Together We Decide: An Essential Guide for Making Good Group Decisions

Kirkus Reviews' Best Indie Books of 2023 in Nonfiction Does your group need help making good decisions? All groups--teams, boards, nonprofits, businesses, governments--must make decisions to make forward progress. In organizations large and small, simple and complex, public and private, people need to decide things together. With tips, principles, examples, and stories, Craig Freshley shares the essentials that groups need to make decisions that provide lasting benefits. Practical and authoritative, this friendly guide from a veteran group facilitator is a must-have for those seeking proven techniques for collaborative decision-making. Board members and senior staff in the nonprofit sector--where there's often a high expectation of collaboration--and corporate leaders who have a collaborative, inclusive mindset or culture, will find this book particularly valuable. Freshley's message is especially pertinent to today's world: It's through collaboration, not competition, that groups of the future will create, innovate, and thrive. It is collaboration, not competition that will save us from extinction. Further, collaborative decision making is a skill that can be successfully learned and practiced. Freshley shows groups how. Topics include:

• Efficient and productive meetings
• Attitudes that help and hinder group productivity
• Group decision making steps: from idea to decision to action
• The supremacy of group culture
• How to listen well and speak with purpose
• Conflict prevention, management, and resolution
• When to apply which type of decision-making method
• Meeting facilitation theory and techniques