Northstar

Planner's Portfolio Meeting Strategies 13 SEP-OCT 2018 MEETINGS & CONVENTIONS MCMAG-ASIA.COM How high-performance organisations make meetings effective WORDS J. ELISE KEITH 1. Set clear expectations for all meetings Meeting norms, ground rules and guidelines set the foundation for building an eective meeting habit. They often include things like use of an agenda and keeping meetings on time. Whatever your rules, the leadership team must follow them. The way the leadership group meets sets the real standard everyone else follows. 2. Document and share meeting results Fear of missing out (FOMO) compels people to attend meetings they shouldn't. E very organisation has to gure out how to make meetings productive. It's a complex challenge. To be eective, each meeting needs to engage the individual talents of the people involved, work to achieve the organisation's specic goals for the moment and do so in a way that's both culturally relevant and contextually sensitive to the world around it. Not an easy feat. So how can your organisation meet better? Here are three ways high-performing organisations make meetings productive: Organisers don't want to leave people out, so they invite everyone who might possibly want to weigh in. Having irrelevant people in the room de-energises the conversation and disrupts productivity. Before the meeting, document the meeting purpose and desired outcomes clearly. Then, send out written meeting results Ways to get more from meetings afterwards. When people can see in advance what a meeting is for, then see afterwards what happened, they can decide whether they need to attend. This keeps meetings more focused, and it keeps everyone more productive. 3. Define "the way" to meet for all core processes There are 16 dierent types of business meetings, and each has a purpose. A regular team meeting is good for conrming progress and identifying problems, but it's a lousy place to make a big decision. Big decisions demand a dedicated decision- making meeting. Similarly, the initial meeting with a prospective client (or funder) should look very dierent from the meeting where you ink the deal. Each of these pivotal meetings can be optimised to drive the results your company needs. High-performance organisations know the type of meetings they need to run and how to run each one well. Each meeting gets a name and becomes "the way" that kind of work gets done. For example, the team's check-in meeting becomes "the huddle." The meeting to impress prospective clients early in the sales cycle becomes a "services brieng." Anything called simply a "meeting" isn't specic enough. J. ELISE KEITH is the co-founder of Lucid Meetings and the author of Where the Action Is: The Meetings That Make or Break Your Organisation. For more information, please visit, lucidmeetings.com and on connect with her on Twitter at @ EliseID8. PHOTO CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES Ways to get more Ways to get more Ways to from get more from get more meetings 3 "Meeting norms, ground rules and guidelines set the foundation for building an eective meeting habit." meeting habit."

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