Meeting Rooms Near Me – How To Run Better Meetings

Proven tips for effective business meetings

Meetings are fundamentally held in order to create awareness, boost efficiency and productivity, get everyone on the same page. When meetings are conducted well even the most challenging and complex tasks can be completed.

Unfortunately not all meetings are run well, they tend to be unproductive and a waste of time. Meetings are an important business requirement and cant be completely eliminated, so how do you make them as useful and constructive as possible.

One of the proven approaches that can breathe life into meetings and improve there effectiveness is to conduct meetings off site. In this article we will look at nine other approaches to improving meeting effectiveness as well as looking in more detail at meeting rooms near me.

#1 Have a clear objective

What is the purpose of your meeting? Is the meeting to gather information, to make decisions or needed to generate new ideas,? It many cases meeting rooms near me may be used for a combination of all these elements.

If you’re unsure what you’re looking to accomplish at a meeting you can be sure it won’t happen. Having a clear goal and a concrete agenda is the number one factor for a successful meeting.

It would appear to be common sense to refuse to have a meeting, simply for the sake of having a meeting. The strapline “No purpose, no meeting” holds true, meetings shouldn’t be considered as social gatherings.

Think of a meeting as a goal-oriented business events and start every meeting by stating the ultimate goal for that meeting.

If you’re in a meeting and are not sure whether participants are informing each other, whether they are constructively discussing, or whether effective decisions are being made. Then think about hitting the meeting reset or stop button.

To finish a successful meeting you need to start with the goal.

#2 Meet Outside the Office

If you have a culture of meetings then tired faces, low energy, and lack of ideas start to appear when you hold a meeting. This could be a signal that it’s time to take the meeting outside. Scheduling off-site meetings ( when there is a clear goal) is a perfect tonic for avoiding meeting fatigue.

Sometimes a change of environment is all that’s needed to bring good ideas and energy back to the meeting table. Brightfield Business Hub is a great offsite environment with meeting rooms near me. With formal meeting rooms, comfortable breakout rooms, an on site restaurant and loads of free parking it provides a great meeting environment.

If you use an external meeting room follow up on your team after the meeting to see if they enjoyed the change of environment and found it beneficial. If it hasn’t find out why and try something else!

#3 Preparation Preparation Preparation

Preparation is the key to successful meeting management.

Before the meeting starts, provide all participants with an agenda. Now this shouldn’t be at the point everybody arrives at the meeting, or by email 5 mins before meeting start time.

Try and get the agenda / objectives out to participants in a timely basis. That way some participants may be able to identify that the agenda needs to change or perhaps the meeting isn’t relevant to them

The meeting agenda should include:

• A list of topics to be covered – don’t just have Sales, HR , Production etc as topics
• A brief description of the meeting’s objectives – very important especially when you have a wide mix or participant roles
• A list of people attending the meeting – that way you can be clear about the level of the meeting
• Who will address each topic – so there are no surprises and participants can be fully prepared to deliver content in a structured and timely manner
• The time and location of the meeting – especially important when you are choosing an off site meeting venue. Where travel and room timings become more important
• Any background / support information participants need to know about should be provided well in advance so that it can be reviewed and analysed
• If you have agreed the agenda ensure that you follow it closely and ensure all agenda topics get covered. So many agendas have multiple items, but with poor timekeeping and agenda items overrunning only a couple of the items get covered

#4 Punctuality is a must

If you were going to the airport to catch a flight you wouldn’t be late. One of the interesting points about flight times is that they are in the majority of cases at strange / unique / memorable times i.e. 11.07. Therefore think about scheduling your meeting to start at an exact non on the hour time

If a meeting is delayed by late arrivals then the meeting will either over run or you wont have time to complete the meeting. Its unfair to those who show up on time having to wait up for people who are habitually late. Back to the flight scenario, what would happen to the person walking on the plane, with the flight still on the ground ten minutes after departure time.

The solution to latecomers is don’t wait for them. Back to the aeroplanes start the meeting the minute it’s scheduled to begin. This sends a clear message to the participants, particularly the latecomers, and develops a mindset for promptness.

#5 All stand

Stand-up meetings (or simply “stand-ups”) have become popular team rituals. Employees become more engaged, more collaborative and less territorial when they participate in a project that involves standing.

A local major Peterborough company who at one point sponsored a racing car, used the pit stop basis for meetings. So having a clear / objective in mind – being stood up and active meant that meetings weren’t designed to overrun.

Being on your feet during a meeting conveys a sense of urgency. With no place to sit ( or relax or get distracted), agenda items get covered faster and hopefully more effectively.

Research identified that stand-up meeting decisions compared to seated meetings took 34% less time making decisions, with no real difference in the quality of the decision.

Now for logistical and personnel reasons, stand-up meetings aren’t always practical, but they might be worth trying or considering.

#6 Invite Less People (but always make room for a “customer”)

When you are looking at scheduling a meeting and looking to invite participants, ask yourself ruthlessly: “Do all these people really need to attend”? On many occasions, a brief summary by email will work just as well.

The maths and logic for this stack up. If you can reduce a thirty minute meeting’s attendee list by just two people whose attendance isn’t essential. That equates to an hour of productive time that the company  gains.

The purpose of meetings is not to simply share information, its to make decisions. When attendees don’t feel the discussed topic is relevant to them, it’s easy to view the meeting as a waste of time.

Now the one person who should always be in the room is the customer. Imagine that they have a place in the meeting. If the items being discussed and decisions being made don’t have an impact on the customer, what is the purpose.

#7 Maintain Focus

Now we don’t want to be a meeting party pooper but for some reason, at every meeting, there seems to be that one person who tends to go off telling off topic stories not connected to the agenda.

At a meeting someone should always take the responsibility of guiding the meeting back to the assigned topics and bringing back the focus. Leading a group of people and getting them to focus is one of the hardest tasks to accomplish. Avoiding off-topic talks at a meeting can really improve the session.

Scope creep refers to constant uncontrollable changes in a meeting’s scope. This can occur when the outcome of a project is not properly defined, documented, or controlled – and is considered harmful for the success of a project.

Everyone in the meeting should be empowered to ensuring the meeting is kept under control. This can be done in a number of ways. I have seen the blue ball approach work well. Essentially all participants in the meeting are given a soft spongy blue ball. When the meeting goes off agenda, or an attendee goes off on one. Other members in the meeting launch their blue ball at the offender.

Now this approach wont be for all, so identify what your team want to use as their off topic mechanisms.

When a meeting has a clear focus, it’s much easier to set concrete action steps and follow up. The meeting should be considered wasted time, if you get to the end of the meeting without having actionable next steps,

#8 Make time for Innovation & Creativity

Now we have a quandary as a lot of what has been mentioned so far has been about structure, rigidity and process. When you have a meeting the knowledge and experience of your employees is a highly valuable resource. A source that is too important to be left untapped.

When people are actively participating, not just passively attending the meeting should result in creativity and energy making for a successful meeting. Short and constructive meetings are ideal, but not when they are stripped down from idea generation and discussion.

If you are holding a meeting to implement a brainstorming session these can often be an ineffective practice. They can be really good at idea generation, but that’s not the part that matters. Its the prioritisation and following through with the ideas that leads to an effective use of time.

#9 Remove Distractions

We now function in a business environment where we are constantly bombarded and interrupted, which has led us to be more and more involved in multitasking. We have probably all experienced the reduction to our performance when we are distracted as opposed to being allowed to focus on a single task.

Harvard Business Review identified that multitasking leads to

• A 40% drop in productivity
• A loss of 10 IQ points – this is the equivalent to having an all-nighter session ( possibly a factor after the Euro 2020 semi finals)

In meeting rooms where email, texts, and web browsing can have a significant impact on an organisation’s bottom line is the problem more apparent.

So how do you prevent participants from multitasking at meetings?

• Have a phone/computer parking bin.
  • Now I know this is highly controversial, so you may have to actively encourage people to use it.
  • It is estimated that employees who use smartphones and computers are distracted on average after every 10 minutes. So get the phones locked away in the parking bin
  • Unless the computer is absolutely necessary for the meeting, turn it off.
• Assign roles for the meeting.
  • Who will facilitate, or be the lead facilitator?
  • Who will take minutes or action notes? What needs doing, Who is going to do it , When does it need doing by
  • When each person is assigned a job, meetings are more focused and productive.
• Provide a timed agenda.
  • Everyone’s time is valuable, so each person needs to focus on the assigned topics and problems.
  • The timed agenda can also discourage sidebar conversations, or working on problems that the group isn’t prepared to address.

#10 Limited time – 30 minutes, 52 minutes

Thirty minutes into the meeting, it’s very likely that your team’s attention is not a sharp as it was at the beginning.

This isn’t because they are distracted or easily bored, it’s the simple fact that if there is a lot of information to process it takes thinking and effort. The longer the meeting, the more effort it will take to keep up the energy and discussion.

An essential component to improving your team’s efficiency is having short meetings. As previously described an agenda tends to expand to fit whatever time limit is set for a particular meeting. An imaginary “Stop” button could be useful to apply if the meeting is no longer generating results but there is still time remaining.

The longest time workers can remain truly engaged is generally Fifty two minutes. Do not schedule any frequent ( daily / weekly) meeting to last longer than sixty minutes. People appreciate it when you understand that their time is valuable.

#11 Make sure stuff happens (post meeting)

A common issue is for people to come away from the same meeting with very different interpretations of what went on. Document the tasks delegated, responsibilities given, and any assigned deadlines (What, Who, When), and where possible send out the meeting action notes on the day of the meeting.

The key to successful meetings lies in getting the right format and communication. Ask your employees / participants for feedback and importantly be open to suggestions. Your conclusions should be based on what they think, not how you personally feel. If your team feels engaged and effective, then hopefully you will get more from your meetings.

Meeting rooms near me

When looking to schedule your next off site meeting remember to ask these three important questions

• Is the meeting necessary?
• Who really needs to be there?
• What will be the agenda?

As a final point whilst zoom and team have become common place during the pandemic. Warrenn Buffett made a famous quote which summarises why in person meetings are needed “You will never see eye to eye if you never meet face to face”

Contact Michelle Craig at Brightfield Business Hub on 01733 595885 or email Michelle Craig at arrange an appointment to see the wide range of Meeting Room options at BBH. Click here to have all your meeting rooms near me questions answered. This article on meeting rooms in Peterborough may be useful click here

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