Mary-Clare Tomes

The agenda is a key business tool that we use to drive our business meetings and ensure that we achieve our business objectives. However, all too often either a standard agenda is used e.g.
1. Welcome & Introductions
2. Actions from the last meeting
3. Departmental Feedback sessions
4. Summary and close
… or it has been put together at the last minute with little or no thought behind it.
Here are 10 tips to create agendas that provide the framework for successful meetings:

1. Set the objectives: it sounds obvious but even if it is a regular meeting, ensure that you are clear what the specific objectives for the meeting are.
2. Prioritise the topics … be ruthless here … which topics are critical to the success of the meeting, would some topics be best covered in another forum? List all the topics that could contribute to achieving the objectives. and invite participants to submit ideas for inclusion (ensure you give a strict deadline for submitting ideas) then systematically sift through to select only the most critical and then rank these.
3. Ensure there is a logical flow … when agenda’s jump around from strategic issues to operational issues, it becomes confusing. I have experienced a meeting when we switched from discussing a major acquisition opportunity to the new sales reps’ car policy and then onto new product development discussions.
4. Do not cram the agenda … be realistic about what can be covered … cover less thoroughly rather than a long list superficially. Build in breaks so people can deal with urgent issues rather than participants being distracted during the meeting.
5. Provide Focus and Templates for Feedback: Ensure that feedback and updates are aligned to the purpose and objectives of the meeting. I have been in meetings where the country head gave their quarterly update … we started off bright and bushy tailed with Angola … but the time we got to Zimbabwe, 11 updates later we were losing the will to live!
6. Define the timing: allocate the suggested timing for each item on the agenda … it allows the chair to move discussions forward if no progress is being made.
7. Ensure Participation: review the agenda … is everyone required for the whole meeting, if not either excuse them or assign a specific role such as chairing that section, taking notes etc. Meetings lose energy and focus when people become disengaged.
8. Preparation time: ensure that the agenda and feedback templates are circulated well in advance … ideally 10 days
9. Deal with action and matters arising prior to the meeting: these can often get the meeting off to a negative and slow start … I remember a meetings where there are the same outstanding actions were discussed for two years!. Ask participants to provide a written update prior to the meeting, and park issues that will that absorb too much time and do not contribute to the core objectives to be dealt with in a different forum.
10. Define the rules: If meetings are to be effective they need to command respect, meetings that regularly start late, are frequently cancelled, and key players often skip, rarely deliver results.