When it comes to meetings, they are notorious for being ineffective and time wasters. Here are a few strategies that will make you more effective when conducting and facilitating meetings of all kinds.
Why have meetings?
Only call meetings when you have good reasons to do so.
There are three types of meetings:
Problem solving
Decision making
Informational (try to avoid these unless necessary to build energy around a subject)
Create an agenda:
Open the meeting with authority.
Review the agenda. Get input on agenda and find out if there is anything else the group may want to discuss.
Introduce matters you have deemed important to discuss.
Establish ground rules.
Start on time. End on time.
It should take approximately 30 minutes to cover each subject. Think “flow”.
Agree who can contribute.
Follow the agenda.
Stay on task.
Have a purpose for calling the meeting:
Examples are: Brainstorming, informing, elicit ideas, fix a problem, determine a course of action or clarify roles and responsibilities on a team.
Do not just have a meeting for the sake of feeling like the group is one-big family.
Do not have people attend that do not need to be there-- ask yourself who and why they need to be in the meeting.
Assign roles and responsibilities to members:
Leader-May or may not run meeting but clarifies purpose, objectives, scope of authority and constraints. Takes responsibility for follow up.
Facilitator-Guides the group through discussions.
Scribe-Someone to take notes for future distribution.
Contributor-Participates actively by offering ideas and keeping the discussion on track.
Expert-Contributes expert knowledge on issues AS REQUESTED
Be realistic:
Things will interrupt/disrupt your meeting so be realistic and expect thing like:
People that arrive late or leave early (ask them questions to make sure they are catching up with the group since they missed part of the meeting).
People who whisper or disturb the meeting.
One participant who dominates the meeting and infuriate everyone else.
A group that gets stuck or confused, focusing on only one small point of the issue/meeting and repeats the same point over and over again.
A group that runs out of energy or just falls silent.
A group that commandeers the meeting and begins to focus on items that are off-topic.
Be prepared:
Use active listening and observation to see where your audience is.
If someone is leaning forward, they may have something to say or are actively listening.
If their arms are crossed and they are leaning back in their chair, it is a good sign that they are disengaged in the meeting.
If a participant dominates the discussion:
If you are standing, walk closer to the person. This draws the audience’s attention TO you and AWAY from that person.
Thank him for his input and call on someone else.
Limit/eliminate interruptions.
If he finishes other people’s sentences, encourage him to let them finish what they had to say.
Ask the group to change roles so those that have been quiet take a more active role and the one’s who have been doing all of the talking can take a back-seat.
If someone disturbs the meeting by whispering, talking or interrupting:
Ask a question and then ask the person talking for the answer.
Boomerang:
Return a question to the person who had asked it in order to let the group know that the leader is not the only one responsible for answering questions.
Break into sub-groups:
Break up into smaller groups to elicit more feedback from all members of the meeting.
Ending and ending on time:
When you end on time you gain the trust and appreciation of all participants.
Have someone keep time.
Make sure all points of view are heard.
Periodically remind the group of the items left to discuss and the time left to do so.
Prioritize or postpone agenda items if time is running out.
If you have everything done, end the meeting. Time is too short to keep a large group of people in a meeting in order to fulfill an allotted time for meetings.
Restate and summarize what has been accomplished.
Clarify what comes next.
Get feedback on items missed or that may be important for future meetings.
Ask the group for an evaluation of the meeting. Either in person or via email.
Send out the proposed to do list moving forward.
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