Review of Article from Fast Company, April, 1999 "You Have to Start Meeting Like This" by Bill Berning

Why do so few of our meetings fail to meet our expectations. One of the main reasons is that each person is coming to a meeting with very different expectations and no one meeting can fulfill everyone's expectations without planning.

Meetings that are productive and meet everyone's expectations need a lot of preparation and work by the leader. A meeting agenda needs to be prepared with its objective stated and distributed before the meeting. It should include start and end times.

Most meetings should have five to ten minutes of small talk scheduled for the start of the meeting. By doing this everyone will feel free to share personal experiences and talk with people they may not have seen for a while. Some people will share more than others, but everyone knows what to expect before hand and will not feel as if they are not doing what they ought to be doing.

The article also stated that each meeting needs different conversation and should be stated on the agenda. There are three different types of conversations: conversation for opportunity, conversation for possiblity and conversation for action.

Conversation for possibility is used to generate ideas and not to make decisions. People should not feel afraid to speak up because their ideas will not be shot down.

Conversation for opportunity is uded to narrow down ideas from a previous meeting. The goal is not to reach a final decision. Inforamtion is gathered, analyzed and people take positions on the subjects.

Conversation for action is used to reach a final decision. After a decision is made a plan of action can be decided.

Meetings that are successful need everyones input so rules of conversation order must be made and enforced. an example of a possible rule would be "before anyone can make a point, that person has to find merit in the point made by the previous speaker." Or another example: "the senior people in the meeting can speak only after the junior people have a chance to express themselves." The person who planned the meeting need to enforce the rules.

At the end of each meeting 5-10 minutes should be scheduled to discuss how the meeting met expectations and also how to improve the meeting.

You may want to experiment with supplying toys to everyone at the meeting. Toys consist of balls, slinkies, and other gadgets. People tend to become more creative when they get their bodies involved.

I thought the article offered great insight to why I often come away from meetings disgruntled or with the feeling that I wasted my time. My objective may have been different than the person wo called the meeting.

I liked the idea of having an agenda and an objective. I think this would get everyone in the same mindset. Often the meetings I attend seem to lack an aim and never accomplish anything more than meeting and the outcome is a decision the leader was goint to make already prior to the meeting.

By following the guidelines the article stated about meetings, the person organizing the meeting acts as a mediator and someone who enforces the rules of conduct stated in the agenda.

I am not sure about the use of toys in meetings. I question if people would get too distracted or get the idea that the meeting was unprofessional. People may also feel that no one is listening to them if others are playing with toys.

I plan on using the ideas in the article in the next meeting which I plan. I think it should help with the productivity of the meeting and also the satisfaction of everyone there.

-- Anonymous, March 17, 1999

Answers

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-- Anonymous, May 20, 1999