Having office meetings are very useful; therefore, they provide countless amounts of benefits. It is important to know what a successful meeting is like, so you do not miss out on the many benefits. There are common mistakes that are made by those who are new at this, but also from those who have done this for years.
Here are a couple of things to avoid at your next staff meeting:
Steer Clear From Unclear Objectives
Quickly jotting down what needs to be addressed at your meeting is not the way to go, much less is it effective to improvise. Effective meetings are planned in advance so that you make sure to hit all the important points required to better your business. Nothing would make me more upset than taking time out of my day to sit in a meeting in which my time is being wasted. Inc.com weighs in, “Getting together just to get together is a big, expensive waste of people’s time. Before you send the calendar invitation, think about why you hold staff meetings. For example, at our company, the primary objective is to build knowledge about the work we do. So our staff meetings are structured as learning experiences.”
Stop Treating a Meeting as Something Unimportant
Meetings if held correctly should feel like real work. FastCompany weighs in:
“People don’t take meetings seriously. They arrive late, leave early, and spend most of their time doodling. Some companies punish latecomers with a penalty fee or reprimand them in the minutes of the meeting. But these techniques address symptoms, not the disease. Disciplined meetings are about mind-set — a shared conviction among all the participants that meetings are real work. That all-too-frequent expression of relief — “Meeting’s over, let’s get back to work” — is the mortal enemy of good meetings.”
Invite the Right People
The only thing more irritating than wasting time from unclear objectives is probably showing up to a meeting in which you have nothing to do with. I mean come on, invite those who need to be there. If it is a specialized meeting invite those whose opinion and judgment is valuable to the topics covered due to their lengthy expertise. This narrows the group you are dealing with and encourages open discussion. Do not invite someone in billing for a meeting that has to do with improving the marketing. It just doesn’t make sense, wastes time, and honestly gets under many people’s skin. Hr Ringleader states, “After making it known to colleagues not to invite me if I wasn’t needed, I had fewer meetings to attend. The ones I attended, I was able to weigh in and add my ideas. The rest….well, somehow the company still ran without me in them. It all worked out.”
Take Action
What determines a successful meeting is the action that follows. There has to be change and improvement in the objectives that were covered. Time and time again what was discussed goes in through one ear and comes out the other. Most likely, you have experienced or witnessed lengthy meetings that promised change and development, yet after that hour is over, everything reverts to normal. No boundaries were broken. Time is money, so make sure you are implementing what was agreed in the meeting. After each meeting, I would distribute a document that encloses exactly what the takeaway message for each objective is just to make sure everyone’s interpretation is the same.
