Are your business, team or department meetings dull, uninspiring, and inefficient? Do they drain morale, waste time, and focus on the past? Would you like them to be vibrant, engaging, productive, and future-focused? If so, here are some suggestions to supercharge your business meetings for more productivity, increased team culture and employee retention! Full on win win!
- Assess your current situation. Be honest. Determine what is and isn’t working and commit to improvement.
- Raise your expectations. Demand more from your sessions. Agendas should be circulated in advance. Attendees should be on time, prepared, and ready to actively participate.
- Set ground rules. No Web surfing or crossword puzzles. Keep your sessions disciplined and business-like. But don’t forget the benefits of humor to lighten things up and reduce stress.
- Have an agenda, but be prepared to leave it. If a stimulating and productive discussion develops, exploit it. Harvest those creative ideas. You can always revisit less important matters.
- Challenge your meeting time and formats. If your meetings get in a rut, try something different. Don’t underestimate the power of mixing things up.
- Know when to quit. If you hit a big breakthrough, consider stopping. End on a high note.
- Avoid the trivial. Handle routine updates via memos or e-mail.
- Stretch and challenge the team. Your meetings are valuable personal and organizational development opportunities. Treat them that way.
- Recognize excellence. Praise and reward performance.
- Focus on the positives and keep future-focused. Maintain a positive tone. Discuss your yesterdays only to improve your tomorrows.
- Recap and take action. Resolve issues, determine a course of action, and assign action steps. It’s important to make recognizable progress.
- End on a unifying note. Reinforce the common bond and move forward together.
You can make your business meetings more productive. Plus it’s so important to boost morale and team culture. You want your team to be excited about meetings, about working for your service business. Commitment and discipline will make it happen.
