Course Description

Do ineffective meetings frustrate you? When you lead a meeting, are you able to keep your participants on track? Do you achieve buy-in from everyone around the table? Do your meetings lead to action? When the meeting ends, do you and your participants leave feeling that time was well spent? Attend this seminar to learn the fundamentals of effective meeting management, starting with how to set the stage for success. Discuss how to manage participation, facilitate buy-in, select appropriate decision-making processes, and deal with the challenges.

Objectives

Participants will understand the theory of managing meetings and be able to design and facilitate a variety of meetings with differing purposes and issues.

Topics

• Examining elements of ineffective meetings and meetings that work 
• Creating a detailed agenda
• Developing process notes
• Clarifying roles and responsibilities
• Agreeing on clear meeting norms
• Managing participation
• Process checks
• Taking minutes
• Determining the next steps
• Evaluation
• Managing conflict and ensuring participation
• Avoiding sidetracks
• Decisions: Are they taking too long, or not long enough?
• Dissenting views ignored
• Dealing with a dominant group member
• Ensuring follow-up and action