How to Schedule a Business Meeting
Many people in business today agree that meetings, when held too frequently and when allowed to drag on needlessly, can actually be counterproductive. Meetings should always be quick, to the point, and everyone should leave the meeting more informed about what’s going on in the office. A meeting scheduled promptly, with the correct proceedings, can make your company more efficient and can boost employee morale.
When to Have a Meeting
The purpose of a meeting is to gather employees and co-workers together to resolve issues in the workplace, to make announcements, and keep everyone informed and in the loop. Announcements and e-mails can reduce the amount of unnecessary meetings that proceed in the workplace, but face-to-face interaction is also useful for many occasions to keep the working environment personal. Meetings should follow a regular schedule made way in advance for things to flow smoothly.
Regular meetings. Instead of holding quick meetings every week, you may want to schedule a reasonably long meeting every month so that your co-workers can prepare themselves and anticipate the agenda. A quick 15-minute meeting is usually enough to make announcements, and to keep everyone updated. Weekly meetings should only be scheduled if your business requires a weekly meeting.
Emergency meetings. Sometimes a sudden event may occur and you need to gather your workmates for a meeting on the fly. Emergency meetings should push through, but don’t make an informal policy out of them (like scheduling emergency meetings every week even when it is not necessary).
It helps to keep a calendar of meetings, with dates prepared way in advance. Set aside around two dates every month to hold a regular meeting, which is usually enough to settle issues and information you need to forward to employees and co-workers.
Big Meetings and Small Meetings
Most business owners, managers, and workers prefer to have smaller meetings, but meetings with larger groups are sometimes needed to communicate information properly. Meetings also serve as making relationships interpersonal, but it should still work on a professional level. You need to make distinctions about when you can hold big meetings and small meetings:
Big meetings work when the whole company is involved, and the information needs to be disseminated immediately to everyone in the organization. Big meetings involve annual programs, semi-annual reports, and gatherings.
Small meetings work best when information needs to be transmitted and communicated as clearly as possible. Most information is passed on by those higher up to the people running middle management, who then transmit the information to employees.
One-on-one meetings may be needed at times, especially if only a few persons are involved. Personal meetings need not to affect the day’s work-in-progress, as long as the information is communicated as quickly and efficiently as they would in group meetings.
Meetings make it possible for everyone in the office or the company to be in the loop, and to keep in touch. With these steps, you can keep your meeting tasks on schedule, and at the same time keep your employees productive and well-informed.