Imperato, Gina (1999, April). You have to start meeting like this. Fast Company. 204-210.

I liked the ideas presented in this article on meetings. It is important for people to meet, yet so many of us hate meetings because they so often seem like a waste of time. Too often people just talk at meetings without listening.

Michael Bergemen, an expert on meeting ritual, sees a different ways of meeting. He says, "there is a 'science' of meetings that's available to people now." First, decide on the goal of the meeting. Is it to generate ideas, come to a decision, or gather as much information as possible? Then, it is important to make this goal clear to participants. At the meeting, stay on task and meet your goal.

Besides making the goal of the meeting clear to participants, it is also important to make expectations clear. Expectations can include starting and ending on time, speaking only after certain others speak, and chatting time of 5 - 10 minutes at the beginning of the meeting. Finally, stress relievers can be brought to the meeting. These can be toys or balls that can serve as creativity enhancers that get the body working with the mind.

After meetings it is important to reflect, spending 5 minutes for participants to discuss what worked well. It is a discipline to take time for reflection and keep record of everyone's comments, but in time meetings can improve using the input from reflecting.

I will try to use some of Bergemen's ideas in planning meetings. I like his approach to meetings, to decide on the goal and convey that goal to participants. I like scheduling the first 5 minutes or so for talking about whatever people want, then staying on topic. Finally, I think it is very good to continually improve meetings. We can do this by reflecting on our meetings with participants after the meeting. One way I've done this at our large meetings is through evaluation. This has served us very well in planning meetings. With a smaller group, I think it is worthwhile to talk with people about the meeting. We can always learn from this reflection after meetings.

-- Anonymous, April 23, 1999

Answers

Thanks for your comments on this article. Others in your cohort also read this article. You may want to contribute to their discussion.

I hope that your plans for implementing this in future meetings works out well for you. Keep us posted.

-- Anonymous, May 20, 1999