In a world where collaboration is increasingly encouraged, knowing how to run effective meetings is critical. If you get it wrong, you can waste your time and your colleagues’ time. As you feel your team losing focus during meetings keep in mind that you are losing social capital and the ability to influence, too. And you’re not alone. Bad meetings are more common than most employers would hope. So, let’s explore five ways to make your next meeting terrific.
“Most meetings aren’t run efficiently or effectively; they’re disorganized and boring — and people end up losing a lot of precious time that could be better spent elsewhere,” says Chris Hummel, CMO of Schneider Electric in a recent interview with Business Insider. “Worse, if bad meetings become a regular habit, they can begin to corrode the corporate culture. I’ve seen companies where people actually spend more time talking about how much they hated a particular meeting than the time the meeting actually took.”
After reviewing articles from Business Insider, 99U, LifeHacker, Forbes, INC.com, Entreprenuer.com as well as some hilariously old school career coaching websites, here are The Potentiality’s Five tips for taking your next meeting to the next level.
Establish an agenda and let your participants know about it BEFORE the meeting
Not everyone can think on the fly, so give people time to let the agenda items marinate. On the flip side, if you want to get other’s strategic thoughts on where you need to take a project, you can try Kristine Kern of INC.com’s idea of creating a real-time agenda based on a lightning round of input from each team member. What do both these methods have in common? The meeting is run with an agenda and, consequently, with a clear purpose, too.
Keep the guest list relevant (and small)
According to an article in 99u about how meetings are run in Silicon Valley, keeping meetings smaller is key. At Google this means no more than ten people should be at a meeting. “Attending meetings isn’t a badge of honor,” writes Google VP of Business Operations Kristen Gil in “Think With Google”. Darn straight. So before you invite half the office, consider who exactly NEEDS to be in your meeting to get the most efficient feedback. Indeed, you may even want to ask yourself whether you even need a meeting or if you can accomplish your objective with a conversation or two.
Keep the meeting short and sweet (15-30 minutes is a good amount of time to aim for)
Any longer and you start to strain people’s attention span. According to Lifehacker, there’s a reason that TED talkers need to keep their speeches under 18 minutes. That’s when focusing on a topic at hand begins to turn into focusing on what groceries you need to pick up later that day.
Manage the talkers and draw out the introverts
People who monopolize the conversation can quickly single-handedly destroy the practicality of your meeting. Recognize these people early on and deploy some tricks to transition the meeting dialogue away from them if they’re following a useless tangent or eagerly answering every question. This post on “Managing Your Meeting Monsters” has some useful tips to do this (even if the webpage is super 2004). The other side of the coin is to remember to draw out the introverts. This might putting them on the spot. For example, “That’s great feedback everyone. I’d really love to hear from John about what he thinks of our plan of attack. John, what do you think?”
Everyone should walk away at the end of the meeting with action items
Both 99U and The Potentiality (and probably anyone else who likes to get stuff done) love action items. That’s why it is important to ensure someone is keeping track of your decisions, deadlines and who in particular is responsible for accomplishing what. Ending the meeting with a review of action items (just to hammer it home to both the individual and group) is a good way to end your meeting.
Follow these tips and you’ll take your ability to collaborate with your colleagues to new and efficient levels.