[ For chapter leaders + moderators ]
How I work with chapters and forums
Every chapter call ends with the same three questions: what do you do, how does it run, and how does the money work. Here is all of it in one place, so your board sees the same thing you heard.
What I do
Forum Health Day
Chapters name it what fits: Forum Health Day, Forum Health Summit, Connection Day, Advanced Forum Skills. Underneath, it runs as an EO Forum Next Level, which is how EO Global helps pay for it.
What a Forum Next Level is: a half-day event with set content and a set curriculum, built by EO to be delivered to a chapter. I deliver all of it, which is what Global's share covers.
What I add on top: the content that turns that half day into a workshop for forum enthusiasts and moderators. It is built from the planning time we spend together up front, conversations with your moderators and the surveys your forums take.
I pitch the content as new tools. Most of it is the forum fundamentals every member should know and most have forgotten. Calling it new makes it exciting instead of making anyone feel behind.
Before the day
- Six to eight weeks outA call with your chapter manager and forum chair: goals, what the board wants to move, and what to call the day.
- Four to six weeks outYour forums take the Forum Health survey (EO's, or a short custom one). The results write the agenda. I compare them against years of chapter data.
- Two weeks outPromo copy and a short promo video for your chapter to send, at no extra cost. Final run of show agreed.
The trip
- The night beforeI fly in. Moderator dinner or happy hour if you want one: Q&A, catch up, whatever your moderators need.
- The day: arriveDoors, lunch, and the chapter's own business if you want to pair it with an all-member meeting.
- The day: the sessionThe tools, built from your survey, closing with live open coaching.
- The day: Forum MashupEveryone splits into mixed groups of five or six, members who do not share a forum, with a volunteer moderator and a worksheet. I brief those moderators beforehand.
- The day: wrapBack in one room for rapid-fire takeaways and commitments. A hard stop so parents can leave.
- AfterHappy hour, where I stay for individual and forum-level questions. Fly home that night or the next morning.
Adding your FTP or MTP? Put it on the same trip, the day before or after. One flight, one extra hotel night, and the chapter gets two or three things done for one set of travel.
Length is your call. Four hours works. One chapter ran eight. Lunch to happy hour, or breakfast to happy hour. Expect 50 to 75 percent of the chapter to show.
Tools on the menu
- IQ vs EQ topics
- The 5% reflection, and who it is for
- Forum mindset
- The parking lot
- Open coaching
- Deep dives
- Clearing rounds and repair
- Connection exercises
Leave-behinds include the one-pagers in the Resource Library, like EQ vs IQ Topics and Open Coaching.
After a Forum Health Day, two or three members went to their chapter manager and said some version of: I was going to drop this year because I did not like my forum. Doing forum today with people I barely knew showed me I am just in the wrong forum. I still need EO.EO Charlotte, after the March session
The moderator layer
Six months after forum training, members remember about half of it. A year later, about 20 percent. Moderators feel that drop first, and they carry the most weight. The moderator layer is less curriculum, more craft: behavior, leadership and the tools that make a meeting work.
What we cover
- Finding the real 5%, so there is material worth a deep dive
- Running a deep dive that goes somewhere
- Using the parking lot instead of losing it
- Open coaching, and when to step in or out
- Setting a theme and goals for the moderator year, then feeding it forward to the next moderator
- Whatever your moderators raise. I ask them before I build it.
Two formats
Both are add-ons to the chapter day. The Forum Next Level is the chapter-wide half day; the moderator layer is the extra built for your moderators.
- Moderator dinner, the night before the chapter day. Private, informal, Q&A.
- Half-day moderator session, before or after the chapter day, when you want real practice time.
- Pick the date by polling your moderators first, then open the chapter day to everyone.
- My bias: anyone passionate about forum belongs in the room. They will be a moderator soon.
Themed office hours
Support between visits without paying for a trip. One hour, once a quarter, on a theme your forum chair picks. It runs as a conversation between me and the chair, then opens up for questions. The chapter records it and shares it, so the members who could not make it still get it.
Open drop-in hours sound good and draw nobody. A theme and a host give people a reason to show up.
Forum retreats
For one forum, at its own retreat. I take the front of it, two half days or one long day, then leave the forum to run with it. I fly in the night before.
Part 1: Forum optimization
- A Forum Health survey beforehand
- The moderator's theme and goals for the year
- A clearing round refresher
- An alignment exercise
- Open coaching from the parking lot, and the roles
Part 2: A retreat theme you pick
- KPIs and goal setting
- Ikigai for entrepreneurs
- Lifeline
- Retrospective, or Snapshot
- North Star, outside under the stars
- What's Next: redesign the business from scratch and vision-cast one to three years out
I can also point you to retreat houses I have worked from, from Puerto Vallarta to Big Sky, and connect you with a retreat planner. A custom forum app and site are available as an add-on.
Ideas I hand over, free
Social placement for new members. New members should get offers from two forums, not a rejection from one after paying their dues. Run member onboarding with the chapter manager, president and membership chair, then a speed networking hour right after where forums looking for members meet every new member at once. Forums that want members send someone. It creates urgency and reverses the scarcity.
Launchpad ambassadors. If your new members start in Launchpad forums, let forums that are recruiting send one ambassador to sit in. Meeting socially plus a Launchpad together is the interview.
Pilots and tools. Regional Training Days, a membership intake and vetting tool, and more live on the Concepts page.
How the money works
The short version: a Forum Health Day runs as a Forum Next Level, so EO Global covers the base trainer fee, and the chapter covers the custom work and travel. Anything else I can do on the same trip rides on that one set of travel costs.
| What | Chapter pays | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Forum Health Day | $1,500 + travel | EO Global pays the base Forum Next Level trainer fee directly, once you submit the Forum Next Level request. Global's share needs at least 12 members in the room. The chapter's $1,500 covers the survey, customization, materials and worksheets, the moderator briefing and promo support. |
| Moderator dinner | Included | When it rides the same trip as a Forum Health Day. One extra hotel night. |
| Half-day moderator session | Scoped on the call | Kept light when it shares the trip. No second set of flights. |
| FTP or MTP | Booked through EO | Stacked on the same trip as a Forum Health Day, the chapter pays travel once. |
| Themed office hours | Fits your budget | Four hours a year plus planning. A typical year runs about $1,600, and it can be bundled cheaper alongside a visit. |
| Forum retreat | Per person | Quoted on a call, plus travel. Usually just a flight when the forum has a room and meals. |
| Travel | At cost | Flights, hotel, ground transport, and meals not already provided. Fees are invoiced before the event. Travel is invoiced after, once charges settle. |
Booking, step by step
- A 20-minute callWhat you want to move, who it is for, what you can spend.
- Pick the datePoll your moderators first so they can be there, then open it to the chapter.
- PaperworkYou submit the Forum Next Level request to EO. I send a one-page letter of agreement.
- Survey and buildYour forums take the survey. I build the day. You send the promo.
Send me the date range you are looking at and what you want your forums to get better at.