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Planning ef fect ive meet ings

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

Planning effect ive meet ingsAccording to research conducted by Microsoft®, the average business person in

the U.S. spends at minimum roughly 5.5 hours in meetings each week. This study

also revealed that 71 percent of those attending these meetings found them to

be utterly unproductive.1

To further crunch those numbers, there are more than 11

million meetings held each year in the U.S. alone. Other

studies have indicated that the “higher up” someone is in

an organizational or system’s infrastructure, the more time

he or she spends in meetings. On average, so-called middle

management spends 35 percent of their time in meetings,

while upper-level management spends 50 percent of their

time in meetings. Most organizations spend 7-15 percent of

their personnel resources on meetings.2

If your team is holding a meeting, it better be worth it. How can you ensure that

your team meetings are effective and worth the time they consume? We have a

few tips for you in this Blue Paper®, including how to effectively plan meetings,

how best to communicate meetings and agendas, how to evaluate the ROI of

meetings and more. Block some time, send your calls to voicemail and keep

reading—this is one meeting you’ll be glad to attend.

What’s the deal with meet ings, anyway?Meetings have been around for who knows how long, as the term refers to a

formally arranged gathering of individuals. In theory, meetings are a good thing.

They help us conduct business and build relationships. It’s when they go awry

through poor planning or implementation that problems arise.

Management consultant, Gene Moncrief, believes that the most common

problems in meetings relate to the following3:

• People try to accomplish too much, in too little time. You can’t do

an information dump, solve problems, make decisions, plan for

action, etc., all in one short meeting.

• Meetings are held with a lack of clear objectives and/or

1 “Survey Finds Workers Average Only Three Productive Days per Week: Most Respondents to New Microsoft Office Survey Say They’re Working Longer, But Are Less Productive; They Relate Their Productivity to Technology.” 15 Mar. 2010. Web. 01 Apr. 2011. <http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2005/mar05/03-15threeproductivedayspr.mspx>.

2 Bonner. “Planning Effective Meetings.” Bonner Foundation. Web. 20 Mar. 2011. <http://www.bonner.org/resources/modules/modules_pdf/BonCurPlanningMeetings.pdf>.

3 “The Ayers Report: Meetings: Time Wasted or Well Spent?” ENews Builder | Email Marketing and HTML Email Newsletters, Create, Send and Track. Web. 01 Apr. 2011. <http://www.enewsbuilder.net/theayersgroup/e_article000450602.cfm?x=b11,0,w>.

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

organization. If objectives have been identified, the agenda

may not properly reflect them and there may not be an

established process to allow each person to contribute to

meeting the objectives.

• Attendees often don’t have clearly defined roles in meetings.

Too often team members are asked to carve out valuable time for

meetings in which they have no real role. “I talk, you listen” isn’t a

good format because no one listens. It’s BlackBerry® time.

• Attendees minimize differences of opinion and conflict. Emotion

is given no place in American business—certainly not in decision

making. We don’t know how to handle strong emotions, so we

suppress them in meetings. We even expect our meeting leaders to

suppress them for us. Yet it’s emotion that contains the passion and

commitment we strive for.

These problems, like all approaches to business, can be avoided when approached

strategically and thoughtfully.

Deciding when to meet: Meet ing goalsLet’s start by determining if and when to meet. In the day and age of digital,

virtual technology, there’s a wrench thrown into the whole meeting thing. Not

only do you have to determine whether or not a meeting is actually needed, but

whether the meeting can or should be held online or in person.

First, as a rule of thumb, don’t meet unless it’s beneficial to everyone involved.

Time is money—either yours or your clients. Don’t waste it.

Second, don’t have a meeting for something that can be better

communicated via email, phone conversation or good-old

fashioned memo or sticky note. If you just need to distribute

facts, use email. If you need feedback on a project, determine

how in-depth you want your feedback: a thought or two, or

a discussion that includes recommendations for alternatives?

The more time consuming or back-and-forth involvement likely

means a meeting is the way to go.

Another way to decide if a meeting is necessary, consider the end result—what do

you hope to accomplish, what are the goals associated with the meeting you’re

trying to propose?

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

If you ask David Allen, author of “Getting Things Done” and creator of online

solutions for Getting Things Done, or GTD®, there are five goals involved with

holding meetings4:

1. To give information: “Hello everyone. I’ve brought you all together

today to let you know what’s been going on about the pending

lawsuit. I’d like you to leave here today understanding what’s going

on, and with as much background as you need to be able to answer

questions that may arise from our customers.”

2. To get information: “Thanks for coming. We’ve invited you all here

to find out from everyone what we should be aware of that’s going

on in your division relative to the new product roll-out. We want to

know what’s happening at all levels in the organization about this,

so we can make some adjustments in our plans accordingly.”

3. To develop options: “We’d like to spend this afternoon surfacing,

formulating and exploring as many possible ways to deal with the

problem we’ve just uncovered in the new system implementation.

We want to make sure we’ve got everyone’s perspectives and all the

possible alternatives formulated.”

4. To make decisions: “We’ve brought you all together this morning

to present to you the three proposed approaches to launching our

new product, and get a consensus decision on

which one to pursue.”

5. For warm, magical human interaction: “There

are 3 agenda items we would like to cover

today. And though we could have done this

by email, we wanted to have an opportunity

to bring the new team together in one place,

and get some time to get to know each other

between the lines ...”

“You may often have more than one of these agendas-sometimes even all five,”

says Allen on his website for GTD®. “Pretty common sense stuff, but it’s very

valuable to get clarification and agreement on the front end, as to which of the

five reasons for a meeting you have going on.”

4 Allen, David. “Five Reasons for a Meeting.” Getting Things Done. Web. 30 Mar. 2011. <http://www.gtdiq.com/media/pdf/Five%20reasons%20for%20a%20meeting.pdf>.

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

Not only will this direction help shape agendas, but it will hopefully prime

attendees for participation while at the same time illustrating value to those

who join in.

If you’re still unsure of whether or not to hold a meeting or you are questioning

other options that don’t involve a conference room or travel, Dustin Wax, writer

at LifeHack.com suggests considering one of these alternatives, instead5:

Instant messaging

While Instant Messaging (IM) is likely to be viewed more as a time-waster for

teenagers and lonely geeks, a lot can get done via IM. IM allows you and your

team to maintain a long-term virtual “presence” as you work, posting questions,

updates and ideas as they strike you or as you come across problems in your work.

Since IM programs maintain a full record of the chat session, there’s no danger

of missing anything or losing it – just scroll up. Alternatives to IM include private

chatrooms like Campfire or Yammer.

Teleconferencing

If more personal contact and real-time sharing is needed,

try a teleconferencing system like Adobe’s Acrobat.com or

GoToMeeting. Most services allow screen sharing, collaborative

whiteboarding and other substitutes for same-room presence.

Since most also create a transcript, you don’t need someone

taking minutes, either.

Wikis

Wikis provide a collaborative environment that is ideal for the

development of working documents and statements, as well

as material that will need to be referred to again and again. For one-off projects,

an online wiki like WetPaint or PBWiki are ideal: affordable, easy to set up and

easy to use. For more mission-critical material, especially when you plan to use it

repeatedly, and where security is a major concern, your organization can fairly

easily set up an internal wiki on your intranet, using advanced software like

MediaWiki, the software that runs Wikipedia.

Wikis are self-organizing and easy to create and edit, and they keep track of

changes made along with a record of who is responsible for each edit (no more

dickering over credit!). Where real-time interaction isn’t a necessity, building

a wiki over a long period of time can be far more productive than a chain of

meetings – but make sure to assign responsibilities and allow time for wiki work.

5 Wax, Dustin. “5 Alternatives to Time-Wasting Meetings.” Your Daily Digest on Productivity and Life Improvements - Stepcase Lifehack. Web. 02 Apr. 2011. <http://www.lifehack.org/articles/management/5-alternatives-to-time-wasting-meetings.html>.

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

Email lists/groups

Another solution where real-time interaction is not a factor is the old-fashioned

email list. Somewhat out of fashion these days, email lists can still be quite

productive ways to get things done as a group – and both Yahoo!™ and Google®

offer services that are free and easy to set up.

An effective email list should probably have a moderator – not to approve

messages, but to remind people when they’re going off track. Good etiquette is

essential in this environment; something about the medium encourages flame

wars. But with a few precautions, email lists can still be quite effective tools,

allowing for thoughtful, considered exchanges and automatically maintaining a

searchable archive of past discussions.

Collaboration apps

Finally, effective use of a project management application can forestall the

need for most meetings. Systems like Wrike and Basecamp allow notes to be

exchanged, tasks to be assigned and files to be shared. They also offer a number

of ways for users to interact: SMS, email, online, RSS, or using a third-party

application through Basecamp’s API.

If full-fledged project management is too much,

consider using online services like Google Docs (which

can be installed to your own domain via Google Apps)

alongside Google Talk or another IM – you can share

documents, add to and edit each other’s work, and

create a repository of materials at the same time.

Planning for meet ingsSo you’ve decided to hold a meeting. Then you better plan for it, bucko. Yes,

even those quick 30-minute meetings should have a plan that helps reach the

goal you’ve just identified. It’s important, too, that this planning takes place prior

to soliciting the invitation to your meeting in order to prepare attendees and

offer the opportunity to seek or review any necessary background information or

action items prior to the meeting time.

Get started by developing an agenda, which will serve to provide direction but

will also be used as a tool to keep attendees on track.

To prepare an agenda, consider the following factors:

• Priorities – what absolutely must be covered?

• Results – what needs to be accomplished at the meeting?

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

• Participants – who needs to attend the meeting for it

to be successful?

• Sequence – in what order will you cover the topics?

• Timing – how much time will be spent on each topic?

• Date and Time – when will the meeting take place?

• Place – where will the meeting take place?

With an idea of what needs to be covered and for how long, you can then

look at the information that should be prepared beforehand. What do the

participants need to know in order to make the most of the meeting time?

And, what roles are they expected to perform in the meeting, so that they

can do the right preparation?

If it’s a meeting to solve a problem, ask the participants to come prepared

with a viable solution. If you are discussing an ongoing project, have each

participant summarize his or her progress to-date and circulate the reports

amongst members.

Assigning a particular topic of discussion to various people is another great way

to increase involvement and interest. On the agenda, indicate who will lead the

discussion or presentation of each item.

Use your agenda as your time guide. When you notice that time is running

out for a particular item, consider hurrying the discussion, pushing to a

decision, deferring discussion until another time, or assigning it for discussion

by a subcommittee.

Generally speaking, agendas follow a pretty standard format:

Date

Time

Duration

Place

Purpose

Topic A – Objective – Presenter – Time

Activity – Objective – Instructions – Facilitator - Time

Topic B – Objective – Presenter – Time

(So on and so forth ..)

Once an agenda has been established, review and send it—as a draft—to

attendees. Let them know that it may change, ask for additions and open the

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

floor to discussion of the meeting’s purpose and objectives. Send initial

invitations through your office’s calendaring service with a note that briefly

explains what the meeting is and why it is being called and the agenda

attached. Send a reminder email the day before the scheduled meeting and

follow-up with a phone call if necessary to those attendees coming from other

locations or traveling.

Prepping the roomOn the day of the meeting, take a moment to prepare

by going through this quick checklist:

Overall logistics:

• How are participants notified?

• Is space scheduled?

• Are confirmations required?

Equipment use and set-up:

• Is AV equipment needed and arranged?

• Is chair and table set-up determined and confirmed?

• Is there a set-up and clean-up crew?

• Do you need flip chart, paper, markers, etc.? Who will get it?

Supplies and materials:

• Do you have hand-outs? Copies?

• Any films, videos, slides, presentation materials?

• Did you generate a complete list of supplies? Who is getting them?

Program and presentation:

• Did you walk through and finalize the agenda?

• Are all presenters confirmed and ready?

• Is there a back-up plan in case of interference or

technological disturbance?

This checklist may seem a bit much for smaller meetings, but get into the habit

of running through it each time your establish a meeting. Not only will it ensure

that time isn’t spent wasted in the meeting getting materials or cueing videos or

altering the agenda, it will mentally prepare you for purposefully facilitating the

meeting that’s about to occur.

Faci l i tat ing meet ingsSpeaking of your role as facilitator, even the briefest of meetings require a leader.

“Leadership is a major factor in the success or failure of team meetings,” says

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

Moncrief. “An executive once called me in because his team wasn’t creative

enough. In talking with the team, I learned that he had come into meetings

swinging a baseball bat and shouting, “I pay you people to be creative!” Fear and

intimidation won’t create effective meetings.”6

Moncrief suggests that leaders need to do the following7:

1. Create an open environment. Participants must know that their

most challenging input will be welcomed, not judged.

2. Engage everyone. Meetings need to be structured so that there’s

less information dumping and more room for conversation, debate

and airing of emotion.

3. Prepare participants so they come to a meeting knowing:

• They will be able to contribute. The process should

allow analysts, problem solvers, organizers, information

synthesizers, etc., to contribute according

to their individual strengths.

• They will get what they need: clarity, a

plan of action, a direction, etc.

• Something positive will come from their

investment of time and effort.

4. Let participants know how each decision will be

made. The decision-making mode is key to engagement. If your

objective is to achieve buy-in, on the continuum of least to most

successful the four styles are:

• Directive: Make a decision and announce it.

• Collaborative I: Make a decision, announce it and challenge

others to change your view.

• Collaborative II: Make a tentative decision and gather input

to make the final decision.

• Consensus: Participate in a process where everyone

contributes to the decision and agrees to support it.

5. Manage unproductive behavior. One person or a clique behaving

disruptively can drag the whole team down. These situations have

6 “The Ayers Report: Meetings: Time Wasted or Well Spent?” ENews Builder | Email Marketing and HTML Email Newsletters, Create, Send and Track. Web. 01 Apr. 2011. <http://www.enewsbuilder.net/theayersgroup/e_article000450602.cfm?x=b11,0,w>.

7 “The Ayers Report: Meetings: Time Wasted or Well Spent?” ENews Builder | Email Marketing and HTML Email Newsletters, Create, Send and Track. Web. 01 Apr. 2011. <http://www.enewsbuilder.net/theayersgroup/e_article000450602.cfm?x=b11,0,w>.

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

to be managed on a case-by-case basis, whether through the

use of group dynamics to change the offending behavior, the

leader pulling aside and confronting the offender(s), or an

established process.

If you call the meeting, facilitate it. Or, meet with someone such as a superior or

guest speaker to delegate the responsibilities and role. The goal is to reach your

meeting objectives in the time allotted, constructively and efficiently.

More t ips for making the most of your meet ings8

After taking into account all this information, your team is well on the way to

more effective meetings. Here are a few additional tips for getting there. And

remember, try to have fun and focus.

1. Start your meetings, presentations and training sessions with an

ice-breaker or warm-up activity. In a large meeting or a short

meeting, the ice-breaker can be a single question that gets people

thinking and talking with their neighbor. As an example, ask a

question that causes people to raise their hands. The length of the

ice-breaker depends on the length of your meeting, so plan wisely.

2. Diversify your presentation methods. If every

speaker talks to the audience, in lecture format,

even interested heads soon nod. Ask people to

talk in small groups. Use audio-visual materials

such as overheads, PowerPoint presentations

and pictures. If you’re talking about a new

painting process, show your employees before

and after parts. Pass around positive customer

surveys and comment cards.

3. Invite guest speakers for audience participation and excitement.

Your customers have lots to say to your workforce about their needs

and quality requirements. One client organization that partners

with non-profit, charitable associations features guest speakers

from the organizations that receive their donations. Speakers from

organizations your employees support financially are dynamite.

4. Encourage questions to get a dialogue going. Ask people to write

8 Heathfield, Susan M. “Spice Up Your Company Meeting: Ten Tips for Meeting Planning.” Human Resources - Business Management Development Jobs Consulting Training Policy Human Resources. Web. 01 Apr. 2011. <http://humanresources.about.com/cs/meetingmanagement/ht/meetings.htm>.

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

down their questions in advance of the meeting and during the

meeting. Allow time for questions directed to each speaker as you

go. If you can’t answer the question immediately and correctly, tell

the people you’ll get back with them when you have the correct

answer. If questions exceed time, schedule a meeting on the topic.

5. An often-overlooked, but very important, successful meeting tactic

is to ask each speaker to repeat out loud every question he or she

is asked. The person asking the question then knows the speaker

understood the question. Other people attending the meeting can

hear and know the question, too, not just surmise the question -

perhaps incorrectly - from the speaker’s response.

6. Set goals for your periodic meeting. You can’t present every aspect

of the company’s business at a one hour meeting. So,

decide the important, timely issues and spend the meeting

time on them. Take into consideration the interests of the

majority of the attendees as well. Remember, you have

other methods for communicating company information,

too. It does not have to take place at the meeting.

7. Formulate the agenda carefully. Identify the needs and

interests of the participating majority. Start with good

news that will make the attendees feel good. Vary the

order of the speakers on the agenda each month. You don’t want

people bored by sameness. Distribute important items across the

agenda so people don’t tune out the end of the meeting, or think

the final items are less important.

8. An article in the Wall Street Journal, several years ago, stated

that U.S. managers would save eighty percent of the time they

waste in meetings if they did two things correctly. The first was

to always have an agenda. The second was start on time and

end on time. I’ll add that you need to allot each speaker the

amount of time necessary to cover their topic. Hold them to

their time limit … nicely.

9. Organize the physical environment so people are attentive to

meeting content. No one should sit behind or to the side of

your speakers. Make sure there are seats for all attendees, and

if taking notes is required, a surface to write on, too. Make sure

visuals are visible and that people can hear. You may need to use a

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

microphone. You can pass props or samples around the

room for viewing.

10. Never underestimate the power of food at a meeting. Food relaxes

the atmosphere, helps make people feel comfortable, helps people

sustain positive energy levels and builds the camaraderie of the

team. Ensure you meet the diverse needs of your group with the

food you serve. As an example, offer fruit and yogurt in addition

to donuts. Offer nut-free or dairy-free items, too, to accommodate

those with allergies or other dietary restrictions.

Success! (?)How do you know when a meeting has been successful? When

all the coffee and Danishes are gone? When an action plan has

been developed? When each item has been crossed off

the agenda?

There are a variety of ways to measure meetings and events.

First and foremost, whether or not the meeting’s objective was

reached is the best indicator, but sometimes this indicator doesn’t offer insight on

how to improve the meeting process for next time.

In addition to examining whether or not you’ve accomplished what you had

hoped, the ROI approach developed by Jack Phillips is perhaps one of the most

well-known methodologies, as well as one of the most rigorous for measuring the

success of a meeting. With its five-tier approach, planners can use the tools and

methods it provides to create very convincing business cases for meetings.

The ROI model consists of five levels of measurement:

Reaction and planned action – What are participants’ reactions to a

meeting and what are they planning to do with the material?

Learning – What skills, knowledge or attitudes have changed following a

meeting and by how much?

Application – Did the participants apply what they learned or what was

discussed?

Business impact – Did the application produce measurable results?

ROI – Did the monetary value of the reached objective exceed the costs?

© 2011 4imprint, Inc. All rights reserved

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According to Boone and Associates, meeting and event planners should evaluate

every meeting, but only a small percentage need to be taken to higher levels

of evaluation. For example, “reaction” should be captured in every meeting to

understand the extent to which the participants see the meeting to be relevant,

important, useful, challenging, motivating, etc. Up to 80% of meetings should be

measured at the “learning” level, capturing the actual takeaways as people learn

information, gain knowledge, make new contacts and develop limited skills.9

It is critical to follow-up on important meetings to see the

extent to which participants are actually using what they

have learned. A small percent of meetings, usually around

10%, should be pushed to the “business impact” level. The

business impact connects the meeting to business measures

such as productivity, sales, quality, errors, cycle time,

employee retention, etc. While this level of rigor is more

demanding, it is necessary for meetings that are designed to

deliver business value.10

Wrapping upMeetings don’t have to waste anyone’s time—in fact, they shouldn’t. They should

be an investment of time that pays off in relationships and business objectives.

Meetings should be productive and efficient and with a bit of careful planning,

clear objectives and thoughtful execution, who knows … maybe your next

meeting will be one no one wants to miss.

9 Allen, David. “Five Reasons for a Meeting.” Getting Things Done. Web. 30 Mar. 2011. <http://www.gtdiq.com/media/pdf/Five%20reasons%20for%20a%20meeting.pdf>.

10 Allen, David. “Five Reasons for a Meeting.” Getting Things Done. Web. 30 Mar. 2011. <http://www.gtdiq.com/media/pdf/Five%20reasons%20for%20a%20meeting.pdf>.