Quick Tip - Effective Meetings Earn a ProfitWritten by Steve Kaye
Most people treat meetings as a free resource that can be used to deal with any issue. As a result, huge amounts of time and money are wasted on trivia. A meeting is a business activity (not a social event) and should be designed to earn a profit. Here’s how. Once you’ve prepared goals for your meetings, use following analysis to plan agenda. 1) Calculate cost of meeting by multiplying number of participants (N), their labor rate (R), and length of meeting (t). Then add all other expenses (E), including travel, materials, refreshments, room rental, and other expenses. Cost = N * R * t + E 2) Estimate value of results expected from meeting. For some issues this step will be easy. Resolving a manufacturing inefficiency, for example, could save thousands of dollars. Or developing an effective strategic plan could earn millions.
| | Quick Tip - Effective Meetings Begin With a GoalWritten by Steve Kaye
Goals are critically important for success of a meeting. You must know what you want so you can ask for it. And participants need to know what you want so they can help you get it. Without goals, a meeting becomes a journey without a destination.Unfortunately, many meetings are called without goals. So, you hear people start meetings by saying, “Well, what do you want to talk about?” This is similar to walking into a factory and asking, “Well, what do you want to make?” You could end up with anything from ant farms to xylophones. Thus, your first step is to write out a statement of results that you want to have by end of meeting. I want to emphasize that you must write out goals for meeting. This forces you to define exactly what you want. Certainly, if you’re unable to express your goals on paper, you can expect to have difficultly explaining what you want to attendees.
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