If you’re frustrated about the level of contribution you’re getting from attendees or if you’re hoping to eke out more production and focus out of every meeting, there are loads of ways you change the way you run meetings to get more out of them.
Some organizations might require a complete overhaul of the structure of their meetings while others may only need to make a few tweaks. Whatever problem you’ve been able to diagnose with the way you’re running meetings, we hope you’ll be able to find the solution here.
Create An Agenda
An agenda allows your meeting to proceed with laser focus. By holding everyone in the meeting accountable to a few select talking points, it prevents discussion from veering wildly off-course – losing precious minutes to idle chatter.
With each bullet point on the agenda, make sure a resolution is reached. A meeting should always have a clear list of goals. If each goal hasn’t been achieved, you know that your meeting has failed to meet its objectives and you need to find a way to make them more goal-oriented.
By setting your goals for each meeting, it’ll help you pare down invite lists, review the way you run meetings and the precision with which your stick to the stated bullet points.
Keep everyone involved
Meetings should be as inclusive as possible. If everyone there needs to be there – everyone will be expected to contribute. By taking the time to hear everyone’s thoughts, queries and concerns, you’ll get a lot more out of the meeting. The more opinions and thoughts that are shared, the more perspectives are considered and you’ll have a more thoroughly developed strategy as a result.
Why not ask to hear from everyone involved?
It’ll also prevent anyone from switching off. When everyone knows they’ll have to get involved, it’ll help maintain attention spans throughout the meeting. Everyone has to stay focused and on task.
This also has the by-product of making each member on your team feel valued. When staff members feel like their voice really counts, they’ll be more confident sharing in the future. It also helps to create a sense of collective spirit that’ll push everyone to work together as a team towards the same goals.
Take the time to reflect on each meeting
Too often, everyone bundles out of the door and flies back into their work – desperately trying to meet rapidly approaching deadlines without taking stock of how the previous 30 minutes might have gone. If you’re determined to host more productive and efficient meetings moving forward, you have to take a few minutes to reflect. Leadership is also about self-leadership.
Think about who led the discussion. Did everyone chime in with their thoughts? Was there healthy debate? Was anyone distracted or not engaged?
By asking yourself these kinds of questions, you can determine which areas of your meetings are most in need of a revamp. From there, you can plot new ways of bolstering engagement, encouraging participation, maintaining focus and, ultimately, getting better, more considered outcomes from meetings.
If you want to take your team’s prodcutivity to the next level and learn from experts in the field how to increase brand awareness, strengthen customer loyalty and streamline business processes, schedule a free call today.
