The Learning Blog Recent Posts Learning and Development Posts Subscribe

5 Rules That'll Make Your Meetings More Effective

Share Tweet Share
Paul Petrone November 9, 2016

LinkedIn Learning LinkedIn.com Subscribe to the Blog

 If you want to make your organization more productive, there’s no better place to start
than your meetings.

Research shows the average professional attends 62 meetings a month. And, as

employees are promoted and gain more influence, they tend to spend even more time
in meetings, with meetings occupying the majority of CEOs’ time.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that, as meetings are where collaboration
happens and strategies are hammered out. What’s troubling though is that employees
believe 50 percent of their time spent in meetings is wasted, and executives consider
67 percent of meetings to be failures.

That means a lot of your employees are losing a lot of time in unproductive meetings.
But the solution isn’t to abandon meetings; instead, it just means making the
meetings you have more productive.

Dave Crenshaw, a business coach and president of Invaluable Inc, has a solution. In
a course on LinkedIn Learning on how to get the most out of meetings, Crenshaw
touched upon five rules all your employees should follow for every work meeting,
which will make them more effective and productive.

1. Before each meeting, the meeting organizer should ask themself

these four questions.

Before setting any meeting, Crenshaw suggests the meeting organizer ask themself
these four questions to understand both if a meeting is necessary and who needs to
attend:

Do we have all the information we need for a meeting? If not, get the needed

LinkedIn Learning
information first, and then set the meeting.
LinkedIn.com Subscribe to the Blog
 In the meeting, are we going to discuss and collaborate or are we just going to
delegate and calendar? The point here is if tasks are just going to be delegated,
that can be done by the leader in one-on-one meetings or emails. Meetings
should be about collaborating and discussion.

Is it critical for everyone to be on the same page? In other words, does everyone
going to the meeting need to know all the information presented? If the answer is
no, it’s better to have smaller, shorter conversations with the relevant parties.

Is this meeting one of our most valuable activities? As in, is this meeting going to
have a real impact on the bottom line? If not, you can probably skip the meeting.

2. Every meeting shall have an agenda.

Every meeting within your company should have an agenda that’s sent out 24 hours
before the meeting starts, as it is essential for keeping meetings focused and
productive, Crenshaw said. Additionally, it allows for participants to prepare as well,
even participants who aren’t presenting at the meeting.

An additional benefit here of having an agenda – it helps introverts. Indiana University

Senior Lecturer Brenda Bailey-Hughes, in a course on business communications,
explained that introverts prefer having an agenda ahead of time, so they can have
solitary processing time to brainstorm their questions and thoughts.

Otherwise, if a meeting doesn’t have an agenda, there’s a good chance a few

extroverts will dominate the conversation. So, agendas not only increase the focus of
meetings, but also should facilitate a broader team discussion.

3. Meeting attendees shall prepare for the meeting as well.

LinkedIn Learning LinkedIn.com Subscribe to the Blog

 It isn’t enough for just the organizer of the meeting to come prepared, as that’s going
to result in the organizer dominating the conversation. If the meeting organizer sends
out an agenda and materials a day before – as they should – it falls onto the
shoulders of the participants to be fully prepared as well.

“Prior to attending the meeting every participant should take a few moments
to prepare their questions and consider how they can serve others,” Crenshaw said in
his course.

That means each attendee reading the supporting documentation before the meeting,
making a checklist of pertinent questions/topics they have and having their calendar
handy, so they can schedule follow-up meetings or deadlines, if necessary, Crenshaw
said.

4. It’s the meeting leader’s job to keep people focused throughout

the meeting.

The Muse reports that 92 percent of employees admit to multitasking during

meetings, primarily checking email. That directly affects the focus of any meeting,
Crenshaw said.

Laptops and smart phones should only be used during to meeting when necessary,
like for scheduling or for note taking, Crenshaw said. If people are using them to
check email, the meeting leader should point that out, he said.

Additionally, if people begin to get off topic or hold back during a meeting, it’s the
meeting leader’s job to fix that. Crenshaw recommends the leader doing that by
avoiding signaling out any one person, but instead addressing the group with
something like, “We all agreed to be candid”, if someone appears to be holding back
LinkedIn Learning LinkedIn.com Subscribe to the Blog
 an opinion. Or, if someone talks over someone else, the organizer should say
something along the lines of, “We all agreed to let people talk.”

5. A list of action items shall be set during each meeting – and

actually be completed.

Most meetings should have action items coming out of them, as that is often an
indication the meeting was truly productive. Of course, just setting action items isn’t
enough; people should be accountable to follow through them.

“Part of the success of future meetings will depend upon your success in completing
your action items,” Crenshaw said. “This means if you can come to every meeting
and show the other participants that you keep your commitments and meet your
deadlines, then you’ll earn their trust.”

Tying it all together

Crenshaw’s rules are simple, yet effective. They ensure your employees only hold
meetings when necessary, that meetings are as focused and collaborative as
possible and that everyone comes through on their promises that come out of those
meetings.

Following these five rules ensure that happens in all your meetings at your
organization. And that will lead to far more productive workforce.

Having productive meetings is one way to make your company more

productive. Another is creating a culture of learning, where each employee is
committed to constant improvement.

LinkedIn Learning LinkedIn.com Subscribe to the Blog

 Topics
Management, Leadership

Related story
Related story
Rock Your Next Work Presentation By Following These 5
4 Ways to Motivate Employees That Will Actually Work
Rules

Recent Posts Learning and Development Posts

LinkedIn Corporation © 2020 About Cookie Policy Privacy Policy User Agreement

LinkedIn Learning LinkedIn.com Subscribe to the Blog