Building value that lasts

Why the second year of a peer group slips, and what stops it

The first year of a peer group runs on novelty. Members are learning each other's stories, the presentations are new and the trust is being built in front of everyone. The second year is different. The stories have been told, the easy topics have been covered, and the group has to decide whether it is going to go deeper or settle into a comfortable routine.

Many groups settle, and it is easy to miss because the meetings still feel pleasant.

The early signs

Watch for updates that get longer while presentations get shorter. Presenters bring topics that are interesting but safe. Attendance stays high, but members arrive late and leave early. Conversations at dinner are better than the ones in the meeting. None of these is a crisis on its own. Together they mean the group is spending its time being polite.

Why it happens

It happens because the group has become comfortable, and comfort feels like success. Members like each other. Nobody wants to be the one who raises the hard topic and makes the evening awkward. The leader is often relieved that things are going smoothly. Every incentive points toward keeping it that way.

What stops it

Name it. Tell the group what you are seeing and ask whether they want the next year to look like the last one. Most members have noticed the same thing and are relieved someone said it.

Raise the bar for presentations. Ask each member what they have not yet brought to the group, and why. The second year is usually when the topics that matter most, such as family, health, succession or a business that is not going well, are finally ready to be heard, if the leader makes room for them.

Go first. A leader who presents something real gives every member permission to do the same.

Change the format. A retreat, a different setting, an outside speaker or a new exercise can reset a group that has fallen into a pattern. The point is not novelty for its own sake. It is to break the routine long enough for members to see each other differently.

Check in one to one

Talk to each member individually at least once in the year. Ask what they are getting from the group, what they would change and what they have not said in the room. The answers will tell you more about the health of the group than any meeting will.

From Leading the Room, a book in progress by Gerry Morton on how great peer groups are led, drawn from twenty-two years in Vistage, EO, YPO and TIGER 21.