Meetings play a big role in organizations. But there’s also no denying that meetings can become meaningless time-sucks when they do not fulfill the purpose they were held for, that is whether it is addressing a problem or fixing it.
When meetings do not fulfill the purpose they were held or scheduled for, they waste the time of all the people who are involved in the meeting. In order to prevent that from happening, here are 5 tips for holding effective meetings!
This is the most important thing you need to do before you have a meeting. Decide on an agenda that the meeting will be based on. Meetings are not impromptu brainstorming sessions. Sure, they can become impromptu brainstorming sessions but before that, they need to be based off something solid and concrete. Set and agenda so that you can control the direction the meeting takes.
Meetings can run forever and nobody wants to be stuck in one of those nightmarish meetings where it simply doesn’t seem to end! You need to schedule a time-limit for the meetings, say 30 mins or 1 hour and then stick to that schedule. That way, you will be forced to et through your agenda quickly and not endless debate certain ideas.
It’s important to understand that everyone’s time is precious and that all the people in a meeting probably have a schedule that will run comfortably if the meeting ends on time. With that in mind, in addition to ensuring meetings end on time, also make sure they begin on time.
Use a top-down approach to tackling issues in a meeting. Get all the big thorny issues out of the way first and then once you have resolved those issues successfully, you can move onto other issues, which are not as pressing as others.
The whole idea behind a meeting is to discuss issues/ideas and come to a conclusion about them. As tempting as it is to not make a difficult decision, as much as possible, try to end a meeting with a definite conclusion.
Do you have any tips for effective meetings? Share them in the comments section below!
