Prepare a written agenda for your meeting. Make sure that everyone at the meeting is aware of it, and if necessary, have the meeting agree to it. Then you can refer to the agenda to keep discussion focussed.

Bernie DeKoven explains what it takes to improve your meetings.

http://bit.ly/RdNNp7

Today's package is a series of free tips on how to use an agenda for meeting success.

An agenda is a one of the vital tools to keeping a meeting on track and efficiently effective.

And the first tip in the series? ...

The very first step on that agenda should be to reiterate the purpose of the meeting. This immediately focusses attention and makes it clear that the meeting is to be efficient. It also allows you to return to that statement of pupose to support any efforts to keep the meeting focussed.

You can get the tips sent to you in emails and know that you are will be on the way to having far more efficient, effective meetings. => http://bit.ly/pMLSSo

Have you been to meetings that don’t work, have you been responsible for meetings that didn’t work, or maybe you just don’t want to go to, organise, or participate in any more meetings that don’t work.

There’s Value in having meetings that work

Why?
… Because

 They waste time you could be spending on something more
productive/enjoyable.

 They waste company funds

 They create frustration which is bad in itself, but also creates a bad image of your meetings and of you/your organisation

 Information and processes are not managed efficiently

So let’s find ways to stop wasting time and money and to avoid the frustration. Let’s make our meetings work – efficiently and effectively.... See you next "Tips Tuesday"

Are you tired of meetings that spend hours of time and money but achieve no outcomes?  Annoyed by lack of direction and beating around the bush?

Take this short course to learn the mindset of a chairman who can make your meetings  efficient and effective

Click here to enrol now, it's free

If you want to have more effective meetings, first you have to learn the basics. Here are some simple, easy-to-follow and proven guidelines that should be followed each and every time your group meets.

Print this page. Hang it on your meeting room wall. Write the guidelines on a poster. Memorize them by heart. Do whatever it's going to take to improve your meetings!

Guidelines you and your group can follow before, during and after your meeting:  =>http://bit.ly/8YFf9V

Decide: Is this meeting necessary?
Are there other ways to have the meeting rather than face-to-face or inperson?
Look at the various communication technologies and systems that you have and weigh up the advantages and disadvantages of each of these compared with an in-person meeting.
Could the meeting simply be replaced by a better reporting system?
A meeting has to be better than playing phone tag.  Email takes time to write and wait for a reply. If the issue is sensitive, then a face-to-face meeting will achieve more than impersonal emails or letters
Meetings can also generate a group energy that cannot be as well achieved with other media.
Can the people who need to be there, be there? Or, conversely, are the people who are invited absolutely necessary to the outcome expected?
Your decision in this regard will affect not only this meeting but also any in the future, because people will expect a repeat of the successfulness of this one.

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By Duncan Brodie

You might have heard the term "death by meetings". While it is true that meetings can be a huge drain on resources, they do have the potential to contribute to great results. So how can you transform your team meetings?

Get the team setting the agenda

As the leader of the team, there will always be things that you have in mind for the meetings. Trouble is in my experience, when all of the agenda and meeting content comes from the leader, there tends to be huge levels of passiveness and disengagement. If you want to have better meetings, get the bulk of the agenda coming from the team.

Keep them short

I have during my career in accountancy spent huge amounts of time in meetings. What I discovered is that the shorter the meetings are, the more effective they are. This is partly because people are more focussed. It is also due to the fact that most of us have a very short attention span. One thing that is particularly helpful in keeping meetings short and focussed is to do them by conference call or webinar rather than in person.

Give people a chance to speak

If you are leading the meeting, you should be speaking less and listening more. You also should aim to take care to ensure that all of the meeting attendees get a chance to speak. There will always be a few who, if you allow them, will dominate meetings and not always with great contributions.

Facilitate well

As a leader of a meeting, you are as much a facilitator as a person who is chairing. Facilitating essentially is about ensuring that the ideas are collected, built on and an agreed point is reached. Think of yourself as the conductor rather than the musician and you will go a long way towards effectively facilitating meetings.

Only record key actions

There are a few meetings that will require formal minuting. Most don't and simply require a record of the key actions and who is taking them forward.

Make sure you follow up on actions

It's vital that you have an effective process for following up on actions agreed at previous meetings. Why? The simple answer is that if you don't, people will see them as unimportant and not follow through. Without follow through, nothing happens.

The Bottom Line

Meetings can be a catalyst to great results or just a drain on resources. So what do you need to start to do differently to get better results from meetings?

Now I invite you to sign up for my free Weekly Leadership and Management Success Tips at http://www.goalsandachievements.co.uk/?pid=26

Duncan Brodie of Goals and Achievements (G&A) works with accountants, health professionals, teams and organisations to develop their management and leadership capability. With 25 years business experience in a range of sectors, he understands first hand the real challenges of managing and leading in the demanding business world.