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Get the Most Out of Your Network with a Mastermind Group

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When Wendy and I had a great conversation not long ago about mastermind groups. She’s been in groups for different purposes and of different configurations. So when I wanted someone to explain the concept is was Wendy I asked to do me the favor. She graciously said she would.

Get the Most Out of Your Network with a Mastermind Group

by Wendy Piersall

I have a close circle of friends here in Chicago that have known me for several years – whenever we get together they like to take credit for eMoms at Home, even though they have never worked for me. I actually totally agree with them – the reason is because this group of friends was my Mastermind Group when I was first started my business.

I wholeheartedly advocate being in Mastermind Groups, and I’ll go so far as to say that yes, eMoms at Home wouldn’t be what it is today if it weren’t for the groups I have learned from along the way.

So What Exactly is a Mastermind Group?

Although Mastermind Groups can take a variety of forms, most function as basically a group that co-mentors each other. Participants will always get the most out of a mastermind group when they put a lot into the mastermind group. I currently participate in a weekly call with Dawud Miracle, Char Polanosky, Edward Mills, Gayla McCord, and Easton Ellsworth. We set up the group with the following ‘ground rules’:

  • Participating in the call is close to mandatory – though we’re flexible when ‘life happens’
  • We start on time and end on time – no exceptions
  • We take turns each week, and two people get 30 minutes every call
  • When it’s your ‘turn’, you get to bring a question to the group and we all brainstorm together to help each other come to a solution – any question is game
  • There are no stupid questions and there are no stupid answers
  • What is said to the group stays with the group – confidentiality is important when we are talking business strategy

We’ve been conducting our conference calls for about 9 months or so – I think the reason it has worked so well (and continues to work) is because:

  • We work hard to give each other really great input, basically giving each other free consulting
  • We keep a good structure in place to make the most of our time
  • We have really learned from each other – probably more from giving advice than from getting it

I think that last point is really key – we give a lot of ourselves in our calls. I’ve participated in very expensive paid mastermind groups that weren’t half as valuable as this group of friends. I really believe it was because everyone paid money and came to the group expecting to get something, rather than coming together to give to each other.

So, How do I Start a Mastermind Group?

Finding a committed group of individuals isn’t easy, but it’s not hard, either. A few tips:

  • Contact people that you want to learn from, but who still realistically also have something to learn from you
  • Lay down some sort of ground rules in your invitation so that people know what they are committing to
  • Let people know that participation is expected on a regular basis, and if they can’t commit to at least a 6-10 week initial time frame, they should probably pass
  • Meet at the same time every week/two weeks/month – either in person, or use a free conference call service like FreeConferenceCall.com
  • Have group members take turns leading the group to give everyone a chance to develop their leadership skills
  • Play with the idea of holding each other accountable to tasks or results if you really want to push each other to succeed

The blogosphere is a very close community, and filled with some of the most talented and brilliant people I have ever met. I’ve learned a ton from reading all of your blogs – and I’ve learned just as much when I’ve thrown my heart and soul into writing a post that teaches. Great Mastermind Groups work because we teach best what we most need to learn.
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Wendy Piersall is the Chief eMom at eMoms at Home the business blog network for moms and dads who balance business and life at home beautifully.

Thanks, Wendy!

–ME “Liz” Strauss

How to Network at a Social Media Breakfast

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My Name Is Liz Strauss

relationships button

In a few minutes, I’ll be leaving to attend Jeff Pulver’s Chicago Social Media Breakfast. If you haven’t heard, Jeff is going around the US meeting folks from the world of Tech and Blogging. He came to Chicago for this event. Bloggers are gathering to me him and each other. Yeah!

As the host, Jeff has invented a way for his guests who just met to find it easier to talk to each other. Take minute to watch him talk about his “Social Networking Toolkit.”

I’m having a few thoughts about how I might make those two hours successful. Here are my tips for anyone who might be doing the same in the near future.

  • Dress comfortably. In clothes that make you feel good about who you are. It’s no fun to meet people feeling like you are really who you are.
  • Keep your goal for attending realistic and low stress. I want to meet new people and find out what they do.
  • Know that even though the other folks there might be looking at you. They could be thinking about you looking at them. Smile as if we’re all in on the secret. Break the ice for them by making yourself approachable, most will be grateful.
  • Have a question ready for that moment when the air seems call for a conversation to start between you and another person. Mine is “What do you do when you’re not doing this?”
  • When someone asks a question that leaves you feeling self-conscious or without an answer say so. . . . “I make everyone at these events so important. It throws me a bit. Could you hold on while I recover my ability to think? . . . Often just saying so gets past the feeling and moves me on to the next part of the conversation.
  • If you make everyone else the center of the universe, it’s hard to feel self-conscious or under a microscope. Get curious and see how many people you can get to tell you about themselves. Ask broad questions such as how they got where they are, what they wonder, or how they’d rewrite a recent industry event if they could.

I remember a friend who, when she and her husband started a new business, they made a contest to see who might get the most rejections from sales calls. I’ve made a contest for myself. I’m going to see how many folks I might get to talk to me when I go there.

What advice can you add for networking newbies about to attend their first networking breakfast?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

Critical Skill 7: The Opportunity Action Test

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Fast Information and Quick Decisions

Future Skills

Do decisions ever come too quickly? Is choosing among your options ever a problem? it seems the more plugged in we are, the more we have to move instantly. It’s stressful. The situation can become so overwhelming that we’re stuck, standing, staring, while the world keeps turning and opportunities pass us by.

A bias toward opportunity and action can help us stay on top of the situation. The key is to base that forward leaning with solid decision making.

The Opportunity Action Test

No one wants to miss a great opportunity. Yet we all do, because great opportunities show up when we’re not ready. They don’t announce their value, nor do they look much different from big mistakes we might have made.

So how do we have a bias toward acting on opportunities that doesn’t lead down a path of personal destruction? Here’s a list of questions to help you choose the right action when an opportunity comes your way.

  • Does this opportunity suit me? Know who you are. If we know our values and our skills, we can be realistic about projecting our success when an opportunity arises.
  • Does this opportunity take me in the right direction? Know your goals. We might be right for an opportunity, but it might not takes us closer to where we’re going.
  • Is the timing right? Opportunities are changes that involve risk. The amount of risk our lives can handle changes based on situations and circumstances. The right opportunity at the wrong time is a bad decision.
  • What relationships and expectations can you see? The goals and promises of an opportunity that come to fruition are a direct result of the relationships between the people who are a part and their expectations of each other and the endeavor.
  • What’s the loss if you do it? What’s the loss if you don’t?

Ask yourself those five quick questions. Verbalize the answers and you’ll know the appropriate action. No more getting stuck, standing, staring. You’ll be a part of the world changing and turning.

How do you decide when to act on an opportunity?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Need help finding a niche that fits you? Click on the Work with Liz!! page in the sidebar.

Related articles
The 10 Skills Most Critical to Your Future
Critical Skill 1: Strategic Deep Thinking
Critical Skill 5A: 3 Parts of Spectacular Ideas
Critical Skill 6A: Five Tools for Finding Faulty Assumptions

SOB Business Cafe 02-15-08

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SB Cafe

Welcome to the SOB Cafe

We offer the best in thinking–articles on the business of blogging written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.

The Specials this Week are

Chris Brogan gets to the heart of getting everything done.
I’ve been working towards learning how to scale my skillsets up to this next level, trying to rapidly prototype what I have to know how to do to get everything on my plate done. I thought I’d share some of what I’ve learned with you, because at some levels, I think this is useful “how to” information for anyone working in the Creative class.

Logic and Emotion gets to the heart of Interaction 08.
The people at interaction 08 came from a number of different backgrounds. Graphic design, Information Architecture, Industrial Design, Programming, Development, Web Design, and others that I’m probably missing. Everyone seemed to share the same struggle—what exactly do we call what we do and how do we evalngilize the value we provide?

Conversation Agent gets to the heart of what a corporate blog can be.
Clearly not every company should have a blog. Last year I wrote about how to build a social media strategy. Without one, there can be no clear path to success. To me the most important point to consider is the organization’s cultural readiness.

All Things Workplace gets to the heart of whatevery leader should ask.
Greater profitability and increased effectiveness drives your business success. Yet your bottom line results also depend on how well you manage your emotions.

Diva Marketing gets to the heart of business relationships.
On Valentine’s Day it seemed like a fun post to explore business relationships. How do you build great business relationships with people? Do “clients” and “partners/vendors/suppliers” (I’m never sure word to use)have different points of view about what is important for each?

Greg Verdino gets to the heart of six-word life stories.
Could you write your memoir in just six words?

Related ala carte selections include

Servant of Chaos gets to the heart of 10 years of Cluetrain.
As I suggested in this post, the Cluetrain still holds sway over our imaginations because its promises are yet to be achieved. This is not a criticism, but in fact, indicates its visionary nature.

Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Is My 'Work With' Page Doing What It's Supposed to Do?

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Work with You or Work for Them?

insideout logo

Last night, I enjoyed a delightful, long conversation with Shama Hyder from After the Launch. We talked about how her business and mine match up. Shama”s strongly drawn niche is in marketing. She offers service professionals a six-month marketing makeover plan. My background is product, community, and strategy. I help businesses and people find their vision, develop compelling new products and services, and write irresistible offers about them.

During our conversation, we talked about that topic I mention so frequently . . . that you can’t be inside the thinking and outside it at the same time.

Our conversation got me wondering whether my ‘Work with Liz’ page is doing what it’s supposed to do as well as it might.

Is My ‘Work With’ Page Doing What It’s Supposed to Do?

So often I say, “Everything needs to be about THEM — the customer, the reader — not YOU (or in this case, me). It’s time I took a look to make sure that I’m following my own advice.

Section 1: Outstanding and Irresistible

This section is most certainly about the clients I want. It’s a little sparse on words. In the world of needs-benefits selling, this puts forward the needs. The subhead might be stronger if it said, Outstanding and Irresistible Business, because that’s what the three questions are about.

Connector and Performance Manager

Connector and Performance Manager
This section is about the features and benefits of the “product,” which is me. [Each phrase in bold is a feature — something that is delivered. The words that follow are the benefits that each feature offers the “buyer.”] The execution could be more tightly done. The YOU in each benefit phrase is hidden. I need to state it outright as I did in the fourth bullet. This whole section could be a whole lot more YOU.

Connecting All Parts of You

Connecting All Parts of You
This section does what the section above should do. It’s interesting that I added it several days after I wrote the rest of the page. Distance from what I write helps me.

What Folks Have to Say about Working with Liz

What Folks Have to Say about Working with Liz
This is the proof and the call to action. If I don’t ask, people don’t know that we seriously want them to buy what we’re offering. I think this does that clearly enough.

Overall, in most places I seem to be selling the right things. My heart says I could do it more concretely.

What changes do you think would improve things?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

How What You Know Can Kill a Business and Thanks for Listening When I Call

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Once You’re Inside . . .

insideout logo

We all do it. We misfire on a key point that shoots us in the foot every time. It’s a major disconnect that I see almost everywhere.

We think we can be the business and still represent the customer. As a result, we end up only thinking that we’re delivering on what the customer wants or needs. The reality is

We can’t be the business and the customer at the same time.

A certain kind of thinking goes into building a product or service. Decisions are made about how the offer works and why it works as it does. When it comes time to judge the value of the finished offer, those who did the thinking can’t forget what they know about how it was made.

It’s impossible to participate in the thinking that builds something and then to respond as if you don’t know what that thinking is.

Unfortunately, businesses everywhere — from entrepreneurs to corporations — try to do exactly that. What happens then is that we offer our customers, clients, readers a flawed product or service assuming that they know why we made it as we did.

I reviewed an interactive site where, four clicks inside I was lost in “helpful” information. I was unable able to find navigational signs to get to the content that was past the “lessons” up front.

Their intentions had been excellent service, but the result had the opposite. The developers didn’t know about the barriers . . . because they knew why each “lesson” was there.

That’s how what you know can kill a business. It’s hard to not to know what you already know. It’s hard to see the disconnects from inside the system.

So if you’re one of the folks that I call to talk about what I’m working on . . . thank you so much! The questions you ask really help to keep me on track.

Have you bumped into products that offer you plenty of extra “stuff,” but not the one thing that you want?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!