Hi all,
In Delhi SHG, we were discussing about making SHG meetings more effective so that everyone can be benefited from it. We thought to make it more structured because we were facing following problems in SHG Meetings:
– Usually PWS don’t come to SHG meetings after a year. I don’t think they have learnt everything, I still feel lot to learn on Acceptance and Communication after spending almost five years with TISA.
– People are getting bored in SHG meetings, maybe they are not getting challenging activities.
– Ownership transferring: We see effective SHG meetings if any senior person lead the meeting. If they are busy for few weeks then meeting qualities are not good. Maybe a structured agenda is lacking what any new host can follow.
Following are three main suggestions to implement:
1) Goals: We can prepare Projects from Apna Hath Jagannath (AHJ) in two verticals ‘Acceptance’ and ‘Communication’, so that everyone will get goals. We have prepared this Google Doc (https://goo.gl/XN9PrG) from AHJ, please add more to it. Some projects will be done in the meeting, some will be done during weekdays.
2) Structured agenda: I think Agenda of SHG meeting should be structured as given below. Timings can be changed. There should be sub-host for activities in the meeting.
– Explain ground rules, TISA, & Techniques (15 mins)
– Activity on Acceptance (45 mins)
– Activity on Communication (30 mins)
– Feedback, Evaluation and Networking (30 mins)
You can add to this Google Doc (https://goo.gl/quafZY) to give your inputs to make structured agenda in a comprehensive manner.
3) Mentors to new PWS. I am seeing new people are getting lost as they require more support than a weekly SHG meeting in initial days.
Bringing change can be experimental and iterative process. We will be implementing structured agenda thing in this meeting in Delhi SHG and see the effectiveness of the meeting. In this world of Open Source, we are also launching the Open Documents (links given above) so that everyone can participate in planning phase and contribute to our stammering community as much as we can.
Waiting for overwhelming response on Google Docs!
Thanks and regards
Vikas
Fan of the tagline ‘Haklao Magar Pyaar Se’
3 thoughts on “Ideas to improve SHG Meetings”
Sachin
(November 26, 2016 - 10:14 pm)Very valid concern, Vikas. Since we charge no fee and make participation so accessible (literally anyone can join)- it seems that SOME people value our SHG sessions LESS – just for that reason! It is free and accessible! And they stop coming! May be they dont realise that in so doing, they harm their own interests a lot more than anything else.
Be that as it may- the bottom line is: Initiative to change will always and should always be in the hands of the person wanting to change. But I agree, as organisers, we can do a lot more. And many of us HAVE done a lot more. Let us institutionalise these concerns and changes. Let us set a good standard (and resource base) for the next person who wants to run a SHG.
These posts also have some relevance on this theme:
http://stammer.in/2014/01/10/feedback-from-shgs/
http://stammer.in/2015/06/15/2015-lessons-from-shgs/
Thanks for flagging this very VITAL matter.
Vikas Ranga
(November 27, 2016 - 12:58 am)Thanks Sir.
Resources are good help to implement more in SHGs.
Amitsingh Kushwaha
(December 23, 2016 - 6:01 pm)विकास जी, आपके सुझाव बहुत ही उपयोगी और प्रासंगिक हैं। हकलाने वाले व्यक्तियों को लम्बे समय तक स्वयं सहायता समूह में आने के लिए प्रेरित करने के लिए नई और रोचक गतिविधियों को धीरे-धीरे शामिल किया जाना बेहद ही जरूरी है। इसमें सबसे महत्वपूर्ण है हर सदस्य में नेतृत्व क्षमता का विकास करना, हर सदस्य मीटिंग को होस्ट करने के लिए खुद को उत्साहित महसूस करे।