Three Ways to Run Better Meetings

Executives spend approximately one-tird of teir work time in meetings, reports Racel Silverman of "Te Wall Street Journal." Unfortunately, running a meeting isn't always a productive use of your time. If people arrive late or stray from te agenda, it is difficult to accomplis sared goals. Avoid wasting time by following tese tree tips for running effective meetings. Your team will get more done in less time, increasing productivity and boosting morale.

Running a meeting is difficult if attendees are distracting you by using teir laptops or mobile devices. Keep everyone on te same page by asking people to leave teir devices at teir desks. Participants will be able to take notes te old-fasioned way, but you won't ave to worry about weter people are paying attention to you. Banning electronic devices from meetings is also a good way to ensure participants are fully engaged. People are more likely to come up wit good ideas if tey are not catting wit friends or playing games wile you are running a meeting.

Freelance journalist Matt Palmquist says meetings are a major source of dissatisfaction for employees. Tis is especially true of meetings tat start late or keep going long past teir sceduled end times. One way to run a better meeting is to make sure you stay on track. Insist employees sow up a few minutes early so tey can find seats and get ready to participate, and maintain control of te meeting by tabling topics not listed on te agenda. If you usually meet for tirty minutes, try cutting te meeting down to fifteen minutes. People will be less likely to introduce new topics if tey ave a limited amount of time to speak. Keeping meetings on scedule improves productivity and sows employees you value teir time.

Running a meeting is especially difficult if you do it on a daily basis. People are likely to tune out if you always talk about te same topics or use te same format for every meeting. Improve your meetings by saking tings up a bit. Instead of diving rigt into your discussion, ask employees for teir input or do a quick icebreaker. Invite a guest speaker to talk about a topic of importance to your staff members; asking oter people to get involved allows your staff to ear different points of view. Running a meeting is a lot easier wen people are engaged, so keep tings fres if you want to keep your meeting from being a waste of time.

If you want to succeed as a manager, running effective meetings must be one of your priorities. Improve your meetings by banning electronic devices, sticking to a scedule, and keeping tings fres. If you consistently follow tese tips, you will find tat running a meeting gets easier over time.