Does it sometimes seem to you that half the business world is always “in a meeting”? And since at least 20% of the time we spend at meetings is wasted time, do you ever wonder who is actually running businesses these days?
Meetings are paradoxical. Simultaneously the biggest source of frustration in the working world, and also the best opportunity to get things done. The most common and at the same time the least understood business activity.
So what’s the point of internal company meetings? There are several, but all stem from the benefits to be gained by getting people together. Some meetings are designed to ensure that everybody present shares the same information. Some are intended to get everyone to participate in making a decision. Some aim at both these objectives, plus coordination of the activities decided at the meeting.
Whatever the reason for having the meeting, there are 5 golden rules for making sure that the meeting achieves its aims.
1.Make sure that everybody invited to the meeting knows when and where it will be held, what is to be discussed, that they have all relevant information before the meeting, and that they know when it will end.
If the purpose of the meeting is simply to communicate information, now’s the time to consider not having a meeting at all. We read much faster than we speak, so if the information can be released before the meeting, why meet at all?
And it’s at this stage that the number of people at the meeting needs to be settled. My experience is that more than seven people cannot “decide” anything; they can only be informed of events, and perhaps exercise a veto.
2.Start on time. No delays, no waiting. Most meetings do not start promptly, which throws the schedule off course before a word is spoken. Over the course of a few meetings people develop the attitude that they do not need to be on time, “because someone’s always late”. And please note that “on time” means sitting in your place, papers set out in front of you, mobile phone switched off, before the scheduled start time.
I used to work for a German company, and that’s how meetings would go. Everyone in place, chatting, until the chairman/boss/facilitator tapped his water glass and started the meeting. Maybe by coincidence, those were the most productive meetings I can recall.
3.Cover each item on the agenda in the depth it requires. Often it’s helpful to make an estimate of how much time each item will take, and set the times out on the agenda. Otherwise make sure that the highest priority matters are covered early on in the meeting. That way, if the meeting runs short of time the important matters won’t be skimped in the rush at the end of the session.
4.Make notes. Some meetings need formal records of who said what. This is a skilled and demanding task, and whoever does it will most likely not be able to be a full participant in the meeting. Other meetings require no more than a list of the actions agreed. Any participant can make this level of record, and in this case it’s a good idea to rotate the job of record keeping around the group, so that everyone gets a chance to try it.
5.Do the actions! Don’t wait until the day before the next meeting! Put the actions you were allocated onto your “to do” list, do them as soon as possible, and report completion to the rest of the group.
Good meetings are powerful tools. A group of people share common information, and work towards a common goal. Bad meetings are corrosive. They destroy cohesion, damage working relationships, and set up tensions within the group. But it’s wrong to heap all the blame onto the person chairing the meeting if it does not go well. All the participants have a role to play as well. They need to be prepared for the discussion topics, they must observe proper courtesy, only speak when appropriate, and when they speak they must be brief and to-the-point.
Generally the language used in meetings is more “formal” than what we use in everyday conversation. I have been in meetings where every participant was addressed not by name but by job title. And in other meetings the participants could only speak “through the chair”, never directly to each other. Meetings where the business language is not your mother tongue can be difficult for you, although I have been the “outsider”, and marvelled at the ease with which my Dutch or German colleagues did business in my mother tongue, not theirs! Occasionally I would have to leave one of these meetings, and discover on my return that my colleagues had not bothered to switch back to Dutch or German.
If preparation for a meeting to be held in a language other than your mother tongue is a problem for you, and you are lucky enough to live in Jakarta, the Aim team is there to help you.