6/693.full

Groups can be a great thing to run and can be beneficial to many people and the community as a whole. I hope that you have learned something new and creative from my blog. Please join me and the rest of our class in the discussion forum where we can discuss forming a group further. Click here! 

-Thank you!