It is generally agreed that two of the largest wasters of time in modern life are email and meetings. Email will be the subject of another blog but first we need to know how to hold an effective meeting.
Before we contemplate the meeting we need to stand back and say that no meeting should be held unless the objective of that meeting is to move the organisation or person closer to their goal. This assumes that everyone in the organisation knows what the goal is. If they don’t then all meetings should be banned until they do. A meeting without this objective is just an interruption from work and should be banned.
Assuming we have got past go then the following steps will ensure and effective meeting:
- Send out a request for agenda items in advance of the meeting requesting items and the justification for their inclusion to be submitted no less than 4 days before the meeting.
- The chairman to decide which items are to be included and communicate his / her decision to the attendees no less than 72 hours before the meeting.
- Those who have submitted agenda items which have been accepted must circulate a maximum one page briefing note no less than 48 hours before the meeting. If this has cannot be done then the item is too broad and must be amended, if it has not been done then it is not sufficiently important and must be removed from the agenda.
- NOTE – “ANY OTHER BUSINESS” MUST NEVER BE AN AGANDA ITEM. IF IT IS NOT IMPORTANT ENOUGH TO BE ON THE AGENDA IT IS NOT WORTH WASTING TIME DISCUSSING IT.
- The chairman must allocate a maximum amount of time to each agenda item. It is the chairman who controls the meeting and so must control the content and time allocated.
- Minutes to be taken by one person during the meeting, the others can take notes but not minutes. The minutes are to be circulated to all members within 24 hours of the meeting.
- All agenda items must be either closed during the meeting or result in an action point for a named person to be completed in a named time period. It is then the job of the chairman to follow up on these agenda items and ensure they are completed by the due date. The chairman of a meeting is not a figurehead he / she is the captain of a ship and it is his / her responsibility to ensure the success of the meeting. The success of the meeting can only be judged by progress made.
- Meetings must never be used to distribute information or for general updates. This is a waste of meeting time and can be achieved more effectively by other means. Regular update meetings are the work of the devil.
- At the next meeting it is the responsibility of the chairman to report why he / she has allowed any agreed actions to fail. Those items must be removed from all subsequent meetings (except for the report of the chairman as to why he / she has failed to ensure they were completed) until they are completed and can be progressed. Note – the captain is responsible for the meeting ship.
- It must be made totally clear that no emails or telephone calls will be allowed during the meeting unless they relate to the agenda item under discussion. People are either in the meeting or they are not. It is their choice. We don’t multi-task.
It is vitally important to give the responsibility of seeing the agenda items to completion to the chairman. This stops people calling meetings on a whim and also limits the number of agenda items to a reasonable number and to those which can be achieved.
This is the way to return to effective meetings.
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