Here's today's question: "How do great managers lead effective meetings?"
Something that all managers have to do is lead meetings and we can all agree that we've been in meetings before that were less than enjoyable. As a leader, you want to make sure that you're leading meetings that are effective.
Tip One
Have a Clear Meeting Objective, and write out an agenda. There is nothing worse than sitting in a meeting and having no idea why you're there. So when you're leading a meeting, make sure that you are really clear on why you're all there. What's your objective? What do you want to focus on? What do you want your participants to take away with them? And make sure that you have all of this all planned out before the meeting starts.
Having an agenda will really help, because everyone will know what you want to cover, and in what order. It also makes the entire group feel like they're included in the decision-making process of how the agenda or the meeting is going to run. If anyone in the team has any preliminary questions that might have been interruptions, now they'll know what you're going to cover, or to save their questions until the end.
Tip Two
Choose the right seat. This is just our opinion but we think that the best place to sit is actually in the middle, and this could be if you have one of those really long tables, or if you're in a room making a presentation, try to put yourself somewhere in the middle. That way, everyone feels included, it's easier to have a discussion back and forth and you look less like an authoritative dictator this way.
Tip Three
Make sure everyone is heard. Pay attention to people's reactions to the discussion.There might be someone in the room who keeps trying to speak up, but is getting interrupted. So if you're leading an effective meeting with all of the people in your office, make sure that if someone's trying to speak up, you call them out and say. Did you have a question? What was it that you were going to say earlier?
These are just a few key steps to lead an effective meeting.
