As a venue finding agency, we get involved with finding venues for many different types of meetings that take place throughout the year. Meeting can take up a significant part of your time within a business, but sadly many employees have the view that they are a bit of a waste of time. This is counter-productive really as running an effective meeting is easy to do. This is why we have pulled together our guide to planning a meeting to ensure that next time you do you keep your attendees productive and engaged.
Have a Clear Purpose
If you speak to any event management companies UK they will tell you it is essential that you have a clear purpose for your meeting in mind before you start planning the day. After all, running an event or meeting is no good to anyone if you are just doing It for the sake of it. You should think about what you want to achieve, the message you want to get across and whether you have a deadline or not. Then if the answer to these questions can be achieved through the use of an email or phone call, you don’t need to waste your time and effort organising a meeting.
Who Needs to Attend?
Once you have narrowed down your message, you need to think about who needs to hear the message i.e. who you need to invite to the meeting. If you have a problem to solve, for example, then you need to invite the people who have the knowledge and skills in that are to attend as you don’t want any of the meeting attendees to feel like they have nothing to say. If you find that you can’t get everyone you need in the same place at the same time then consider using a video conferencing system instead so that everyone can collaborate from their own workspace.
Create the Right Environment
The meeting room you choose needs to be comfortable, well-lit and kitted out with all the technology you need – although don’t make it too comfortable or your attendees may fall asleep. On the other hand, if you are running a video conference make sure everyone is in front of a plain background, rather than in front of any distracting objects or people.
Stick to a Schedule
The old adage fail to plan and plan to fail is very true when it comes to successful meetings. Make sure before the meeting starts you have a written agenda completed making sure you clearly list each item that needs to be discussed and allocate a time to each point. Email this agenda to your attendees before the meeting and have it displayed on the screen during the meeting. It is highly likely that you will want to display other things during the course of the meeting so make sure the technology at your venue can cope with it.
Have Strict Rules on Technology
The last thing any event or meeting planner wants to see is bored attendees scrolling on their phone or tablets during the meeting – and so you should ban the use of distracting technology to be on the safe side. Of course, this doesn’t mean there will be no technology used at all, as collaborative technology such as a wireless presentation system will no doubt come in useful.
Be Strict on Time as Well
If you consistently start and end your meetings on time, you will get known for this and it will be more likely that people will attend. You are showing them that you realise their time is valuable and also gain the reputation of being a great host. It is a good rule of thumb to try and ensure your meetings run for an hour or less, as once you get past an hour it is hard to keep your attendee’s attention.
Take Action Post Meeting
Follow up each meeting you organise with a round-up of what was achieved and the main action points that came out of it. The best way to do this is to list the responsibilities of each person who attended, the actions that were delegated to them and the relevant timescales agreed for each action.
If you are planning a meeting, or any other type of event, and are looking for help with event management London then please get in touch with the team at Conferences Group today.
