Orchestrating a successful meeting

You’ll usually be acting in the role of chair and therefore be wielding significant influence over how each event unfolds. Even when the right preparation has been done, it’s important the meeting gets off to a flying start. The opening is likely to set the tone for the meeting as a whole. Make sure you’re the first one in the room, and greet everyone as they arrive – especially if it’s likely to be a controversial or contentious meeting. The informal pre-meeting niceties need to be managed too!

Start proceedings off by welcoming everyone in a bright, positive way without going overboard. A smile and a friendly greeting can create a good atmosphere that will spill over into the meeting proper. It’s also an opportunity to introduce yourself to anyone who doesn’t know you.

Next, set the key meeting ground rules up-front. It’s easy to alienate people if you come across like a scolding schoolteacher, so be careful to outline the meeting etiquette deftly. For example, there’s no point in antagonising someone from the start just because their mobile is switched on. So, as you turn off your own mobile, make the observation, ‘I always forget to turn this thing off!’. You’ll find that most reasonable people follow suit.

Ultimately, developing the skills required to be an effective chair comes with practice, but it helps to stick to a few, very simple rules:

Although the chair will set the pace and lead by example, it’s very important to have other people in the meeting who are sympathetic and supportive. For example, if you need a controversial idea or decision to be discussed, it’s more effective to have someone else in the meeting primed to raise the point. You’ll then be able to influence the direction of the discussion, without simply being seen to dominate the meeting.

Domestique is French for ‘servant’ and is used as a cycling term for a team player who sacrifices individual performance to help the team. Every project manager needs a collaborator – to use another French expression – someone who arrives on time, keeps to the designated etiquette and completes their actions in a timely fashion.

Our final tip for the meeting chair is to make use of a meeting ‘car park’. This is an area – usually on a flipchart or whiteboard – that can be used to park points raised during the meeting that are perfectly valid, but which fall outside of its scope. The car park is a useful device for enabling the meeting chair to keep the session on track, but without being seen to ignore contributions. However, for this to be effective it’s important that the car park is always visible and that agreement is reached on how each parked item will be dealt with outside of the meeting.

Reap what you’ve sown

Many see the end of a meeting as job done, but it’s rare for it to be a neatly self-contained event that doesn’t have resulting actions. So, in reality, the benefit of a meeting lies as much in what happens after it as during it. It’s therefore imperative for you to ensure that decisions and actions are followed up.

The follow-up process actually begins in the meeting itself, with the scribe taking minutes. At this point, perhaps an image of a nitpicker taking meticulous notes springs to mind; someone producing a blow-by-blow account of a session you didn’t want to sit through in the first place. Embedded in the text will be a couple of vague actions you can’t remember agreeing to. It doesn’t need to be like this. Minutes are your friend and provide important control documents for your project.

Only three types of entry are valid in minutes:

Ensure each meeting action states precisely what needs to be done and the date it needs to be done by – and the someone present at the meeting who has taken ownership. Vague action points are a recipe for confusion and inaction.

Where the minutes might be contentious, get them agreed during the meeting. It can be perceived as a bit tedious to review each key point – either as it’s recorded or en masse at the end. However, this technique is great for confirming a shared understanding of what’s been agreed and can save hours of work dealing with post-meeting disagreements.

We’ve found that prompt issue of minutes makes a big difference to the likelihood of the agreed actions being followed through. By prompt we mean ideally the same day, but no later than close of business the next working day. As we’ve already outlined, minutes don’t need to be an onerous chore and putting off writing them up undermines the whole point. It also sends out the wrong message about your own commitment to action. Book time after the meeting with the scribe to get minutes issued while the discussion is fresh in your mind.

Having got the minutes out in a timely fashion, it’s then essential that you track progress on the agreed actions and chase them up if required. You’ll need an effective mechanism for doing this, and an actions log sitting alongside your risks and issues log is a useful tool.

You’ll soon find that active meeting follow-up creates a virtuous circle. Once people see that their meeting commitments are not going to be quietly forgotten, they’re more likely to get on with whatever they agreed to. Next time around they’ll also think that little bit harder about what they sign up to at one of your meetings.

Think big by thinking small

It’s extremely easy to overlook, or underutilise, the power of small, semi-informal meetings. Think back on how much you achieved at less formal events – perhaps chance conversations in the corridor or the lift. People seem more relaxed, perhaps less on their guard, when the setting is informal.

We’re not suggesting you adopt a totally Machiavellian approach to your chance encounters, but we do promote better use of seizing the moment or dropping in to see people. All we’re recommending is a quick, automatic mental check of the business potential in these situations and a more systematic approach to exploiting the opportunity. As you can see, our basic meeting principles are scalable and can be used on anything from a large workshop to a one-to-one.

Where two or more people are gathered, anything more than a social chitchat is a meeting.

This approach is especially useful when you’re dealing with senior management or anyone with a meeting phobia. Senior managers rarely have time for lengthy meetings, and you can chase your tail trying to pin down their availability. In our experience, it’s far easier to wait for a chance encounter or to fashion one. Wait for the customary greeting of ‘How’s it going?’ and hit them with what you want. We strongly advise having one request in mind, not a barrage – ask for too much and you’ll get nothing. Look upon these meetings as coming across a reluctant genie – someone who can grant your dearest wish but isn’t going to make the first move.

However, a word of warning: beware of falling into the trap that semi-informal meetings don’t need the same kind of rigour as ‘proper’ meetings. You need to be suitably prepared if you’re going to get a decision or some action agreed. Ask yourself what you’re looking to achieve. What’s your precise objective for this encounter and what’s the best tack to take? If you’re not prepared, your ad hoc meeting may well prove to be a backward step.

Also, always make sure that anything of significance is documented at the next available opportunity. Often a friendly follow-up email that captures the important points you discussed will suffice. If these discussions are not recorded they can become counterproductive; you may well become a victim of conflicting memories and at the mercy of hearsay.

Review recurring meetings periodically and check whether they’re still really necessary. Don’t fall into the trap of holding regular ‘project meetings’ without good reason.

Summary

Have you ever heard anyone say: ‘The agenda was clear, the right people attended and we started on time. The chair was focused and everyone contributed. How did it all go wrong?’. The discipline needed to run successful meetings isn’t hard to master but it can be difficult to apply consistently.

Meetings are going to play a major part in your project, and for you to be a brilliant project manager it’s important they’re highly productive. The foundation for success lies in the preparation. Ensure you arrive at your well-chosen meeting venue with a solid agenda and the right people in attendance. Make sure that your meeting roles are sorted out in advance of the event.

Once the meeting is under way, be alert to how effectively your chair, scribe and timekeeper are doing their jobs – even if that’s you wearing three different hats! Make sure you stick to the agenda and that all important actions and decisions are recorded. Don’t overrun. Build up a reputation as someone who runs a tight ship, not someone who shoots from the hip.

Meetings are not only an important part of brilliant project management, they’re your showcase as a project manager. Many people will only see you in action during these sessions. If your meetings are tight and focused, not only will you get what you need out of them but your reputation as a project manager will be justly enhanced too.

• Always put the time needed into meeting preparation – it’s the only way of ensuring that your meetings will be effective.
• No meeting should go ahead without an agenda, supported by a statement of its purpose and objectives.
• By default, take the role of the chair at meetings and make sure you have the right people acting as scribe and timekeeper.
• Meeting follow-up starts with the production of a set of punchy, action-oriented minutes. Get these issued without delay.
• Have a system in place to ensure you always follow up on meeting action points.
• Above all, create a virtuous circle for your meetings. Get a reputation as a brilliant project manager who runs the best get-togethers in town.