Mike Watson: Principal, Wazuku Advisory Group
Keeping your meetings focused ensures that you are effectively using staff time. Paradoxically, this critical ingredient to successful meetings is often missing, and we find ourselves meandering down a path of adhocracy and random thoughts. It need not be this way.
Always ensure that all participants know, in advance, what the meeting is about and what it is that you hope to accomplish. If you do not have clarity of destination, your journey is assured to be circuitous. Establish a desired meeting outcome and test this at the beginning of the meeting with all participants. Ensure they are clear why they are there and what they are expected to achieve.
Have a clear agenda. Advise participants on the desired outcome and share the agenda (in advance) that has been established to lead you there. You now have your destination and the roadmap. Give people an opportunity to weigh in on the agenda. But, once on the road, stay true to your map.
Ensure you have the right people at the table share information and get you to the outcome you pursue. Then, ensure that you draw out the perspectives from everyone at the table. Recognize that some like to speak more than others but all have a valuable contribution to make.
Be rigorous in setting and sticking to a timeline. You must respect the time of participants and recognize that they have hours of work waiting for them at their desks. Start the meeting on time and end it on time. If you start late, you are disrespecting those that are on time.
Finally, record your action items and follow up relentlessly. The greatest killer of a meeting is knowledge that the last meeting accomplished nothing.
Mike Desjardins: CEO, Virtus
Here's a possible framework to structure weekly team meetings within your business and keep them on track and worth attending.
•Personal update: everyone shares the good, bad and ugly of what's going on with them. This helps explain everyone's context and helps build trust.
•Top three: have everyone in the room state the top three things they're focused on over the next week.
•Sticking points: have everyone list what the keything is that's holding them back. It can be resources, health, time, people, information, technology – anything.
•Top three to five metrics: the core numbers, financial and non-financial, that you as a team need to watch weekly. Think of these as the "canary in the coal mine" helping you to forecast what's going to happen.
•Build the agenda: after hearing all the above, decide which three to five items need the collective brain power in the room to tackle. Items that don't make that cut can most likely be dealt with offline.
•Rank the agenda and dive in: go through the items on the agenda and rank them in order of priority. That way if you run out of time at least you've tackled the biggest opportunities and challenges.
•Accountabilities, decisions and communications: have everyone who is responsible for an action list out their understanding of it, along with the timeline and who they need to communicate outcomes to.
•Good news: offer the chance to share any good news that the rest of the team might not be aware of.
•Appreciations, difficulties and closing statements: before heading back out, have everyone share an appreciation, difficulty and any closing statements.
After a month or two of using this format, you really start to see the leverage you can create.
Lisa Martin: Leadership coach, consultant and author of Briefcase Moms
If we tolerate unfocused and mediocre meetings, that's what we get. But if we truly value our and others' time, we'll do what's necessary to ensure we take care of business in the most efficient way.
In the spirit of being focused, here are some brief suggestions to get the most out of your meetings:
Stop having meetings. Call a meeting only if it is absolutely necessary. Ask yourself whether you can achieve your goal in some other manner. Consider participating in direct conversations at the office, via the telephone or using video Skype. Perhaps a simple exchange of email or an internal blog will suffice.
Keep it clear and concise. Announce the purpose, agenda and length of the meeting, and stick to it. Only put items on the agenda that can be effectively addressed. You'll find fewer participants checking their phones and more taking an active role in meetings.
Invite the right people. It's the ideas and people in the room that make meetings successful. Bring together people who have a vested interest in the topic and who can take action or influence others to do so.
Stay the course. Stick to the subject at hand. Make note of any half-baked ideas for another time. If your meeting starts to drift off course, say so and direct others to get back on track.
Start and end on time. Start every meeting on time, no matter who is in the room. End every meeting a few minutes before the scheduled time. Never go over.
Get real. Practise civility and compassion. Show gratitude for people's time and attention. Smile and be sincere.
When you keep your meetings succinct and stimulating, your team will love you and everyone will be happier and more productive.
