Team meetings are meant to drive performance, provide clarity, promote accountability, and provide an essential opportunity to motivate a group of people. Everyone has most likely been in really good meetings, and unfortunately have found themselves watching the clock in others. Below are 5 suggestions on how to successfully lead a meeting.
1. Make an agenda: Preparation is essential. Creating an agenda allows you to outline your thoughts and organize the meeting. There should be a mission to every meeting. What do you hope to accomplish and what actions need to proceed? Without a focus, it’s easy to deviate from the proposed topic. While tangents can lead to good ideas, it’s distracting in the sense that it takes the focus off the mission which can distract participants and lose engagement. If you find yourself in this position be sure to take note of the side conversations and plan another session to deliver on those ideas.
2. Don’t let technology drive: There are excellent resources that can enhance presentations. Knowing how to effectively manage those resources is crucial when leading a meeting. Reading verbatim from a slideshow is almost a guarantee that people will lose interest. If people are simply reading there is a chance they will focus attention on the slides, and not the presenter.
3. Engage the team: Prior to the meeting, attach the agenda in the invite. Challenge the team to bring ideas to the meeting. Create a meeting where people can openly contribute feedback on initiatives that are/aren’t working. Ideas for improvement, analytics around performance, or anything else that allows people to participate is a great way to engage the team. entreQuest has seen companies find success in achieving results when employees are accountable for establishing goals. It creates a sense of accountability and ownership for implementing strategy, rather than being told what to do.
4. Manage your time: Creating an agenda for your meeting also gives you the ability to allocate time to segments within your meeting. Starting a meeting late may insinuate the topic of discussion is of little importance, and may set the precedent that being late is acceptable. When a meeting runs significantly over you run the chance of losing interest. People start looking at their phones to reschedule other meetings which is distracting and can lead to disengagement. What you don’t want as a leader of a meeting is for people to think you don’t value their time. If you find yourself in this position, simply create a list of action items that need to be completed and set another meeting to follow-up on the items not hit.
5. Follow-up: Meetings can lead to great initiatives. Ideas are often born that drive growth, performance, and accountability. Most of the time this only happens when action is taken after a meeting. Send the team a summary of what was discussed along with the next steps. Keep the momentum moving and excite the team!
Meetings can be a powerful tool for bringing together a team and making people feel a part of an organization. If you are able to plan, organize, engage, and be the leader, your team will look forward to future meetings.
As Talent Acquisition Manager, Jessica focuses on finding the right candidates to fit our clients’ needs. She works with our clients to understand the exact skills and attributes that would fit with the cultural climate and their environment.
