Collect phone numbers from the recipients who are going to be part of the phone tree. For instance, if the phone tree is for a Little League baseball team, gather the names and telephone numbers of the parents of each child on the team.
Designate the name of the person who will be listed at the top of the phone tree. For example, if the phone tree is going to be used for a baseball team, the coach's name and phone number should be in the first spot at the very top of the phone tree.
Decide how many spaces or blocks you will need to have on the phone tree. For the above baseball team example, you may have 12 kids on the team, one coach and two assistant coaches so your phone tree will need at least 15 spaces.
Determine the number of levels you will have on the phone tree. For the baseball team, the coach would go in the top spot, which would be level one and he would be responsible for calling two assistant coaches, who would be level two.
The assistant coaches would each contact two parents so there would be four parents on level three. Each level three parent would contact two parents so there would be eight parents on the fourth level.
Test your phone list to make sure the numbers are input correctly. Inform the phone list recipients to let you know immediately if their numbers change so you can update the phone list.