Rene
Kaluza of the St. Cloud Times developed a workshop to make
newsroom meetings shorter and more productive. Following are
the outline and handouts for the workshop, along with a form
used in planning meetings.
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Meaningful
Meetings
A. Calculate
the cost of meetings
1. Each participant
calculates the # of hours spent in meetings, hourly rate, percentage
of their week in meetings.
2. Is the benefit worth the time?
B. Participants
list what they think are characteristics of a good meeting.
C. Meeting planning
form
1. Hand out and
ask them to choose one of the meeting they attend/lead and keep it in
mind as we go through the discussion.
D. Review objectives
1. Make regular
meetings more productive
2. Shorten
time in meetings
3. Raise
level of creativity
4. Reduce
the number of meetings
E. Roles at
a meeting
1. Leader
a. Prepare
agenda
b. Move
the meeting along
c. Keep
it relevant
d. Provide
the wrap-up
2. Participant
a. Come prepared
b. Pay
attention
c. Participate
without repeating
d. Keep
it brief, relevant and focused
e. Be
courtesy
3. Handout
(click here
for a copy of the handouts)
F. Keys to a
productive meeting
1. Need
a. Real business
– re-examine regular meetings for need
b. Key
people present
2. Purpose
a. Everyone
attending should understand purpose/goal of meeting.
b. Everyone
should understand their role and come prepared to do it.
3. Agenda
a. Defines
the priority of issues, establishes discussion topics and the expected
action.
b. Set
times to move discussion along, prevent side conversations. People
can arrive when their input is relevant.
c. Allow
flexibility.
d. Distribute
in advance so every meeting isn't a brainstorming session. People
will come with all materials ready and meeting doesn't stall because
of missing pieces.
4. Courtesy
a. Leader sets
the tone and level of courtesy.
b. Come
prepared
c. Allow
for variety of opinions and ideas
d. Avoid
repetition
5. Timeliness
a. Begin and
end on time, especially regular meetings.
b. Can
set time to affect the poor habits of attendees.
c. Define
cost-per-minute of meeting
6. Action
a. Summary
is key
b. Define
an action plan
c. Define
each person's role
d. Review/wrap-up
e. Set
next meeting
7. Handout
G. Plan
a productive meeting using planning form (click
here for a copy of a
meeting planning form).
H. Training
evaluation
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