The 5 Best tips to running effective meetings Part 1

Meetings have a bad rap for being a waste of time. Meetings can be plagued with inefficient, unproductive processes such as:

• Meetings run over time
• People are unprepared (thus waste time retrieving information or setting up)
• People are distracted by other work (checking emails, replying to texts, answering calls)
• No clear actions are decided during the meeting
• Decisions from previous meetings are not executed
• People grumbling about having to come to a meeting
• No one brings input but the person calling the meeting
• More meetings scheduled to make up for all of the above

Ineffective meetings can zap morale and can be very costly if we calculate the amount of time and personnel that participate in them.
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Effective meetings don’t just happen. However, with the right planning, practice and time management, they can become a productivity tool for your team.

Following are tips for running effective meetings that will increase productivity and stop wasting time.

Tip 1. Have a clear purpose in mind.
Productive meetings have a clear goal and purpose that can be easily identified and summed up in a couple of sentences. Making an assessment of the worth of the meeting and what you hope to achieve from the meeting is crucial. Crammed meetings can be a real drain on time and energy and eliminating any unnecessary items can be very productive. Committing to focus only on what clearly matters can more effectively accomplish your goals. If you are requesting people to devote time for the meeting then it should be for a good reason and productive. 

Tip 2. Always have an agenda.
Your agenda should set out a clear strategic roadmap for your meeting by indicating goals, creating a structure for the meeting and incorporating action steps. The agenda will help to keep the meeting moving forward by sticking to agenda items that are pre-organised and relate to the topic and your purposes.
It is an effective strategy to distribute the agenda at least a day in advance so participants have had a chance to review it beforehand and have had time to think about the items. This can often yield more productive discussions.

Tip 3. Keep it short.
Keeping meetings to less than one hour and limiting the number of items included can increase efficiency. When planning your agenda, estimate the amount of time needed for each discussion topic so you can attempt to keep your meeting under one hour. If it appears that you don’t have enough time for all items determine if there are items that could be handled by individuals instead of the whole group. Determining the priority and need for each agenda item can be effective in keeping the meeting under one hour. 

Tip 4. Reduce travel time.
If your business is spread out across numerous locations the time spent commuting to a meeting is very unproductive.  A more time productive option would be to hold the meeting online through a platform such as Zoom.

Tip 5. Eliminate possible distractions.
Laptops, tablets and smartphones can be essential tools for conducting business but can zap meeting productivity. They can be a huge distraction that can cause users to tune out. Consequently, information may need to be repeated or addition time is spent clarifying items during discussion. This can contribute to the meeting running overtime and reduced productivity.  Unless these tech tools are needed they should be switched off or not brought to the meeting.

Collagis is committed to helping businesses like yours to optimise workforce and organisational effectiveness. We'd love to share with you how we can help you increase your overall productivity.

Read Next: 
The 5 best tips to running effective meetings - Part 2
26 habits that can improve productivity
6 tips to reduce procrastination

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