Stop Unproductive Meetings!
We’ve all been there. The endless meeting that gets no results. The meeting may end with many sticky notes on the wall, brainstorm lists everywhere, a large parking lot, and yet no one can say that the meeting actually accomplished anything. This often leads to even more meetings to sort through what happened and try to gain some results. These are the meetings that give meetings a bad name. However, there is a solution to avoid this scenario. Great meeting facilitation!
Great meeting facilitation takes planning, preparation, meeting management, and follow-up.
Planning
The first and most important step is planning the meeting. The plan begins with articulating what the objective of the meeting is. In other words, what is the expected result? A well thought out meeting objective will help you determine if the meeting was successful with tangible results. I recommend developing an objective that is SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound). Consider the following two objectives.
- Discuss stabilization needs for the new human resources management system (HRMS).
- Identify the top three barriers to stabilization of the new human resource management system (HRMS) and identify strategies, with owners, to address the barriers.
Can you visualize what success looks like with the first objective? Will your definition of success match those of the other meeting stakeholders? Likely not. On the other hand, in the second example, we can see that we will have a specific list of barriers along with strategies and owners for each of the strategies. Having a clear meeting objective will also help to ensure that needed participants will attend as they can more easily see what the expected result of the meeting will be.
Are you struggling with identifying the meeting objective? Consider or ask; what compelled us to hold a meeting? What does success look like? What is achievable given the time and participants involved? Getting clarity on these questions will help you to establish a reasonable meeting objective.
Once you have the meeting objective, you can begin to identify who should be in attendance and what activities are needed. We can ask “how can we most quickly identify the top 3 barriers”, “how will strategies be suggested and prioritized”, and “what is the format of output for strategies and owner identification”. Depending on the size of the group, and the culture of the organization, you can identify meeting activities such as brainstorming, multi-voting, breakout groups, or facilitated discussion as needed. Visualize your meeting from beginning to end. Consider what could hinder meeting effectiveness and identify strategies to mitigate these.
Planning the activities of the meeting will yield two significant results; a detailed agenda that provides participants an understanding of what to expect, and also something in which to base logistical needs for the meeting. How big of a room? What supplies and equipment are required? Is there pre-work to assign to meeting participants?
Preparation
Now that you have a great meeting plan, it is time to prepare. Time sending invitations, arranging for the room and equipment, gathering supplies, and other general readiness. But that is not all! This time is where you need to do your preparation. Is there background material to collect and read? Are there meeting participants that require additional preparation? Are there materials to prepare in advance? Use your planning list to identify what you can do in advance of the meeting that will help you be more efficient in facilitating. Preparation makes for a more productive meeting where meeting participants feel their time was well spent.
Let’s take a moment to see what this looks like for our HRMS Stabilization meeting above. There are two major activities to consider. Brainstorming and prioritizing barriers and identifying strategies along with owners for each. We may decide to use brainstorming and multi-voting for the barriers. Do we have sticky notes, flip charts, and voting dots? Preparing instructions of the exercise in advance will also help save time in the meeting by providing participants reference for how this task will be accomplished. We may also want to collect information on barriers previously reported as a jumping off point for the discussion.
Meeting participants may need guidance or information on how to set good strategies to address the prioritized barriers. We may look for a video on YouTube or prepare a document to help describe how a good strategy looks. Figure out what you can do in advance of the meeting to help keep things moving and participants productive. Putting effort and time into preparing for a meeting will be time well spent before the meeting.
See our Meeting Preparation Worksheet for additional assistance.
Meeting Management
The planning and preparation you have done for your meeting will make meeting management much easier. Start off the meeting by reviewing the meeting objective and agenda. Allow for minor adjustments to either, provided they can be accommodated in the overall scheme of the meeting and all participants agree. Having time-boxed activities will help your meeting flow and keep distractions at bay. One tool that I always use is to have the participants define their own ground rules and ask them to monitor and enforce them themselves. You may need to step in to help them enforce the ground rules and stick to the agenda, but it will be much easier with these tools in place. Also, any preparation you did in advance with specific individuals will help them in contributing to the overall success of the meeting.
Follow Up
Here is where you get to prove the value of the meeting to the participants and the organization. Prepare a package of the outputs from the meeting. The package may include pictures of the results of various activities, the final deliverables that represent the meeting objective, and any action items identified along who will own them. Be sure to thank meeting participants and highlight the contribution they have made to the organization. Check back with the meeting sponsor or participants after a few weeks to see if additional help is needed to help keep the organization moving forward.
Real Life Example
I recently had the privilege of helping a small non-profit organization in developing the strategy for their portfolio steering committee. We had a planning meeting where I had the opportunity to ask “why does this group need to meet” and “how will you know the meeting is successful.” We were quickly able to get to a meeting objective to develop the vision and mission of the committee as well as goals and an action plan to move the committee forward. We developed a business case template that they would require the organization to use to request funding for future projects. The meeting was one and a half days. That is a lot for one and half days!
In preparation for the meeting, I reviewed information on the organization including an outdated mission and vision for the committee and the organization’s overall mission and vision statements. Additionally, I researched activities that help organizations develop mission and vision and adapted them for this group. I also found a helpful and humorous video “How to Write a Mission Statement That Doesn’t Suck.” I took the time to prepare a PowerPoint presentation that would walk them through agenda with visual prompts and instructions. We spent a productive day and a half completing the activities and reviewing the results as we went. I was able to take the results of the first half-day and incorporate these into the PowerPoint as a jumping off point for day two. We successfully completed all of the planned activities and met the objective of the meeting. I prepared a package of all of the activities and results of those activities and sent these off with a note of gratitude, and they were thrilled. When asked how things were going six weeks later, word back was “"...we are starting to use our new business case model to review and approve projects. It’s still a bit of work in progress, but we’re moving ahead."
Conclusion
Following the steps described in this article will help you achieve greater success and value from your meetings. One barrier to effective meetings is often when a needed meeting participant attempts to facilitate the meeting. Using an outside facilitator will help to keep the meeting on track and get the most value from time spent. The facilitator may be a person inside the organization who does not have a stake in the meeting or an outside consultant. The key is to have someone whose only vested interest is in achieving the meeting objective.
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