How to organize effective meetings and get results from meetings

Poor preparation, confused allocation of tasks and responsibilities, lack of punctuality ... are your meetings time consuming, demoralizing and a money pit?

You can turn your meetings into productive discussions and outcomes with the help of these tips:

1- Set specific goals

Set Meeting Goals

The success of a meeting held in preparation. To be effective, you must do it only when you know what it will be used. Define the objectives of this meeting allows to decline the agenda. Establish it in a clear and concise manner, detailing the themes. This will determine the time required for the meeting and perhaps eliminate some points. We must be reasonable: a usual two-hour meeting work is usually sufficient.







2- Choose the right participants

Meeting Participants

Make sure that all present employees have a real interest in taking part in the meeting. A good remedy against boredom and possible yawning ... The facilitator may also provide for the presence of certain people for part of the meeting, according to the points raised. Participants often arrive with a blank notepad and pen, then it would come with a folder containing the history of meetings and a presentation of their intervention.

To hunt the spirit of improvisation and inefficiency that follows, tell your employees in advance of the holding of the meeting, the agenda and schedule of its amplitude. Ask them clearly to prepare for a built debate by saying for example on every invitation you would expect from so and so to intervene on a particular issue. They prepare all the more they will know how much time will be given to each point. To optimize the dynamics of trade, do not exceed eight or ten people per meeting.


3- Pay attention to the environment

A Meeting Room

The place where the meeting will take place is important. To make the presence of the boss less burdensome, avoid his desk. The choice of a meeting room is therefore more appropriate. Avoid the blind rooms - participants get tired more quickly if they are not illuminated by the light of day - and the concrete walls that reflect sound, and prefer light walls. To the facilitator at the center of the group, the ideal is a table "U". In exceptional meetings and long lasting, a break is needed at least every two hours. If possible, avoid the niche 14 hours- 16 hours, time of day when the brain is less alert due to digestion.

4- Follow a schedule

Setting Fixed Meeting Agenda

Warn the participants that the meeting will start on time. This is the best way for it to finish on time, simple rule of respect for the organization of work of each. If someone arrives late, the presenter can pause the course of the meeting to get noticed. We bet that the latecomer will pay more attention to his watch at next appointment.
Also make sure to respect the agenda and the time allocated in advance for each issue. If two thirds of invited participants do not have the time to address them, they may prove frustrated to have worked for nothing and to be disappointed by the meeting. The facilitator should therefore not hesitate to call to order the "windbags".




5- Animate listening
The choice of the supervisor as meeting facilitator is often not the best: the function needs not to be done by one of the most involved participants. Guarantor of the rhythm of the meeting, the facilitator speaks little and shows able to speak other to achieve the objectives. It regulates the time. When a new problem threatens to monopolize the discussion, he treats it as a separate item on the agenda and postpones.
Also be aware that conflicts often emerge during meetings. "If an important point involves two interlocutors, we must not let them monopolize the floor, but getting them to meet to discuss it outside, and communicate the results to the next meeting for example.

6- Establish clear rules
A meeting always starts with the clear wording of the topics to the agenda and the expected timing for each item. Indeed, the participants do not necessarily have all noted. The facilitator must pass a kind of contract with the group to fit the spirit of the meeting. In early meeting, it establishes the principle that those who want to make a critique against-offer, then to discuss all the proposals. "With a positive review, the debate will be constructive. If certain points are not addressed, they will be deferred to the next meeting. This presentation early in the session should not last more than two minutes.

7- Synthesize results
At the end of meeting, the facilitator summarizes, orally, arrested decisions, missions of each by the next meeting and the points still under discussion, to be included on a future agenda.

With these points, you can get productive meetings and outcomes.

Do you have other pointers that we can add to this list? Let us know, we will be glad to include them here.