If you want to create and run your own mastermind groups’ online, here are some six basic guidelines to help you get started:

1) Define the purpose to the group: What will your objectives be when you meet online? What do you want to accomplish together? For instance a mastermind of business students could set a goal of future business success.

2) Decide on the online groups' ground rules: What is acceptable and more importantly what is not? And how will the ground rules be enforced and what are the consequences for breaking them? One group I heard about was extremely committed to attendance and promptness - they decided that if a person was late showing up for a call, he or she paid $1 per minute to your charity of choice. Miss the whole meeting and it was $60 as their meetings ran for one hour.

3) Determine the structure of the online groups' time together: You can have an agenda put together and a facilitator can be used to help moderate the meeting. Or, you can rotate leadership between the members of the group. You can have freely-flowing conversation, although this can get a bit messy sometimes. You can also decide to have closely monitored time frames for each person to speak ex; opening statements and 10 min per member to speak if you group has 6 mastermind members.

4) Plan the groups' logistics, this is for offline groups’: Where, how often, and how long will you meet? Online groups’: Where is on your online mastermind group site. When will your group start and when will it be completed, is your group an on-going or short-term membership based on a single task? For instance, one mastermind group met every week for one hour for a period of four months, when the project they were working on finished the group ended, too.

5) State wants, needs and life goals: What is it that the mastermind groups created online hope to accomplish during the meetings? Mastermind groups can only reach their full potential if each group member is willing to think big and ask powerful questions. Each mastermind group member must be accountable to their groups’ other members always. At your meetings, each mastermind group member can tell the group exactly what he or she wants - the member does not have to know how it will be accomplished, that is one of the main benefits’ of belonging to mastermind groups’. Case in point, a group member might start off - "This is Daniel. You all know I’ve been working on my mastermind social networking group site. I am facing a problem in my business [describe] and I need the group's ideas on how to solve it." Another group member might say, "This is Jonathon. I want the group to help me develop a marketing strategy to make give or company an additional $100,000 in brand recognition my international consulting business this year."

6) Commit to contributing to all members of your mastermind groups’ success: Your mastermind group's success depends on each and every member being accountable by following through on any task the members commit too. Make a commitment to listen carefully, be present, login on time, and fully support your fellow mastermind groups’ membership. In this way, you exponentially increase the groups' synergy and other members will rise to a level of contribution, which your collective group of like-minded individuals wishes to achieve.

In conclusion; being a part of a successful mastermind group can be an enriching experience that will accelerate you professionally and personally in ways you can't imagine not being a part of for the rest of your life! You don't have to be a “lone ranger” any longer and you don't have to figure things out all on your own, when you have your fellow mastermind group’s membership watching your back.
So, don't wait to start, create or join one today! Use the power of the internet and accelerate your success by bringing you offline mastermind groups’ online or start a new mastermind group and the best place to get going is here now!

Regards, All Masterminders

Author's Bio: 

About the Author:

Daniel E. Holmes of http://imindlive.com is a new mastermind junky! Holmes is currently working a website for online mastermind groups’ to come together for meetings online, the meet-up for mastermind groups’, publish mastermind videos for use privately and (or) publicly on their own blog, plus articles for general members to learn more about masterminding. Holmes has created the world’s first specially designed online mastermind social networking group service specifically for small business owners, coaches, consultants, and solo-entrepreneurs. Subscribe to his Google mastermind group at http://groups.google.com/group/imind-live and/or “twitter” him @ www.twitter.com/DanHolmesiMIND the key to modern mastermind groups’ bring them online! In Dubai his meetup is http://www.meetup.com/iMIND-Live/
Holmes is also writing an article on Wikipedia and can use some support. See the Wikipedia article "Professional mastermind network service" here:"Professional_mastermind_network_service"