Meetings that Work: A Practical Guide to Teamworking in Groups By Catherine Widdicombe Written in the conviction that individuals, groups and communities flourish best when people have a say in decisions that affect them, this is an invaluable guide for anyone who needs to organise, chair or contribute to meetings or discussions. ISBN-13: 9780718830014 Specifications: 234x172mm, 208pp, Paperback with colour cover and b&w diagrams Price: £19.50 • US$42.50 Publication: April 2000 Order this Title Now

About this Book

In the Western world we have a plethora of groups and meetings. From multinational businesses to enclosed religious orders, from professional bodies and statutory services to community groups, from teams of colleagues to training courses, from local committees to self-help therapy, group meetings are endemic in our society. People depend largely on meeting together to keep things going and to move things forward. But such meetings are too often experienced as deadening rather than life-giving. This book is written in the conviction that group meetings, teams and committees of all sorts have a seldom-realised potential both for development and enjoyment.

The book is for anyone who wants to help others to think and discuss together and to tackle their common task in a collaborative way. This means pooling ideas, insights and expertise in the conviction that individuals, groups and communities flourish best when people have a say in decisions that affect them.

This is a ‘how to’ book, a helpmate, arranged so that the reader can focus down on what is specifically needed for a particular group or situation. It is therefore a book to be used selectively rather than read through from start to finish.

The author recognises that every group and every meeting is unique. Her approach is aimed at getting people to think for themselves about the best way forward, whether in starting a group, concluding a meeting, facing a problem or dealing with an impasse.

The book draws on more than twenty years experience in enabling people to realise the potential for good, stimulation and enjoyment which comes about when people, secular or religious, meet together in groups and make them work.

About the Author

Catherine Widdicombe is co-founder of Avec, an agency for Church and community work, and formerly President of the Grail Society. She is experienced in working with a wide range of groups, and continues to work with groups both secular and religious. She is co-author of Churches and Communities: An Approach in Development in the Local Church. She lives in Pinner, Middlesex.

Other titles available by Catherine Widdicombe:
Small Communities in Religious Life: Making Them Work