How to Improve Meeting Culture at Your Company

Workplace meetings are crucial for successful business management. Effective meetings enable communication, information flow, problem-solving, and teamwork building. However, for many employees, meetings are a rather dreaded obligation. With the manager taking forever to finish and workers slowly losing concentration, time spent in the conference room seems like a waste. To prevent experiences from occurring in the future, look for ways to improve meeting culture at your company. Basically, meeting culture is all about meeting practices, both good and bad.

If you want to improve the meeting culture at your company, take a closer look at these practices. It is important to be able to understand what you are doing wrong.

With this knowledge, you can start looking for adequate solutions. These include proper time management, keeping a meeting agenda, and leaving enough time for questions during each meeting.

Below, you will find tips that will help you improve meeting culture at your company. If you use these, gone are the days of wasting your own and your employees time. Not only will you make employees happier, but it may lead them to become more productive.

Make Sure to Book the Conference Room Properly

One of the biggest reasons meetings are a waste of time is because they are poorly planned. For instance, it is common for managers at big companies to book a conference room without the help of conference room booking software, causing employees to end up with a room without proper equipment. This equipment is imperative, and can include speakers, a projector screen, and even a podium to stand behind. This can lead to frustration among attendees, who might not be able to hear what is being said.

To prevent such situations from occurring, you need to thoroughly check the conference room that you booked. Do this prior to the start of the meeting. If you are not going to be the one booking a conference room, ask the person who is going to be doing it to choose a room with enough chairs for each attendee. Also make sure it has the right equipment for the meeting like a projector and a projector screen.

While this seems like a trivial task, properly booking a conference room is a great way to improve meeting culture at your company.

Prepare a Meeting Agenda

One of the best ways to improve meeting culture at your company is to prepare an agenda. Meetings are meant to tackle certain tasks and have a clear purpose. If you do not plan a meeting in advance and it is really disorganized, it might be hard for its organizer to achieve the goal that the meeting was set to achieve. This can make the entire meeting pointless.

As the minutes go by, attendees might stop paying attention and start feeling frustrated, seeing that the meeting is going nowhere. To avoid ending up in such a situation, you need to set an agenda for each meeting. Also be sure that you stick to it.

The first step in preparing a meeting agenda is to establish the purpose of the meeting. Next, figure out what you can do to achieve it. After this, you can proceed with planning everything out, including the topics that you wish to cover and allocated time. This way, it will be easier for you to keep everyone from going off-topic. It will also ensure that the meeting focuses on the important issues.

Lastly,, when preparing the agenda, do not overload it with information. Try to keep it short and simple. You do not want people to leave the meeting tired and frustrated. Instead, ensure that the meeting is as short as possible so that each attendee can stay engaged and focused both during and after the meeting.

Leave Enough Time for Questions

It is crucial that you leave time for questions at the end of each meeting. Planning time that allows attendees to have an open discussion is a great way to improve meeting culture at your company. People may want clarification on something that was said earlier. Plus, they might want to ask about something connected to what you were talking about. Ideally, you should allocate at least a few minutes at the end of every single meeting for questions. 

Also, it is a great idea to ask for feedback after each meeting. Ideally, you should do it in the form of an anonymous questionnaire. That way, people will be more willing to share their thoughts with you. This can also be a great opportunity for you to understand what you can do to improve organizing meetings.

Practice Effective Communication

Effective communication is the key to making meetings successful. In order to achieve this, managers need to set clear expectations for the meeting. Also, those holding the meetings need to be sure that everyone understands the message.

In case you are not able to make yourself understood, you can use visual aids, such as charts, graphs, and slide decks. In addition, avoid using overly complicated language and speak at a pace that is not too fast and not too slow.

Create More Inclusive Meetings

Inclusive meetings are much more productive than exclusionary ones, as people feel more involved and engaged. But what is an inclusive meeting? In short, an inclusive meeting is one in which every member of your team is able to contribute ideas and information to the discussion. 

For example, it is a great idea to ask potential attendees to come up with topics for discussion before the meeting starts. This way, they will feel involved in the process and better understand the issues you need to tackle.

Ways to Improve Meeting Culture at Your Company – Summary

Meetings are essential for proper business management, but only if done right. If a meeting is chaotic, they can end up being unproductive and a waste of time.

With this in mind, you should start looking for ways to improve the meeting culture at your company. To start off, you need to keep in mind that any meaningful changes will not happen overnight. It takes time and effort to improve meeting culture at your company, no matter the size.

Ideally, you should establish goals and objectives for meeting culture improvement and carefully plan your meetings so that they are as effective and efficient as possible. The tips listed above should help you take care of it in no time!