Meeting Planners: Quick Meetings Work Too
Many businesses try to make meetings long and infrequent, usually no more than once per day. This might work for some companies, but not for all. Here are some ideas to make shorter meetings more practical:
• Keep meetings small – The more people that are invited to a shorter meeting, the less likely it is that the meeting will start or end on time. Microsoft ran into this problem as they grew and have since abandoned certain requirements that necessitated two or more department level admins to be involved in each meeting.
• Let everyone know – Let everyone know that the meeting is coming, even those that are not attending. Nobody like running clear across the building only to find that a sales group has taken five minutes off.
• Schedule – When multiple groups take small meetings throughout the day, be sure to do so in a scheduled manner. This is especially true when there are only a limited number of rooms in which to conduct mini-meetings.
• Have a focus – The best thing about small meetings is that they can be used to keep track of current progress. .
Trying a new sales technique? Refine it throughout the day. Trying to reach a certain statistic? Keep people updated and on task with frequent small meetings and incentives. Sometimes a small break to focus and regroup is all that it takes to recharge workers, but meeting planners will ensure that a fresh supply of beverages and/or snacks are also available when appropriate
