Running Impactful Meetings — Don’t Present, Converse

Juraj Holub

It’s no secret that people hate meetings. We see them as unproductive and often a complete waste of time. But labeling meetings as productive or unproductive is not quite accurate and sets wrong expectations. Because, let’s face it, work simply doesn’t happen at meetings, no matter how much we try to justify it.

At meetings, we brainstorm, discuss, learn, plan. But the actual work takes place out of the meeting rooms.

There are some pretty scary facts about how much time and money is wasted on meetings each year. But are these resources truly wasted?

In many cases, it might be so.

But if we get meetings right, they can empower us to get things done, become more productive and boost our creativity.

Meetings can empower us to get things done, become more productive and boost our creativity. Click To Tweet

At Slido, we believe in the transformational power of conversation and we design our meetings with this belief in mind.

Below I share some of our meeting design practices that proved to be working well along with other tips from the leading experts on how to run impactful meetings.

1. Set up goals and prepare the agenda

No two meetings have the same aims and goals. It’s important to first decide what type of meeting you are going to have and then set your goals. Doing so will help you set your agenda and decide whose attendance is crucial.

Inc’s writer, Josh Spiro, defines four main meeting types here:

  • Action-oriented meetings: meetings that solve a pressing or time-sensitive problem.
  • Brainstorming or creative meetings: free-flowing sessions designed to come up with new ideas
  • Short-term planning meetings: meetings that require a lot of interaction and strategizing among the crucial team members
  • Long-term planning meetings: usually a high-level executive meeting for setting up long-term goals.

And there’s another type that becomes popular among many companies.

What we did

We organized an all-hands meeting to talk and synchronize before the autumn season fully kicks off. All employees were invited. Before going in, we stated the purpose and communicated the goals at the outset of the meeting in order not to drift off the track. Our objectives then defined what the rest of our meeting looked like.

2. Design the right setting

In spite of its critical importance, designing the right physical setup is often largely neglected. Marla Tabaka explained in her recent article: “Simple factors, such as where the leader sits, can shape the mood and effectiveness of the meeting.”

Depending on your meeting objectives, you might want the leader to sit at the head of a table if he wants to demonstrate his position in a hierarchy. But in meetings where you want to put participants at ease, you might want to sit in a circle with the leader in the middle of the table.

What we did

There were a few newcomers with us and we naturally wanted to make them feel welcome and part of the company. To create the atmosphere of team spirit and cooperation, we sat in a large semicircle with the speakers presenting in the middle. No theater room set-up with rows of chairs or official table seating, only a casual campfire-style formation.

3. Don’t present, have a conversation instead

Having (all) employees in one room is too much of a precious opportunity to just have them listen to presentations. People want to talk. One of Marissa Mayer’s first moves after joining Yahoo was to establish a weekly Friday afternoon meeting of all Yahoo employees where employees could ask her or other leaders what they were up to first hand.

Sole presenting often keeps many of the essential topics uncovered. And it’s during the Q&A time that leaders can provide those much-needed answers and increase the value of the entire meeting.

What we did

After briefly presenting the company’s strategy, our CEO, Peter Komornik, engaged us in the conversation by taking and responding to our questions. In addition to face-to-face questions, he tackled a number of questions that we sent to him via Slido (of course!) during his brief talk. This way, he was able to give us the answers to what we were eager to know about the direction of the company.

4. Endorse anonymity to create transparency

This sounds like an oxymoron. But let me explain. Most of us are simply scared of asking sensitive questions in front of a roomful of people, or even worse, in front of the board. We don’t want to look stupid or feel that we might be punished for challenging our leaders. But these questions, usually concerning layoffs, salaries or vacation, are super-important for employees to know answers to.

Going back to Marissa Mayer’s strategy, she allowed Yahoo’s employees to submit questions anonymously using their internal tool. Even though they were very tough questions, she was able to unearth what truly bothered her employees and address those issues instantly.

Recently, we analyzed over 63,000 questions and discovered that 54% of them were asked anonymously!

What we did

Although there were only 20 of us and we know each other as a team pretty well, there was still a number of anonymous questions that we preferred to ask via Slido instead of raising a hand. Even in a smaller team such as ours, it’s not always easy to open sensitive topics, although they are vital for the entire company.

5. Have multiple presenters

Meetings need to be engaging if you don’t want your employees’ attention to drift. Steve Jobs always brought guests onstage in order to bring different new viewpoints and also to change the dynamics of the event and keep his audience engaged.

This strategy can be easily duplicated in smaller meetings and still remain super-effective. Not only will you need much less preparation, you’ll also help to unearth first-hand insights from other departments and demonstrate the work and roles of others.

What we did

Peter was not the only presenter. He invited four other team members working in customer service, marketing, sales and finance to share their goals and their impact on the company. They had only five minutes to present before plunging into the Q&A.

While the brief presentations were revealing, it was the Q&A time that followed each of them that was the most valuable for the team. While colleagues were presenting, people submitted and voted on questions. Once their brief talk was over, the presentation was seamlessly bridged into a conversation.

6. Get ready

By failing to prepare, you prepare to fail claims the old saying. And it can’t be truer than in the context of meetings. In many cases, it is not only a meeting leader who needs to be prepared. Many action-oriented and strategic meetings won’t be successful unless all members come prepared. And that might require distributing necessary materials ahead of time so meeting participants can review them and come to the meeting prepared.

What we did

Even a short preparation can radically improve the quality of your meetings. Our preparation didn’t take longer than 30 minutes, but it was essential for making our meeting effective and engaging. In that time, we managed to identify our goals, designed the physical setup and prepare a simple presentation that helped us get the messages across.

In conclusion

Building your meetings on the conversation can help you not only engage your attendees but reveal what is truly on their mind so you can tackle those questions. And planning such meetings is no rocket science. You can organize them with as little as 30 minutes of preparation. Here is a brief summary of the main steps.

  • Set up goals and prepare the agenda
  • Design the right setting
  • Don’t present, have a conversation instead
  • Endorse anonymity to create transparency
  • Have multiple presenters
  • Get ready

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