Most of the people I coach who can't stand meetings and check-ins avoid them for the same reason: they've never been in a good one. I tend to avoid meetings at all costs as well, and yet I've been in some great, inspiring, and effective meetings.
Meetings and check-ins are where the work of leadership gets done. Individual work happens outside of meetings, but the most important things happen when two or more people come together to combine their collective experience, effort, and perspective to create a better solution than what could have been achieved in isolation. Meetings, whether formal or informal, have great potential for effectiveness if done right.
They're also expensive to hold, so it's important we get them right. The cost, per hour, of a meeting of seven leaders making $100k each is $364.58.
That's a high-priced hour.
Below is a structure for meetings that lends itself to great outcomes and maximizes bang-for-buck:
Pre-Meeting
Before the meeting, get clear about it's purpose. Why is it happening? Even if it's a regular meeting, each one should have a unique, explicit purpose. Based on that purpose, is there any pre-work that needs to be accomplished to maximize the time? Even if the request is "come having thought about ______," pre-work leads to effective use of time.
Email the team or individual ahead of time to state the purpose for the gathering so they are prepared to participate and stay on point. People hate meetings when they don't understand the "why."
Here's some verbiage you might use:
"Hi Team,
I'm looking forward to meeting on Wednesday. The outcome for out meeting will be to... My request is that you come prepared to... Below is a simple agenda we'll use to guide the flow.
{Insert Agenda subheads only}
See you soon.
Sincerely,
{Your name here}"
Once you've communicated the purpose (which takes all of 5 minutes to send out), create the agenda. Below is a sample agenda with descriptions of each component. A meeting without a plan is a meeting primed for distraction, wandering, and ineffectiveness.
Effective Meeting Structure
Outcomes of Meeting: The goal of our meeting today is...(e.g. to collect feedback, etc.) -- State this at the top of the agenda and say it explicitly at the outset.
Agenda:
*What makes a great collaboration topic?
Post-Meeting
Follow-up immediately after the meeting with an email containing the agenda and a list of action items. In the next meeting you have, you can use these action items as a launch point for accountability and revisit them at the beginning of the agenda.
Also reiterate the date of the next meeting and send a calendar invite if appropriate.
A few keys to remember:
Meet for no less than 30 minutes and no more than 90 minutes, no less often than once a month and probably no more often than bi-weekly. Perhaps for check-ins you may want to meet weekly. And, for sanity's sake, if there's nothing to talk about cancel the meeting!
If you want to take meetings to ninja level, you can also plan for the processes you'll engage during the meeting (pair and share, individual brainstorm, small group work, etc.) but this is for a future post.
If you lead or manage, you meet (for better or for worse). Do it right and get better results, higher engagement, and a future blog post from someone who attended your meeting years earlier and loved it!
Meetings and check-ins are where the work of leadership gets done. Individual work happens outside of meetings, but the most important things happen when two or more people come together to combine their collective experience, effort, and perspective to create a better solution than what could have been achieved in isolation. Meetings, whether formal or informal, have great potential for effectiveness if done right.
They're also expensive to hold, so it's important we get them right. The cost, per hour, of a meeting of seven leaders making $100k each is $364.58.
That's a high-priced hour.
Below is a structure for meetings that lends itself to great outcomes and maximizes bang-for-buck:
Pre-Meeting
Before the meeting, get clear about it's purpose. Why is it happening? Even if it's a regular meeting, each one should have a unique, explicit purpose. Based on that purpose, is there any pre-work that needs to be accomplished to maximize the time? Even if the request is "come having thought about ______," pre-work leads to effective use of time.
Email the team or individual ahead of time to state the purpose for the gathering so they are prepared to participate and stay on point. People hate meetings when they don't understand the "why."
Here's some verbiage you might use:
"Hi Team,
I'm looking forward to meeting on Wednesday. The outcome for out meeting will be to... My request is that you come prepared to... Below is a simple agenda we'll use to guide the flow.
{Insert Agenda subheads only}
See you soon.
Sincerely,
{Your name here}"
Once you've communicated the purpose (which takes all of 5 minutes to send out), create the agenda. Below is a sample agenda with descriptions of each component. A meeting without a plan is a meeting primed for distraction, wandering, and ineffectiveness.
Effective Meeting Structure
Outcomes of Meeting: The goal of our meeting today is...(e.g. to collect feedback, etc.) -- State this at the top of the agenda and say it explicitly at the outset.
Agenda:
- Teambuilder -- Start with a simple question that builds trust and team; bonus points if it aligns with the outcome of the meeting. For example, if the meeting will be focused on brainstorming an upcoming event, the teambuilder might be, "What's the worst event you ever hosted? Why?" Other generic questions that build trust:
- What's most stressful for you right now?
- What's the best thing you worked on in the past week?
- What aspect of your values/talents/personality has been most activated in the past week?
- Updates (short) -- No more than 60 seconds per person; each should share what's top-of-mind in their area
- Cascading Messages from senior leaders -- What updates need to be shared from the top? Putting this at the top emphasizes the importance of transparency and communication
- Collaboration Topics* -- This is the meat. Spend the majority of the meeting here. If the meeting is an hour, spend 45 minutes collaborating. Why else would we meet if not to tap the expertise in the room?! Below are the four types of things you may cover in a meeting/check-in:
- Decisions to make -- Review the facts and circumstances and make a decision together
- Action plans to create -- Identify the next steps of an event or other project and delegate
- Ideas to generate -- Ideate as a group to generate solutions
- Feedback to provide -- Collect insights about initiatives or other topics
- Close Out -- Review the initial outcome of the meeting and summarize what action was taken.
- Review Action Items -- Review "who is doing what, by when, and how you will know when it's done."
- Scheduling -- Plan the next meeting, and any other meetings that need to occur to move along the action items.
*What makes a great collaboration topic?
- Relevant to the entire team
- The synergy of all of the minds in the room would add tremendous value to developing a solution
- Future-oriented and/or contributes to growth and progress toward the mission/purpose of the team or organization
Post-Meeting
Follow-up immediately after the meeting with an email containing the agenda and a list of action items. In the next meeting you have, you can use these action items as a launch point for accountability and revisit them at the beginning of the agenda.
Also reiterate the date of the next meeting and send a calendar invite if appropriate.
A few keys to remember:
- Send the agenda out early to appeal to the introverts who may appreciate the time to process
- Set expectations when you send out the email of things you expect the participants to come to the meeting with (e.g. come having thought through the one thing about X you most connect with and the one question you have)
- Establish roles in the meeting and rotate these each time (one note taker that records action items throughout the meeting and sends them to you at the end to distribute to the team, one timekeeper that keeps you on task so you don't spend too long on any one item, one facilitator to run the agenda)
- Your role is to mine conflict and encourage it when you hear it. Remember, conflict leads to the best ideas emerging!
Meet for no less than 30 minutes and no more than 90 minutes, no less often than once a month and probably no more often than bi-weekly. Perhaps for check-ins you may want to meet weekly. And, for sanity's sake, if there's nothing to talk about cancel the meeting!
If you want to take meetings to ninja level, you can also plan for the processes you'll engage during the meeting (pair and share, individual brainstorm, small group work, etc.) but this is for a future post.
If you lead or manage, you meet (for better or for worse). Do it right and get better results, higher engagement, and a future blog post from someone who attended your meeting years earlier and loved it!
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