Highly Effective Meetings
Leadership Workshop (4 of 12) – Lead Through Others
Leading at Light Speed is a groundbreaking leadership book by Eric Douglas describing the 10 Quantum Leaps which build trust, spark innovation, and create a high-performing organization.
Chapter 3 is about how to Lead Through Others and on page 60 Eric talks about how to manage highly effective meetings.
The key to highly effective meetings is not what you do during the meeting, but what you do before and after the meeting. Here are four of the practices that we teach:
1. Take ownership of the agenda. Before the meeting, decide what outcomes you want, what decisions need to be made, the time required, what information will be provided, and who needs to be included. Send out the agenda in advance, along with the background material.
2. Stay Focused. During the meeting, remember the following mantra. “Make sure we’re having the conversation we need to have.” When people digress, it’s the meeting leader’s job to rein it in. Offending people shouldn’t be your concern; people appreciate strong leadership..
Introduce each item by providing the necessary context and linkage to previous decisions. Once the discussion begins, keep everyone focused on the agenda topic. When unconnected topics arise, bring the meeting back to the issues at hand and decide later if it merits another dialogue.. Give everyone a chance to provide input, and keep a tight watch on the clock.
3. Achieve closure. Prior to moving on to the next point, be certain the desired outcome is achieved.. If actions need to be taken, make sure that everyone understands them.. Clarify what the next steps will be and who will be taking them.. Decide on who’s going to communicate the results of the discussion.
4. Keep a written record. As a matter of reminding people what was decided, send out a followup memo after the meeting.. This memo becomes a fail-safe way to check later to ensure that the necessary actions have occurred. It’s invaluable for monitoring performance. Plus, you never have to waste people’s time trying to remember what you did at the last meeting!
Is your organization implementing the practices of high performing organizations? Find out with this free work survey.
