Mastermind Groups in the 21st Century

The mastermind principle, as originally conceived by Napoleon Hill, is about the power of a "third mind" made possible through regular collaboration.

That's when a small group of co-equal colleagues and contemporaries share experiences and insights that create "Ah ha" moments for each of them.

In a real mastermind group there are no profesional organizers. There are no gurus acting as experts.

And nobody is paying anybody for advice, group management, or facilitation.

In a real mastermind group it's just you with a few of your colleagues, other people you know, like, trust, and whose opinions you respect. Simply peers with no ax to grind and nothing to sell, with only your best interests at heart.

That's right - no professional moderators and no organizers are required to have a successful sustainable group that meets regularly over the years.

Many of the old fashioned mastermind groups are the face-to-face variety, like the one that Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone made famous nearly a century ago.

Just think, if you could put together a group of peers, people from your industry, who are far outside of your (and their) traditional marketing areas - you could have all the benefits that come from sharing experiences with people who know what you want to know. People whose insights are directly relevant to you. And since you are not direct competitors there is never any fear of giving away your secrets.

Today, cheap long distance calls, instant online webinar services, and free Yahoo! groups can make your meetings much more effective than the old fashioned face-to-face variety. No time and money wasted getting to and from the meetings and the ability to connect with the other members of your group 24/7 - to deal with the speed of business today.

You can get together in person of course - that's what your trade association meetings are for.

Using the simple techniques that I later complied into my mastermind group report I established and participated in several peer to peer mastermind groups.

I personally use a conference call service that allows each member of my group to call a central number and connect over a bridge line. Nothing special about that. Except with the service we use if one of us in not able to be there the call can be instantly recorded and available for the missing member - no extra charge and nothing to do but push the record button.

Recently one of the members was out of the country on vacation. He was able to log on to the call via the Internet and participate in the live simulcast of the meeting. No extra charge for this either.

And using our Yahoo! group we can post documents to be shared confidentially among the six of us. In addition we can create a calendar of upcoming meetings, keep track of who is in charge of the next meeting, post links to the resources to be discussed, an outline of our normal agenda and set reminders for one another some of he previously time consuming activities required to keep a mastermind group vibrant and productive.

A few years ago I suggested to several business owners from across North America, members of the same association, that they create a mastermind over the phone to continue a discussion we had together at their annual meeting.

That was a dozen years ago and they still get together twice a month to share strategies, offer insights from their experiences, and provide support to one another.

If it was possible at the time, Napoleon Hill would have created this type of mastermind group process.

Just imagine how much more Harvey Firestone, Thomas Edison, President Harding, and Henry Ford could have achieved if they had the tools available to you today?

Today I am making the same tips, tools and techniques available to you - so you can create your own board of advocates - your own strategic planning team.

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