Four Leadership Secrets of Effective Meetings

“Either one meets or one works. One cannot do both.” So says management guru Peter Drucker in his book, The Effective Executive. He points out that the only reason we really meet is that “the knowledge needed in a specific situation is not available in one head.” Of course, there are times when we must piece together this knowledge from many heads. That’s when one needs an effective meeting. And whether you conduct project, staff, or offsite meetings, there are four leadership keys that can help you meet with success:

I.      Clarify objectives

II.    Engage Others

III.   Create the rules

IV.  Announce assignments

I.      Clarify objectives.

Think through, and then communicate the specific purpose of the meeting. Remember, the primary reason behind most meetings should be that several heads need to come together to help decide what to do in a situation (when the meeting is over). Paradoxically, the focus of your meeting should really be on what outcomes you want to produce after the meeting.

When I managed an institute at UCLA, I held meetings with the idea that it was important for my senior staff to share information about what was going on in their departments. I was wrong! Most of the time it wasn’t important. Luckily, one of my staff brought this to my attention. I then began defining and communicating the purpose of the meeting based on what actions I wanted us to take after it. This decreased the number of meetings and the amount for each.

II.    Engage Others

Before your next meeting, involve those who’ll be asked to take action after the meeting. For example, when a CEO recently asked me to facilitate an offsite meeting for his senior management team, I asked him what actions he wanted the team to take as a result of the meeting. He said he first needed his senior managers to identify strategic initiatives during the offsite meeting. Then, after the meeting, he wanted these senior managers to implement the initiatives with their respective teams (i.e., direct reports). To increase the direct reports buy in, I therefore recommended that he encourage each senior manager, prior to the offsite, brainstorm with their respective teams, possible strategic initiatives.

Do you see what’s critical here? The CEO needed his executives and their mid-level managers to commit to action after the meeting. Increasing participation before the meeting increases commitment after the meeting.

III.   Create rules

I was helping an organization increase productivity using project management tools a few weeks ago, when a supervisor asked how to encourage his team to speak up during his meetings. I advised him to stop thinking of it as “his” meeting. (Too many supervisors have MEings – it’s about ME – instead of MEETings.) Second, I suggested that he conduct a brief brainstorming session by asking the team to answer this question: “Imagine you’re going to a great meeting, what might that look like?” I recommended that he write everything they said on a flipchart – no processing initially. (Separate idea generation from idea evaluation.) Finally, I encouraged him to have the team vote on the seven rules that they wanted their meeting to follow. People don’t buy-in to the outcome of a process if they don’t buy-in to the process.

IV.  Announce assignments

At the end of a meeting, ask each person who has agreed to complete a task to tell the rest of the team what the task is and when he or she will complete it. Researchers call this public accountability. You and I know it as peer pressure. (Whatever you call it, it is much more effective than having a team leader conclude a meeting by repeating everyone’s assignments.) Follow-up with an e-mail of action items everyone has committed to take (i.e., minutes of the meeting). For each agenda item, write three bullet sentences:

 1. This was discussed

 2. This was decided

 3. This is who is taking action in what time frame.

Next time you realize that the knowledge to move ahead is not in one head, go ahead and have a meeting. Just make sure it has a definite purpose, a lot of participation, clear rules, and public assignments. Only then can you meet with success… so everyone can get back to work.

What other ideas have you found that make your meetings work?

            Keep eXpanding your leadership,

            Dave

P.S. Dave Jensen and his team transform proven leadership tools into your success stories. Dave is an executive coach and an engaging speaker at conferences, meetings, and retreats. He can be reached in Los Angeles, CA at (310) 397-6686. Click here for more info about the research-based, online 360-leadership assessment (XLM): http://xlmassessment.com/ )

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