Tips for Improving the Productivity in Meeting Rooms
Even before the pandemic, and the remote working directive, meetings were a bone of contention.
Do we need to have as many as we do? Will an email suffice? Was that meeting as productive as we’d hoped?
Meetings can be a colossal waste of time. And now, more than ever, as we conduct the majority of them online, aligning, and solving problems in said timeslots might even harder. In fact, it’s often akin to herding cats in there.
There are, however, things that you as the meeting owner can do, to bring a modicum of focus and direction back into the meeting space. These pointers can be applied to remote meetings, and, as lockdown eases and we start to slowly head back, you can start to introduce them into the physical meeting room, too.
Meeting Rooms – How to Restore Order, if Things Get Messy
To ensure a productive, ordered meeting, certain preparations must be undergone initially, to establish house rules:
An Agenda
Before the meeting, have a clear objective in mind, write that down, and share it with attendees as an agenda.
When the people in the meeting space know the touchpoints, they can focus to solve each in turn.
Phones Off
For a meeting not to get muddled, and be productive, each attendee must be on full focus. Establish a no-phone policy while in rooms of the meeting space – physical and digital. Members who are on their phones aren’t focused on solutions – the meeting will flatten in no time, as a result.
No More Than 10
Keep any given physical or virtual meeting to a maximum of 10 people. We’re in a pandemic, yes, so this will do a lot to stay within covid regulations when at the office. More so, however, is that with a smaller attendance, focus can be maintained on having the right people, with the right skills in the room, to better solve the problem.
Short and Sweet
Unless an important brainstorm or business crisis, meetings don’t need to go on for hours. Establish the problem, work to solve it, and then let the right people go off to implement the work.
Meeting efficiency is a breeder of productivity.
Not for the Sake of it
Again, can everything you want to achieve be communicated in an email? Time is money, and meetings take time. If you can spare your workforce the often-derailing process of meeting prep with a clear solution or directive in an email, rather do that.
For more on how to be better and more streamlined at meetings, contact FutureSpace now. We have the remote working infrastructure and workspace efficiency guidance for you.