"Oh no another meeting... With the whole team too? So we'll never end."
To come together is a beginning, to stay together is progress, to work together is success. -Henry Ford
Team meetings are the most crucial tool for collaborating and communicating on decisions within the company, but they can also quickly have the opposite effect.
E.g. “Yet another meeting….”
Here’s how to make sure your team meetings stay sweet and short, and of course - productive:
Steps (too) often neglected in team meetings.
- 👉 1. Prepare your meeting well to capture the attention of your employees over time
❌The mistake of the manager who thinks he or she is used to it and doesn't need to prepare:
"Hello everyone! So today we're here to talk about... Uh... Just a moment... I had some notes with me... Ah here they are! Uh... No sorry these are last year's notes..."
🌟Preparing your meeting in advance allows you to gain fluency, and to think about animations that will allow your collaborators to not get bored and to be captivated during your presentation.
The best practice is then to share your agenda in advance.
At Spoke we have a very efficient rule in that regard: no agenda? No meeting
- 👉 2.Only invite active members of the meeting
❌ The mistake of the manager who thinks that inviting the entire team to a meeting is a good thing so that everyone knows about the project:
"Hi, we'll start by talking for the first half hour with the Marketing team.
I invited the whole technical team as well so that they can be informed about what will have been decided today by the other teams, I find this really important."
🌟Inviting only the relevant participants (those who can make a real contribution to the project) is the best way to facilitate the exchange.
The more participants a meeting has the more difficult things become -
- And so it becomes :
- 👉 3. Get straight to the heart of the matter
❌ The mistake everyone frequently makes:
"Hello everyone! How are you doing? I just got back from an amazing ski weekend, my wife blah blah blah, my son blah blah blah, and today you'll never guess what happened to me on the way to pick up my kids from school...blah blah.
🌟Giving the framework of the meeting and its objectives directly is the best way to not lose focus and be focused on something else.
This allows you to control the duration of the meeting, and having an order and not making this moment counterproductive.
- 👉 4. Properly wrap up the meeting and reiterate important dates and key objectives.
❌ The mistake not to make:
"Hi Julie, were you able to finish the report today so I could get it to the appropriate teams? Not yet? But the deadline was today, I'm sure I mentioned it at the very beginning of our Tuesday meeting with all the teams, the one that lasted 2 1/2 hours."
🌟Recapping the topics discussed is an essential step it is this step that allows you to remind the actions to be taken, set the deadlines for each task, allocate them and most importantly thank the participants.
- 👉 5. Recover the notes taken by a designated participant and make a complete record of the meeting.
❌ The mistake not to make:
"I don't need my participants' notes, or my own for that matter, I remember everything, and the meeting was so productive that they probably remember it too, I don't think a debriefing is necessary after all, everyone knows what they have to do."
🌟Charging one person to take notes throughout the meeting is very important,
If you don't keep a written record of what was decided in your meeting - even if it was ultra-productive no one will remember.
This is what will allow for future meetings to have a written record of previous meetings, and be able to compare progress.
💡The key takeaway:
Team meetings are used to guide communication and maintain cohesion among team members - they can be used to discuss progress and issues, share information, evaluate performance, and plan activities.
They are a way to maintain commitment, motivation and promote a sense of belonging - but can have the opposite effect if they are not well led.