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Holding Effective
Meetings Can Be Easier than You Think!
by Adele Sommers
I’m sure
you’ve experienced those typical “headache”
meetings! You know the kind I’m talking about
— the ones where the key players are running late,
no one knows exactly why the meeting was called, and
there’s not a single agenda in sight. Everyone’s
sitting around wondering, “Will this last 20 minutes
or will we be here all day?” It’s impossible
to tell!
Then, once the meeting
finally gets off the ground, the real pandemonium starts.
For instance:
- You may
hear some people yak incessantly on the sidelines,
or one or two folks might jump on a soapbox and dominate
the discussion.
- The meeting
topics can bounce back and forth so many times
that no one can keep track of what’s actually
being discussed.
- If a decision
results, no one knows whether it was ever recorded
or even whether anyone agreed to it.
To counteract these
frustrating problems, this article reveals four techniques
for running great meetings and following up afterward.
First,
How Big Is the Problem?
 What
are the consequences of holding ineffective meetings?
Meetings held for the wrong reasons, that don’t
involve the right participants, or that don’t use
a disciplined meeting process can waste the time, resources,
and funding of the business.
Not only do they
have the potential to make the participants feel perpetually
frustrated and unproductive, they’re also a financial
drain. Just in the area of cost, have you ever
tried to calculate the expense of holding even a single
unproductive meeting?
If you multiply
the number of people sitting in a room by an average
hourly rate, and add the cost of employee benefits (overhead),
you’ll see what I mean. And that’s the average
cost for a holding a single meeting, not including
expenses for any related travel, food, or equipment.
You can multiply
that figure across the entire company to estimate
the cost of meetings held per month and per year.
As you can imagine, holding meetings, especially unproductive
ones, can be an expensive proposition!
How Can You Turn Your
Meetings Around?
In contrast to the
chaotic, unplanned encounters, at well-run meetings,
participants collaborate to produce a valuable outcome.
They also leave the meeting feeling that their time
was really well spent. Making simple changes to the
protocols for running meetings can shift the dynamics
into a highly effective mode.
To achieve excellent results, try the following:
1. Be sure you really
need a meeting before scheduling it.
 Respect
your colleagues’ busy schedules. Don’t set
up a meeting unless:
- You really
need the cooperation of several people at once.
- The attendees
must contribute to, or will be affected by, a vital
decision.
- You want
various people to listen and respond to what others
have to say.
2. Send out a meeting
notice and agenda well in advance.
Give your attendees
plenty of advance notice — for example, at least
a week. Also consider whether any of your invitees are
likely to be unavailable on that date. If so, you may
want to postpone the meeting or seek alternates.
Be sure your meeting
notice includes all of the key information: Include
the 1) meeting date, 2) starting and ending times, 3)
purpose, 4) attendees, 5) location with directions or
access instructions, and 6) the proposed agenda. That
way, everyone will know exactly what to expect, what
to do, what their time commitment is, and what’s
in it for them!
3. Conduct the meeting
using good facilitation techniques.
These
are some of the most effective techniques professional
facilitators use:
- Start on
time; don’t reward latecomers by waiting for
them.
- Decide on times for each
topic and stick to them.
- Follow the
agenda; avoid hopping around.
- Discourage
side discussions.
- Set a “no
interrupting” rule.
- Stop, repeat,
and clarify the points people are making.
- Test for
closure before moving on to the next agenda item.
- Record decisions,
action items, and due dates for each topic.
- Summarize
the key decisions and action items before closing.
4. Follow up afterward
with summaries and action items.
After
you’ve completed all of that hard work, you can
avoid having everyone’s ideas and decisions simply
melt away because no one sent out a good summary or
bothered to track the agreed-upon assignments.
A summary doesn’t
have to be fancy or very detailed to be effective, but
it should contain enough substance to inform the people
who weren’t there, for example.
The
summary should list: 1) each topic, 2) the key points
of each topic discussion, 3) all decisions made, and
4) action items and due dates. At the end, it may include
the next meeting’s 5) proposed agenda, 6) date
and time, and 7) location, if known.
With a little fine-tuning,
you can convert your meetings from “profit stealers”
into “profit boosters.” The process will
transform the quality of group collaborations and breathe
new life into your morale and productivity!
Copyright 2005 Adele Sommers
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Although
the holiday season evokes images of people giving
friends, family, and colleagues boxes and bags of
material things, sometimes the most valuable gifts
you can give are those that involve your undivided
time and attention.
