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🤝 Principles of meetings

This details principles for effective meetings, mainly based on two reference texts [1, 2].

🚷 Principles

Type of meetings

There are 3 purposes a meeting can have [1, 2]. To:

  1. ℹ Inform.
  2. 💬 Discuss.
  3. 🤔 Decide.

How a meeting takes place depends on what type of meeting it is.

Phases of a meeting

There are 3 phases to a meeting [1, 2]:

  • ⏳ Before.
  • 🕑 During.
  • 📡 After.

⏳ Before a meeting

  1. Decide if you need a meeting.
    • Clarify the purpose: is the meeting meant to inform, discuss or decide?
    • Write the agenda: write a precise agenda. Do not be vague.
      • Information sharing: include as much of the information in the agenda as possible.
      • Discussion: include the specific and precise discussion points in the agenda.
      • Decision: include the actual decisions, potentially as questions in the agenda.
    • Possibly reschedule: rescheduling a meeting that has no clear purpose is better than having a meeting with no clear purpose.
  2. Circulate an agenda.
  3. Share details with sufficient actionable time for all participants.
    • Where is the meeting taking place?
    • When will the meeting take place (date, start and end time)?
    • Will everyone have time to look at relevant information before the meeting takes place?

🕑 During a meeting

  1. Stay on time
  2. Identify a facilitator. Depending on the meeting purpose their role will be different:
    1. Information sharing: ensure the information is shared.
    2. Discussion: ensure all participants have ability to share their point of view. Do not let some individuals take over a meeting. As described in [1]: "provide psychological safety to encourage everyone to participate"
    3. Decision: listen and gather all relevant information. Note that the decision might not need to be a democratic one.
  3. Note actions.

📡 After a meeting

🛑 What is not a meeting?

  • A group working session is not necessarily a meeting.

References

  • [1] Felix Haller, 2021. Meeting Success Habits -- Independently published.
  • [2] Leigh Espy, 2017. Bad Meetings Happen to Good People -- Blue Room Press.

Contributing

Contributions welcome which add to these principles. Whilst anecdotal experience will not be dismissed, ideally this document should be evidence based.

Examples of best practice and any research studies on meetings are particularly appreciated.