Do you have management meetings? If you take notes, have you ever looked back at the minutes from the past and compare them to present day meetings? You may find the same discussions on the same issues. If properly conducted, meetings are an excellent format to foster teamwork, develop individuals, exchange ideas, build communication, make or announce decisions, adjust priorities, provide urgency to project work and promote participant accountability.
Meetings can range from informal football-type huddles to major corporate board gatherings with strict rules and procedures. Here are a few basic thoughts that may help you rev up meeting performance:
- Set the parameters (who, what, where, when, how often)
- Keep the agenda short
- Have a chairperson to maintain pace
- Take short objective notes and quickly circulate to attendees
- Park issues that cannot be resolved in this meeting
- Be objective, it’s about performance issues not people issues
- Let everyone participate and share their point of view
- Be consistent and determine actions to be reviewed at next meeting
- Set a time limit: short meetings are far more effective
- At closing, set the date for the next meeting