How to Use Nominal Group Technique (NGT) for Better Team Decision-Making and Consensus

Author: Alvin Villanueva, PMP; Editor: Geram Lompon; Reviewed by: Dr. Michael Shick, MSPM, PMP, CSM

As a project manager, you often turn diverse team input into actionable, cohesive solutions.

But let’s face it: team meetings can quickly spiral into chaos, with ideas clashing and key opinions getting lost. How do you efficiently collect input, foster teamwork, and drive consensus?

The solution lies in the Nominal Group Technique (NGT). This structured, proven approach helps you generate and organize ideas, making prioritizing solutions easier and ensuring that every voice is heard.

With NGT, you’ll guide your team toward consensus, streamline decision-making, and improve project outcomes while maintaining team engagement.

Ready to transform how you lead your team? Let’s dive into how NGT can elevate your collaboration and decision-making process!

What Is Nominal Group Technique (NGT) and Why It’s Essential for Project Managers

NGT is a structured brainstorming and decision-making method that helps groups generate ideas and prioritize solutions in a controlled, systematic manner. It is an effective group process model that guides teams through organized brainstorming, helping them prioritize solutions with clarity.

Unlike traditional brainstorming, where dominant voices often overpower others, NGT ensures that every team member contributes equally.

The technique involves a straightforward, step-by-step process for gathering, refining, and evaluating the ideas generated, resulting in consensus-driven decisions that reflect the team’s collective input.

Example: In adult education program planning, NGT provides a structured way to gather diverse perspectives and prioritize actionable outcomes.

This systematic approach guarantees that your team’s discussions are efficient, organized, and inclusive. This prevents any one idea from dominating the conversation, fostering a collaborative atmosphere that leads to more well-rounded solutions.

Why NGT is a Game-Changer for Project Managers

Mastering NGT is crucial for project management because it encourages equal group participation, improves decision-making, and ensures that decisions reflect the group’s collective understanding. It is a useful consensus methodology that fosters inclusive decision-making, in which each team member’s voice is heard.

Whether managing a complex project, leading a workshop, or tackling a difficult decision, NGT can help you gather diverse insights and make informed decisions efficiently.

Here’s why it’s indispensable for you as a project manager:

• Promotes Equal Participation: One key benefit of NGT is promoting balanced participation, ensuring that every team member contributes equally to the discussion.
• Improves Decision-Making: NGT ensures decisions reflect the collective input of the group, not just majority opinions, making the decision-making process more democratic and robust.
• Facilitates Consensus: The technique promotes consensus by evaluating and prioritizing ideas collaboratively, helping your team find common ground.
• Organizes Ideas: NGT separates idea collection from evaluation, making focusing on the most relevant and actionable solutions easier.
• Saves Time: Following a structured approach, NGT avoids the confusion and inefficiencies of unorganized brainstorming, allowing your team to focus on the essential issues.

Incorporating NGT into your project management program planning process will foster a more inclusive, efficient, and organized decision-making environment that drives better results.

7 Steps to Run a Successful NGT Session and Drive Team Consensus

Now that you understand the theory consensus methodology behind NGT let’s break down the structured steps of an NGT session so you can get started immediately. Each step is designed to keep the conversation focused, productive, and aligned, ensuring you get the most out of your team’s contributions.

When done correctly, nominal group technique work can streamline decision-making and ensure that the group’s input is accurately reflected in the final decision.

1. Define the Problem Clearly

Before you dive into idea generation, make sure everyone on your team understands the problem at hand. A clear problem statement sets the direction of group discussion and helps participants focus their brainstorming efforts. If the issue is unclear, discussions will likely become muddled, leading to ineffective solutions.

How to execute:

Present the issue concisely and allow time for questions. Keep the focus broad but specific enough to guide productive brainstorming. You want everyone to understand the problem’s scope and relevance clearly.

2. Allow Time for Individual Idea Generation

One of the keys to NGT is that each team member generates ideas individually, not group consensus, which prevents groupthink. When people brainstorm together without individual reflection, dominant personalities can sway opinions, and good ideas may be overlooked.

How to execute:

Set a timer for 5 to 30 minutes, depending on the complexity of the problem, to give participants ample time to reflect and write down ideas. Encourage team members to jot down as many ideas as possible, even if some seem far-fetched initially.

3. Share Ideas Round-Robin

Once individual brainstorming is complete, have each participant present one idea at a time in a round-robin format. This prevents small groups with multiple voices from speaking over each other, ensuring that all ideas are heard.

How to execute:

Ask participants to share their ideas individually, ensuring that everyone contributes equally. As new ideas are shared, write them down where everyone can see them—on a whiteboard, flipchart, or digital tool for remote teams.

4. Eliminate Duplicates

After all ideas have been shared, it’s time to eliminate duplicates. This step helps streamline the process by removing overly similar ideas, allowing the group to focus on fresh, unique solutions.

How to execute:

As participants share their ideas, duplicates are checked, and similar suggestions are consolidated. This helps clarify which ideas need further discussion and which have already been covered.

5. Clarify and Discuss Ideas

Once all ideas are on the table, clarifying any that may require further explanation is essential. This ensures that everyone has the same understanding of each idea and prevents misunderstandings.

How to execute:

Ask participants to explain any unclear ideas and allow time for discussion. Encourage feedback and refinements to ensure each idea is fully understood before moving on to the next step.

6. Group Similar Ideas Together

Now that you have a wide variety of ideas, it’s time to organize them. Grouping similar ideas helps you identify patterns and themes, making prioritizing the most relevant and impactful solutions easier.

How to execute:

As a group, review the ideas and categorize them into themes. This allows you to focus on related ideas and focus groups and see how they connect. Encourage input from everyone on how to organize the ideas best.

7. Rank the Ideas

The final step is to prioritize the ideas. This ensures that your team first focuses on the most critical or feasible problem-solving solutions. The ranking also helps narrow down the options to a manageable number.

How to execute:

Use a simple voting system or dot-voting to allow each participant to rank their ideas. Have them allocate votes based on importance, feasibility, or urgency criteria. After voting, the group members review the top-ranked ideas and discuss the next steps.

Following this structured approach, you can run a Nominal Group Technique session promoting collaboration and decision-making.

Key Insights for Leading a Productive NGT Session and Overcoming Common Challenges

While NGT is a powerful method, its success depends on proper facilitation. Here are some additional insights to ensure your session runs smoothly:

1. Clear Communication Is Crucial

It’s essential that everyone understands their role in the process and feels comfortable sharing their thoughts. Clear communication helps ensure all participants are engaged and active during the session.

2. Manage Time Effectively

NGT can be time-consuming, especially if you have a large team or complex issues to discuss. To keep the process efficient, set time limits for each stage and stick to them. This will prevent the session from dragging on unnecessarily.

3. Set the Ground Rules

Make sure participants understand the NGT process before starting. This will avoid confusion and ensure everyone is on the same page, leading to more productive discussions.

Taking Your NGT Sessions to the Next Level with Digital Tools and Advanced Techniques

Want to elevate your NGT sessions even further? Consider integrating digital tools to streamline the voting process. Online platforms allow participants to contribute ideas, vote, and organize them in real time. This is especially useful for remote teams or larger groups.

Additionally, you can enhance your NGT sessions by combining them with other decision-making methods, such as SWOT analysis or the Delphi method, for more detailed insights into each idea’s potential impact.

Top Alternatives to NGT for Brainstorming and Decision-Making

If you’re seeking alternatives to NGT, here are a few worth considering:

Brainstorming

A less structured approach that promotes creativity and spontaneity is ideal for smaller teams or more straightforward problems.

The Delphi Method

Conducted remotely, this method involves multiple rounds of anonymous submissions and refinements of experts’ ideas. It’s perfect for sensitive or highly specialized topics.

SWOT Analysis

It is a method for evaluating ideas based on strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. It’s perfect for strategic decision-making and long-term projects.

Wrapping Up: My Experience with NGT

NGT is one of the most effective methods for gathering team input and making clear, informed decisions. By following this process, you can ensure that every team member’s voice is heard, fostering a collaborative atmosphere that leads to better decision-making.

If you’re looking to improve your project management skills and facilitate more productive team sessions, NGT is the way to go.

Ready to try it out? Download the NGT Template we created for you and start mastering this technique today. Your team—and your projects—will thank you!

Key Takeaways

• NGT is an organized method that helps generate and prioritize ideas efficiently, promoting equal participation.
• It separates idea generation from evaluation, ensuring diverse input and more transparent decision-making.
• Digital tools and other methods, like SWOT analysis, can enhance the NGT process for even more effective results.

References:

• Alves, J. A., & Silva, M. G. (2023). Online utilization of the nominal group technique for healthcare decision-making. Journal of Clinical Education and Health Promotion, 44(4), 440-450. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcehp.10
• Bester, J., & Parkinson, K. (2017). A structured approach to decision making using the nominal group technique. Project Management Journal , 48(2), 45-56. https://doi.org/10.1002/pmj.113
• Hussain, I., & Shafique, M. (2017). Application of Nominal Group Technique for prioritizing educational objectives. International Journal of Educational Management, 31(5), 773-786. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEM-05-2016-0146
• Murray, J. P. (2018). Using Nominal Group Technique in clinical decision-making. Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, 62(1), 73-81. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclinepi.2008.01.010
• Project Management Institute. (n.d.). Nominal group technique. Retrieved from https://www.projectmanagement.com/wikis/233070/Nominal-Group-Technique
• Rao, P. S., & Reddy, S. K. (2019). Integrating Nominal Group Technique into agile project management for effective decision-making. Journal of Project Management, 12(2), 103-112. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jprojman.2019.03.004