Tips to Conduct a Business Meeting Effectively

Meetings are essential but not all meetings are always successful. You may have sometimes got a feeling after particularly stretched out meeting, “What a sheer waste of time. Now let’s get started on work.” Meetings can go off the track if you don't plan well in advance. As the CEO, you need to be thorough and well-prepared to chair a meeting. Here are some tips to help you conduct a meeting which is effective and leads to some fruitful results:

Set a time limit

Set a time limit for the meeting. And make sure to inform everyone attending the meeting about the start-time and end-time. Be precise and try to cover all the topics within the set time. Don't stretch the meeting for too long. It gets boring and is wastage of time as well. Stick to the topics you need to cover in a meeting within a set time limit. This helps you to be more productive as well. You can take inspiration from CEO peer groups or CEO clubs where exact topics are discussed and solutions are provided by the experts within the set time.

Set an agenda

Be sure what you want to discuss in a meeting and set a clear-cut agenda for that. Send a mail to the attendees informing them about the agenda of the meeting and the planned start and end time. This will save unnecessary time of explaining to attendees why they are in a meeting and what needs to be discussed. Besides everyone who has to attend the meeting will get an idea about the topic and can prepare or review any stuff that is to be discussed.

You need to prioritize things. If certain topics can be discussed later on, you should postpone such things till the next meeting.

Be clear about the objective of meeting

Having a discussion on a subject is not enough. As a CEO, you need to clearly outline the objective of the meeting. A meeting is futile if you just discuss about the issue. You need to emphasize what goals need to be achieved and the results you are expecting from the attendees. Assign responsibilities to certain people and set deadlines for them.

Invite executives who are crucial to meeting

Don't invite everyone to the meeting. As the CEO or a senior executive, you need to figure out which people are actually required for the meeting. Calling employees for a meeting who don't have any role to play in the meeting is a sheer waste of time for the employee and the organization too as a whole.

Sum-up

Summarize the meeting by reviewing the actions that need to be taken and targets that need to be accomplished. Besides, identify once again who will be responsible for which task.

Generally for CEOs and top-level senior executives, a good amount of time is spent in meetings, making strategies and in discussions. How you utilize your time in a meeting influences your organization's future and growth.

As a CEO, you need to keep improvising and learning new things to stay ahead of competition. You can join a CEO club or a corporate executive coaching where you can share your ideas with the other experienced CEOs from the non-competing industries and get practical solutions. Being in a CEO corporate association would help you understand how to conduct a meeting effectively and get maximum results.