Meeting & Study Guide

  Be Prepared For Meetings How to Lead Productive Business Meeting

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  On Time Meetings 

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Meetings: The Benefits and the Costs

Prepare Well

    It's important that you start your meeting well.  The confidence, cordiality, and organization you display will set a tone that will be reflected in the contributions of all your participants. :

• Establish a Friendly Atmosphere

• Start On Time

• Open With an "Attention-Getter."

• Welcome The Group.

• Bring Everyone Up-to-Date.

• State the Purpose of Your Meeting.

Start Fast

Stay On Track

Close Decisively

Visual Aids

Problem And Cause

Establish a Friendly Atmosphere.

You should arrive well in advance.  Check details such as seating, lighting, and visual aids.  As the members arrive, greet each one individually.  Chat informally with everyone, and introduce those who don't know each other.  Use this time to create an atmosphere of friendly cooperation.  If left alone before a meeting begins, participants sometimes settle into a cold silence that will take time to thaw.  Worse yet, some participants could begin voicing complaints about the meeting's purpose or ridiculing some aspect of the project.  Arrive early and set a constructive tone.

Start On Time.

Set a realistic starting time - one that allows an adequate interval for moving from one activity to the next.  Then start exactly on time.  Few will object to meetings that start at the scheduled time.  But many will object to meetings that start late.  Starting late is a discourtesy to every person who arrives on time.  Establish a reputation for starting on time and stick to it.  it's often useful to choose an off-hour starting time for your meeting - ten or fifteen minutes after the hour, fir example.  Most meetings end on the hour if your meeting follows another, your participants will be given a short interval to prepare and move from one meeting to the next.  Off-hour starting times also suggest good organization.  People will take note and expect you to keep a schedule.  ( Since people expect to meet on the hour, you will need to emphasize your starting time in your announcement of the meeting.  Underline it, boldface it, and punctuate it.!  But stick to it ).

Open White an " Attention-Getter. "

You should begin your meeting with something dramatic, novel, or humorous that will grab your group's attention and focus it on the current problem.  Save your expression of welcome until after you have the group's attention.  Most participants have heard such welcomes so often that they've learned to ignore them.  Once they tune out, it may take a while to get them to tune back in.  Humorous stories get attention quickly, and so do statements that appeal to self-interest  : " You may have thought that this meeting was about cost-cutting, but what it's really about is increasing our salaries.  If we can come up with cost-cutting procedures for our department, then we ought to be able to convince management to allocate those dollars save to our own paychecks."       

" I've brought everyone of you a framed copy of this small plastic gear.  This little gizmo was going save us fifteen to twenty thousand dollars a year. It ended up costing us more than a million.  It's like my3-year-old daughter.  It's a tooth grinder."   " Sometime in the next ten days, a middle management executive in a windowless office in a high-rise building in Detroit is going to make a decision that's going to have a very direct and very immediate affect on all of our live." 

Welcome The Group.

If the meeting is one of a regular, continuing series, just a brief " Thank you for coming once again" is adequate welcome.  If it a special meeting, a once-a-year only event, then a detailed welcome is appropriate.  If there are individuals not usually present, they should be introduced.  A short description of their backgrounds, positions, and experience may be useful.  If their contributions are needed or expected, establishing credentials will enhance their credibility.  It is often effective  to have a regular member introduce anyone present for special reason.  The leader might say : " John, we're looking forward to hearing what the accountant for your department can tell us about the problem under consideration, and we're glad you've invited him to be here.  Would you introduce him to all us?"

Bring Everyone Up-to-Date

Your update should be a brief reminder, not a detailed report of what participants already know.  Results of any previous meetings should be summarized, and events leading up to the present meeting should be reviewed.  You many also want to include a brief review of the problem, explaining how it arose and why it's important.  Committee reports  and background reports are often best presented here, where they can be treated as brief summaries.  Well before the meeting, the leader should inform the committee spokesperson that he or she will be called upon.  Clear instructions must be given to be brief, and a time limit - two to three minutes, for example may need to be set.  If the committee has detailed information to present, it should supplied in writing in advance of the meeting.  Emphasize that the spoken  report can only be a very brief summary.  Presenting committee reports at the beginning assures that they won't turn into prolonged ordeals later in the meeting.

State the Purpose of  Your Meeting      

Your ship is about to embark.  The train is beginning to roll.  Now is the time to be sure it sets off on exactly the right course. Pause. Make sure everyone is looking directly at you, and state your purpose slowly and emphatically.  If it seems that anyone might not have understood, say it again.  Turn the sheet on your flipchart or pull the card on your chalkboard. Let your participants both hear and look at your purpose.  This is what this meeting is about.  This is your compass.  This is what will keep your meeting on-track and on-course.......for next information ,..Read More,.. 

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