So, How do You Make a Success of Your Meetings?

Management, as they say, is 80% communication. And a key component of communication is meetings held among stakeholders to discuss status, strategies, tactics, problems, and all sorts of other things. Meetings, while being a very important tool, may also turn into unproductive time gobblers if they are not organized and conducted properly. Here are a few tips that PMs all over the world have found useful in getting the most of this useful but much reviled tool.

• Have some snacks for the attendees to munch on. This will make the participants look forward to a meeting rather than having them dread the prospect as a chore. Hopefully a Pavlovian response will kick in after a few such meetings! At that point you might gradually turn the snacks into an optional item although you must be careful in not eliminating them permanently as the "Pavlovian Training" will not last forever in the absence of a stimulus.
• Try unorthodox ideas like using the webcam on your laptop to record a meeting. People may feel self-conscience at first but soon, once the meeting gets into a flow, they'll forget about it. The recording may be condensed later in a meeting minute for distribution.
• Copy the Google way of projecting a countdown timer on the wall. This will subtly force everyone to be aware of how long the meeting has gone and how much time is remaining.
• Try standing room meetings. Anecdotal evidence show that this type of meetings keeps everyone focused on the subject and the durations shorter. These are not everyone's cup of tea so keep the attendance list limited to absolutely the most essential people. If you are calling the department heads to meet do not let them bring their assistants too. If the meeting is for the construction team there is no need to have the administrative people there. Also the meetings should not be scheduled to go beyond 30 minutes. Make sure that everyone attending is actually able to keep on their feet for the duration, so do not try it if you have pregnant women or disabled people in your team.
• Use technology like shared Google Docs to take consolidated meeting notes. The resulting document may be polished later to turn it into a meeting minute. The now defunct Google Wave would have been a great tool but sadly Google killed it a bit too soon.
• No mini-meetings in the room, please! These are too distracting, both for the people indulging in the mini-meets as well as for the others who are interested in the main discussion.
• Do stick to the agenda. If it is a status meeting do not get side tracked into discussing problem solving options. Keep the meetings short and to the point - if you are done in a few minutes, well and good. There is no need to stay longer.
• Do not allow interruptions unless the chairman feels it to be pertinent to the discussion.
• As Google's Marissa Mayer says, discourage politics, encourage sharing of data. This means no editorializing (I like, I don't like, etc), make your point using data - unless you are in a creative team meeting!
• Hold meetings during regular work hours - lunch time meetings create resentment unless you are paying for a nice lunch. Respect other people's personal time.
• Make sure a minute of the meeting is produced shortly after the meeting is finished, summarizing key findings, action items, responsible parties and deadlines. Distribute the minutes among all interested shareholders, whether they participated in the meeting or not.

The most important thing for organizing a successful meeting doesn't happen in the meeting at all... it happens afterwords -- follow up! Follow up, follow up, follow up. Make sure that the action items from the meeting are being taken care of. A meeting is only as successful as the actions taken on the resulting items.