Meeting things (3): Organizing valid meetings

 

Thanks to God, I am grateful to Buddha for writing this article when the code word reaches vomiting blood. Now, it's time for us to stop ourselves from wasting others' time. First of all, before sharing organizational experiences and skills, it is necessary to clarify what are the effective standards?

1. Valid meeting vs invalid MEETING

Why is a valid meeting crucial to us?

1. correct decision:EffectiveAs an important part of the company's decision-making flow, effective meetings mean that we can get good decisions and make the right actions.

2. Cost saving: efficient, meeting time occupies about half of our working time. Meeting efficiency can save us a lot of time, thus saving the company a lot of cost.

The so-called happy people are similar, unfortunate people are different, and an effective meeting is always similar, but the reasons for the death of a meeting are varied. Here we only extract the general characteristics:

Valid meeting:

1. end on time

2. Achieve meeting objectives

3. You do not need or need to repeat your work.

4. enthusiastic participants

5. Participants feel interesting (this is an icing on the cake)

Invalid meeting:

1. I will not discuss it.

2. No way, no way, no responsibility

3. No decision is achieved or the decision quality is not high.

4. Dragging

5. Boring, no sense of participation

Even though ineffective meetings are also part of the issue of participants, for example, they are not active, they are all late, and they are not enthusiastic about the speech, but the results are awkward after the meeting, but according to my observation, most of them are the responsibility of the organizer, who did not make the meeting better organized. The suggestions mentioned below will certainly improve the quality of the meeting if the organizer can pay attention to them.

There are three main statements: 6 preparations before the meeting, 3 control items during the meeting, and 3 tracking items after the meeting.

2. Preparations before the meeting

If you don't have time to take a closer look, you just need to remember one sentence,That is: meeting with a clear purpose! (Meeting with purpose !)

1) determine the goals that the Meeting hopes to achieve first (objective)
2) Think about the necessity of the Meeting (right time? Is it possible to be replaced by emails or phone numbers ?)
3). Identify key problems and key persons)
4). Prepare materials and themes
5). Book meeting rooms and projectors
6). Imagine a possible conflict in advance

Regarding the 3rd point, identifying key issues and key persons is closely related to your meeting goals. To achieve these goals, you should confirm the key issues at this meeting, and what key figures are needed for confirmation? As the organizer, you need to have a score in your mind. If your memory is as bad as mine, you can print out your meeting goals and key issues as a memo.

3. Important invitation letter

Try to send your invitation to those who should come 24 hours in advance. This includes key figures, important roles, and other roles (for example, supporters, advocates who are smart and not busy at the moment, evaluators of important issues, etc ).

 

TIPS: it is best to set a required and optional difference when inviting people, outlook has this function. In this way, you can pay more attention to the required characters and select options.

In addition, please pay attention to your invitation letter. If time permits, please try to make it clear and simple, but add some respect and attraction.

Have you explained the background of the Meeting, why should we start the meeting, and what is the goal of the meeting? What is the topic to be discussed? Are some pre-viewed materials provided?

Not everyone you invite knows the cause and effect of the incident. If you make the invitation clear, you can save a lot of time to explain it at the meeting.

Here is a reference case:

Case 1

Case 2

As for the counterexample, I will not talk about it. I often receive it in my daily work. Even some invitations are not written at all, and they are written in the mail title. This is similar to inviting everyone to come and try again with us, make sure everyone understands it! And so on.

Before that, we had a boss who had always been very enthusiastic about meeting invitations. They were written with Lihua poems. They were not only beautiful, but also logically clear, after reading it, you can't help but want to attend the meeting that he sent out.

Therefore, after reaching the basic requirements, you can try to make your invitation interesting and attractive.

Basic Requirements for reference:

• Purpose
• Meeting subject
• Time and place
• Increase the benefits of participating in meetings if necessary (additional snacks and fruits are also considered)
• Attached references if necessary

For invitations, I would like to add a very important point: do not think that it is fine to send an invitation letter. For key figures and important figures, it is best to confirm the time before sending the invitation letter, and 30 minutes before the meeting, call again to confirm, so that you have time to respond.

Iv. Three major controls of the Conference

 

Now, the meeting has started. Make three controls and get the perfect results.
1). Time
The organizer must prepare the meeting 10 minutes in advance. You need to organize the materials, arrange the meeting room, and adjust the computer and projector.
I often see a meeting room full of people. The people who organized the meeting rushed over and adjusted the projector. As a result, a group of people waited, this is a great disrespect for others' time.
On the contrary, if you are prepared in advance, you can go through the process and the possible risks in your mind.
2). Process
Make sure that all the questions discussed in this discussion are discussed. Make sure that the discussion of each question has a result, whether it is done, how it is done, whether it is not done or temporarily waiting. Once a question starts to be discussed, only when there is a result can the next problem be transitioned.
Make sure that key figures have clear opinions.
Therefore, process control is very important. You can neither stay too long on a problem nor end it.
3). Risks
The meeting may be affected by the following risks, resulting in invalid meetings:

A. the key person put you on the tab.
B. The Meeting deviated from the topic

C. endless disputes over an issue

D. Questions not prepared

E. The participants did not actively participate.

F. The meeting time is broken by unnecessary explanations
H .......

The preceding risks may occur at the same meeting. For example, one day Mr. Kobayashi asked the old and outsourced service companies to confirm the cooperation plan. The other party had arrived. As a result, Mr. Kobayashi's boss made a temporary phone call saying that he was unable to come because of the congestion. The meeting was held normally. As a result, some people raised the issue of settlement after the contract between the two parties. This was not the subject of this meeting. The results were discussed around this issue for a long time, later, it took a long time to discuss the details of a feature. However, this feature may not necessarily be adopted. Because the boss is absent, the other party's participants are not actively reviewing the plan ....

It is best to prevent risks, but in case they cannot be prevented, there are also solutions to these risks, and there are even many solutions. Here is an example, which may not be the most effective.

A. the key person put you on the tab.
-- The best thing to do is prevent it. Confirm the time with him 30 minutes in advance, remind him of the importance of the meeting, and tell him that other important people have already said they are coming. If he cannot come, you can make a decision within 30 minutes: cancel the meeting or continue the meeting. After the meeting, you can communicate with him separately.

B. The Meeting deviated from the topic
-- The topic of this meeting should be clarified from the very beginning. When you notice that the meeting has deviated from the topic, you must immediately guide everyone back to the topic.

C. endless disputes over an issue
-- Reasonably allocate the time spent on each topic. It is best not to spend more than five minutes discussing a specific issue.
In particular, when there are only a few people discussing the issue, even two people can interrupt them in time and tell everyone that this issue will be recorded as a point to be confirmed. After the meeting is over, contact the relevant personnel to solve the problem, and then send an email to notify everyone.

D. Questions not prepared
-- A former employee often fears others. She often raises questions that others are not prepared for, and is always trying. For example, she would ask: How many users are expected to use this function after the product is launched? The organizer (generally PD) is surprised to say that the product is still in the demand review stage. How can I predict the number of users after the product is launched? She continued to ask: I need a rough number to assess whether it is within the acceptable pressure range of our servers. I need this number.
Of course, the product manager cannot take this number at the scene, because the product manager cannot take the picture at will. So they fell into the discussion about why the number was needed. In the end, the PD often compromised and he would find a number for her offline. In this way, it took 10 minutes for a problem.
-- Try to prepare a "FAQ" for yourself, such as the PD. After this embarrassment, ask the same person for the same project in the future, i'm sure I will come up with a number in advance. Rest assured that the person who asked the question may only get an answer, but it's not hard to figure out how to get the answer, however, if you want to know more about it, you should be prepared in advance to figure it out. As far as I know, common and difficult problems can be:
Why?
Why do we need a new version?
What do you want to achieve?
How do you determine whether or not you have reached?
What is the significance?
......
Then again, we are not Zhuge Liang. Who knows what the problem will be. Therefore, when you encounter a problem, you may have to think about it first. If you have not prepared the answer, you can ask questions from other participants. Then, you can ask them if they have any answers.
If I still don't have one, I modestly say to the person who asked the question: Sorry, I am not sure yet. I will record it first. After the meeting is over, I will confirm it, can I send emails to you? Or, after the meeting, can I tell you more?

E. The participants did not actively participate.
This ...... Look at me. After each problem is over, you must act as the organizer to provide prompt guidance. Otherwise, it will be cold.
Then, try to throw your tone, and don't get sleepy like chanting.
Eliminate nonsense and meaningless words as much as possible so that everyone can concentrate.

F. The meeting time is broken by unnecessary explanations
Yes, some people do not know what to do before they come to the meeting, so he will ask many others questions that may be very clear, or ask unnecessary questions, there are more problems behind each issue, so the meeting time becomes increasingly uncontrollable.
For example?
How do other websites do this?
To prevent this risk, make sure that all the people you invite are "supposed to come". In addition, make sure that these people have an understanding of the background of the meeting. If there are still many problems that require explanation and are also of interest to others, do not spend more than 5 minutes to handle the risk by referring to the risk handling Article 3rd.
If the questioner is very concerned but not concerned by others, take out his notebook and record it and tell him that it is a good way to calm the questioner's mood and let the meeting proceed.

In addition, Heidi wants to add that although it is the organizer's primary responsibility to solve the chaos, as a participant, the observer is clear, sometimes it is advantageous to help solve the chaos, as long as you are not afraid of winning the competition, but in most cases, the host will thank you for coming out of the chaos and helping you to calm down the dispute, you can also ask questions that have been discussed in a mess to help you pick out the questions and columns them on the whiteboard to confirm whether they are the issues. Sometimes this kind of trick is very useful and can help you reach the result early.

5. attach importance to your meeting summary
We reserve 5-10 minutes for a simple meeting summary.

The commitment form is the next action that will be taken during the discussion at the meeting. Before the meeting ends, let the problem owner promise the time for completion.
If the meeting is concluded and your meeting time is just reached, a valid meeting will be completed. However, do not forget that there are still follow-up actions, that is, important meeting minutes.

6. Issue meeting minutes in a timely manner
If there is no meeting minutes, it is inevitable that the meeting will be completed.
It is recommended that the meeting minutes be sent to attendees within 24 hours after the meeting, which is also an important basis for multi-party follow-up and tracking.
What should a Meeting Minutes contain?

• Time and place participants (optional)
• Meeting objectives and achievements
• Resolutions generated at the meeting
• Legacy problems
• Next step

In addition, the next step should be recorded in the form of a "commitment form". The reference format is as follows:

 

TIPS: if you put all the meeting minutes of the same project in the same folder, It is very helpful for you to trace back any problem.