EDITION 023

Learning Tree

Management Insights
Expert Advice from Todays Top Professionals
Five Steps to Managing
Successful Meetings
Serena Williamson, PhD, speaker, author, seminar leader and coach
specialising in people skills

Managing Successful Meetings:

The Challenge
Three years ago, and with a new engineering degree, Xiao
immigrated to Canada from China. Xiao took her job seriously.
She didnt spend a lot of time socialising with co-workers and
stayed focused on her work. In a short time, Xiao was made project
manager. As project manager in a matrix environment, Xiao had to
run meetingsbut she was failing miserably.
First, the wrong people showed up for her meetingspeople who didnt
really need to be presentwhile the people Xiao needed (decision
makers or people with pertinent information) didnt show up or came
unprepared. Xiao also felt that attendees did not respect or pay attention
to her. They would use their PDAs or have side conversations with each
other. Xiao felt that this was because she was shy and spoke with a quiet
voice. She was also younger than many of the people on the project and
felt this was another reason for the lack of respect she was given in the
meetings she chaired.
In addition, there were two regular attendees who constantly
interrupted her and steered the conversation in different directions.
One attendee was an ideas person who could not seem to stay

focused. The other person, a woman a couple of years older than

Xiao, was resentful that Xiao was the project manager. That woman
seemed to be deliberately sabotaging Xiaos meetings. In the end,
nothing seemed to get accomplished in the meetings, though they
seemed to drag on forever.

Mimicking Success
Xiao noticed that one of the other project managers, Lak, had a
reputation for running successful meetings. Laks meetings stayed on
track and were regarded as very productive. Too shy to ask Lak what
his secrets were, Xiao would drop in on his meetings to determine how
she could mimic Laks success. It didnt take long for Xiao to build a list
of five rules that summarised Laks successful meeting strategies.
Xiao began applying these rules to facilitate her meetings. By
sending out a strategic agenda in advance, Xiao got the right people
to attend her meetings, while those who didnt have to be there
were appropriately grateful. Xiao established new ground rules for
her meetings, such as no PDAs and no side conversations, and got
compliance by offering to cut meeting times in half (from 60 minutes to
30) if people agreed to follow her rules for a one-month trial period.
Xiao also started managing her emotions. For instance, when the
ideas person or the saboteur tried to take over, Xiao calmed herself,
maintained her confidence, and used the agenda to keep the meeting
moving forward as planned. Almost overnight, Xiaos meetings became
more effective. The change was so miraculous that when she passed her
rules on to Paul, another project manager struggling to hold effective
meetings, she called them the five magic steps.

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Productivity through Education

EDITION 023

Learning Tree

Management Insights
Expert Advice from Todays Top Professionals
Five Steps for
Successful Meetings
1. E
 -mail a strategic agenda
well in advance
A strategic agenda has four key ingredients:
It has a specific subject line. If the e-mail subject line says Project
X, everybody who is involved in Project X will come. Specifying
what aspect of Project X the meeting addresses limits attendees to
those actually needed.

4. B
 e authoritative
Too many meeting facilitators are afraid to drive the bus and, instead,
let the passengers drive. Treat your meetings like a bus route with a
schedule and agreed-upon stops. Set the time allotted for each topic
in advance and keep the meeting moving forward on that schedule. If
people are reluctant to move off a topic, then agree to cover the topic
outside of the meeting or at a separate meeting.

5. U
 se a meeting agenda template
Do not use the strategic agenda you mailed out to manage the
meeting. Instead, use a one-page landscape sheet:

It is sent only to those people who need to be there, not to

everyone involved in the project.

At the top, have the meeting objective(s), date and time.

It contains a list of the action items for the meeting.

Across the top, have these five headings, which should all be filled
in before the meeting starts:

It contains the name of the person responsible for each item so
that they can come prepared.
If a senior decision maker is required at the meeting, sending them a
personal e-mail and following it up with a telephone call is a good idea.

2. Establish ground rules

No matter what the norms are for your organisation, if your meetings are
effective you can establish additional ground rules. You can, for instance,
forbid PDAs in the room (but allow urgent calls or e-mails to be taken
outside of the room); ban side conversations while others are speaking;
expect attendees to come prepared; and start and finish at the scheduled
time. Once you establish these rules, and your meetings become more
effective, the value of the new rules is reinforced.

3. Practise self-awareness

Down the left-hand side, list the agenda items.

Objective

 erson Responsible (Filled in, unless the purpose of the

P
meeting is to assign a person.)

Time

Result

 ue Date/Follow-Up (Filled in, unless the purpose of

D
the meeting is to assign a due date or follow-up date.)

As the meeting progresses, fill in any empty cells and update cells that
require change. The agenda allows you to track both your time and
accomplishments. This serves as evidence to yourself and others that
your meetings are productive and worthwhile. Remember that the
agenda is separate from the minutes, which are taken by someone else
so that you can concentrate on managing the meeting.

Before the meeting begins (and during, if necessary), take command

of your emotional state:
Take a few deep breaths to calm yourself.
Engage in positive self-talk and visualisation like professional
athletes dosee yourself confident and in control of the meeting.
Stand when making important points to give yourself the feeling
of more height and power.
If people have trouble understanding you, speak slower,
summarise often, and frequently check if attendees understand
the agenda.

About the Author

Serena Williamson, PhD, is a speaker, author, seminar
leader and coach specialising in people skills. She teaches several
Learning Tree Courses, including Course 292, Communication
Skills: Results through Collaboration, Course 244, Assertiveness
Skills: Communicating with Authority and Impact, and Course
344, Effective Time Management.

1-800-843-8733
OR VISIT www.learningtree.ca
CALL

Productivity through Education

CA1006 Mgmt Insights June