This report provides some basic guidelines for planning and establishing a consortium. Systems analysis was used to study 5 consortia, determine their objectives, identify applicable system variables, and ascertain the contribution each variable must make to achieve organizational objectives. The consortia were the Central States College Association; Dayton Miami Valley Consortium; Five Colleges, Incorporated; Great Lakes College Association; and the Union for Research and Experimentation in Higher Education. Data collected during personal interviews and from analyses of selected documents at each of the 5 consortia were summarized, and planning areas and activities were extracted or developed for utilization as elements of a model. Specific elements were determined in terms of their contribution to 1 or more of 19 proposed objectives. These objectives, along with 9 assumptions, served to guide the selection of the model's activity components and to provide a framework for time estimates and for a sequence of activities. The activities were arranged in a precedence diagram which was later converted to a 25-foot long PERT Network that graphically illustrates the 292-step model. The report contains 4 diagrams of the Network, and lists the 19 objectives, 9 assumptions, and 14 subsystems of activities that were developed for the attainment of network objectives. (WM)