CLIP work and the community-building process are enhanced when the CLIP members jointly establish ground rules at the beginning. These build on the Eight Guiding Principles for CLIPs and are practical operating procedures that everyone agrees to abide by.

The group may want to include ground rules about personal interactions; meetings; tasks and responsibilities; attendance; and timeliness.

For example, some ground rules might be:

• show respect
• make it possible for everyone to participate
• schedule meetings to fit the needs of the group
• begin and end meetings on time

Together, you and other CLIP members may also develop rules about how to communicate with each other (e.g., by email, phone), how quickly everyone will be expected to respond to messages, how the CLIP will make decisions when there are different opinions in the group, and how the CLIP will determine tasks and responsibilities for its work.

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