
How to run a meeting (1976) - trendoid
https://hbr.org/1976/03/how-to-run-a-meeting
======
cgio
My take: 0) invite the right people 1) send all relevant reading material 2
days before meeting 2) have an agenda for the meeting - in the invitation 3)
agree who runs the meeting 4) follow the agenda, keep a log of issues that
hijack the discussion but leave it at that and keep on with the subject 5)
document decisions 6) send email with decisions/actions

Not that complex. I run meetings quite often, and they always work fine. Now
workshops are a different think...

~~~
slgeorge
Yeah, I think "send all the relevant reading materials before hand" is great,
and I'd add "and make sure everyone reads them" which is a cultural thing.

Another great one is to differentiate between items which are 'for decision'
and those that are 'for discussion' \- it sets expectations. If something is
'for decision' then the max-4-sides reading materials should cover all aspects
(pros/cons) and it should be possible to make a decision from the materials.

If something is 'for discussion' then the meeting is going to contribute to
the reading materials so there will be missing parts, or perhaps controversies
that need to be hammered out in the meeting.

~~~
drdeadringer
How does one "make sure everyone reads" the material? Issuing a pop quiz is
popular amongst only school teachers.

~~~
slgeorge
Yes, that's what I meant by this this is a "cultural thing". In some
organisations turning up to a meeting and not having done the pre-work would
be unacceptable, in others it's not. It's something that the whole group has
to buy into.

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dammitcoetzee
There are sections of this that overlap with how I treat meetings, but overall
it seems like a bunch of verbal fluff that's the opposite of what a meeting
should be. Exceedingly clear, short, and purposeful.

I learned a more pragmatic, even meeting-hostile approach to meetings:
[http://hackaday.com/2016/10/06/life-on-contract-how-to-
have-...](http://hackaday.com/2016/10/06/life-on-contract-how-to-have-a-
meeting/)

~~~
sitkack
The hackaday article is close, but not complete.

    
    
      1. The Problem, communicated in advance, understood by all parties
      2. The Exit Condition
      3. Time Boxed
      4. The Actionable tasks, when they will be done, who they are communicated to
    

When the exit condition is satisfied, the meeting is over. If the time
allotted to the box goes over, the meeting is over. Once the exit condition is
satisfied, tasks are allotted with clear timelines and points of contact. The
meeting is run by _someone_, that person gets consensus when the exit criteria
is met and is often the point of contact for the follow up tasks. The person
running the meeting does research and communicates that research to the
attendees. Any attendee not familiar with the research before the meeting
starts is asked to leave. If it is determined that something is unknown and
needs more research, those tasks are handed out and the meeting is reconvened
at a later date. The meeting date is scheduled immediately.

~~~
irontoby
"Time Boxed" needs to mean boxed on _both ends_. If a meeting is scheduled to
start at 2:00, it starts at 2:00. Not 2:05, not when the last person wanders
in, and not when the organizer figures out how to run the projector. The
implied task there is that any setup should be done prior to the start time.

Nothing is more frustrating than company cultures which allow the "meetings
never start on time, so I'll show up late" / "not everyone is here on time so
I'll wait a few more minutes" death spiral. It's like a game of chicken to see
who thinks their time is more valuable than everyone else's.

~~~
carlisle_
This is a much more difficult problem at large companies where meeting rooms
can be a scarce resource, and other meetings that run long can negatively
impact yours.

Having a plan for the meeting and having everybody trying to keep the meeting
short helps a lot. I think if you're in a place where you need to write ground
rules for meeting there's a larger cultural problem that needs to be
addressed.

~~~
jermaustin1
I couldn't agree more. At my company, we have a few thousand employees spread
across 2 main locations in the same city and 25 smaller offices. BUT we only
have 12 full sized conference rooms and 4 that only seat 5. So we end up
scheduling meetings more around conference room availability than person
availability, and then we have people having to walk/bike/cab/uber a mile (or
more) from another location to get to this meeting on time.

Scheduling meetings around employees (especially management), vendors and
conference rooms is one of the biggest challenges we face for meeting times.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Try Sococo - virtual conference rooms. I swear, its better than everybody
sitting in a physical room. You can see, hear, share docs, chat, form
subgroups and regroup fluidly.

Caveat: I own stock (used to work there)

~~~
jermaustin1
We have this through various other tools, but it will never kill off the need
for face to face communications. Drawing on the white board, throwing markers
at each other, two people presenting ideas at the same time.

This is especially difficult during technical integration meetings, where you
are tossing around ideas left and right.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Sococo does all but the 'throwing markers' part.

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hkon
How meetings are run:

1) Wait 5 to 10 minutes for everyone to join

2) Spend additional 5 minutes getting your computer hooked into the projector
and shared with remote participants

3) Read through your powerpoint

4) Ask for feedback. Receive comments about your choice of font for the
powerpoint.

5) Thank everyone for the meeting and head to the next one.

~~~
lh7
> Receive comments about your choice of font for the powerpoint.

That would be 2.5, they will be unsolicited, and yes, your font really _is_
too small.

2.6 is where you spend another five minutes faffing about with the font size
until everyone is happy.

(which is why I rarely use slides and even more rarely put any text in them)

(but if you're demoing anything on a computer screen, the same applies)

~~~
teekert
You also forgot to label your axes and you have to discuss the points that
were decided on last time, but not everyone agreed with!

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scrabble
This is helpful for me. I serve on a local board and this very much describes
the type of discourse that occurs there. For reference, we run the meetings
according to Bourinot's rules of order: [https://www.amazon.com/Bourinots-
Rules-Order-Assemblies-Shar...](https://www.amazon.com/Bourinots-Rules-Order-
Assemblies-Shareholders-
ebook/dp/B004JN1CGK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1481744194&sr=8-1&keywords=bourinot%27s+rules+of+order)

By the same token, this is not terrible useful for me in terms of work
meetings which are extremely informal in comparison. They are also intended to
achieve a different goal.

I'd say that both types of meetings are appropriate for their goals, but I've
also been surprised at just how effective the more formal meetings have been
in achieving progress and consensus.

------
ThomPete
I avoid meetings like the plague. Even when I was running a company with 80
people I would ask if I was necessary or my input was necessary. If not I
wouldn't accept.

Meetings are like teamwork trips. They are the illusion of progress.

There are situations where they are necessary but nothing beat ongoing
discussions around actual work.

~~~
zeveb
Did you read the full article? Meetings are where a group comes together and
adds to its knowledge as a group. Nowadays we have things like IRC, which lets
us do a lot remotely, but there's nothing like sitting in a room with other
people to examine an issue.

 _Poorly-run_ meetings give the illusion of progress, but I posit that well-
run meetings are actually a good thing. They shouldn't be gab-fests; they
should be intentional, with reasons for existing and with some sort of output
(e.g. 'the design for the new subsystem' or 'the team will understand and be
prepared to address the causes for our failure to ship').

~~~
ThomPete
Yes i did and i dont agree with that description of meetings in reality.
Nothing beats working side by side, but meetings is not working side by side
its mostly talking about things which could be communicated in a mail.

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john_gaucho
Just a couple of days ago I was thinking about this topic exactly.

Considering that I spend upwards of 2 hours per day in meetings it is amazing
how little time I have dedicated into thinking about how to make meetings more
efficient. I don't think I'm the only one to make this mistake. Just because
you have 5 people sitting in a room talking does not mean we are going
anywhere or we are making any decisions.

Does anybody have a book recommendation where I can read more about how to
maximize productivity of meetings?

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phailhaus
Wow, what an obnoxious page header. It takes up a quarter of the screen on my
laptop!

~~~
jwalton
And, it makes it yet another web site where page-down fails to go one page
down.

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edoceo
There was an old book on the topic. Roberts Rules of Order

~~~
ap22213
It'd be hilarious if one of my co-workers tried to break out the ole Roberts
Rules at a typical meeting.... Meetings are bad enough.

~~~
zeveb
That's the thing — the rules of order are intended to make meetings function
smoothly, even when the attendees _hate_ one another.

And the rules themselves anticipate that not every meeting needs to use every
rule. The basic ideas are good ones (e.g. record minutes of the meeting or the
chairman should run the meeting but not take sides).

~~~
walshemj
Maybe he should you need a chair who will to take a stand and enforce the
rules.

------
majc2
A related classic take on how to run meetings:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46BFYo4drLc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46BFYo4drLc)

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disposablezero
-9) Keep everyone productive and focused... scarcity = prioritization

-8) Eliminate boat anchors wasting time of previous with non-value-add bullshit.

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ap22213
Off topic, but I'm so glad that writing has gotten more concise over the last
40 years.

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epynonymous
interesting that this is from 1976 and still applies to 2016, but does it
apply to startup companies?

here are my takes on meetings in general, some correlated to the article's
sentiments:

1\. avoid meetings when possible, avoid them like the plague. as a meeting
organizer, you need to be very clear about your objective/goal for the
meeting, so don't be too liberal with other people's time, but this also means
when being asked to attend a meeting, cancelling or rejecting the ones you
deem to be useless. learn to just say "no". as an engineer i feel this
sometimes lowers your favorability in the eyes of managers or peers, but this
sets the right culture and tone, if you're in a company where you attend a lot
of useless meetings, i feel for you.

2\. avoid meetings when possible

3\. avoid meetings when possible

4\. for decision making meetings, limit the number, preferably <= 3, the more
people you add, the more opinions you have to filter which sets things back.
lots of my key decisions are done in private with one person. ever go into
that meeting with 11 people in the room, all ready to say something for the
sake of saying something? run, run as fast as you can!

5\. always list actions triggered from the meeting and follow up on them
adamantly with owners assigned before leaving the room. the meetings where
there's a lot of talk, but then everyone leaves without clear ownership are a
waste of time.

6\. for developers, it's important to recognize that they maybe in "the zone",
so if i must have a meeting with developers, i try to organize this during the
beginning or end of the day, meetings during the middle of day tend to break
them out of the zone, then they have to context switch back to that deep
problem that they were thinking about which would be a huge productivity fail
on everyone's part.

7\. keep things concise, we're not here to small talk about families or the
warriors, do that at the water cooler. some people use this as an ice breaker
to relax the mood, but that is just potentially a cover up for some big shit
storm about to happen.

8\. for the meetings where you're trying to pass down information, keep it
concise again, ok to reiterate key messaging, believe the shit that you're
saying, have conviction.

9\. keep track of time, i hate all the assholes that overrun meeting times, i
tend to attend these meetings less and less, if they can't prove that they can
hold effective meetings then you lose my time.

10\. know thy audience, what messaging do you want to give, what messaging do
you hope they digest, and tailor it, don't talk about stuff that 80% of the
people don't care about, you're wasting people's time.

11\. the good ol' status meeting, everyone and their mother attends to get a
feel for what others are working on, but has absolutely no pertinence to what
i need to get done or have done. really keep things high level, this is not
your chance to voice your opinion, or give people the illusion that you're
busy. just talk about the high level points, if you have stuff to resolve,
don't do it in the meeting, do it offline, ahead of the meeting.

12\. prepare well for meetings, i used to think that i could just waltz in and
improvise, no, you need to prepare well, if you have a 1h meeting with 5
people, that's 6h of company time being spent, almost a full person day spent.
you better be ready and you better get to the point.

13\. be on time, every minute wasted is amplified by the number of people
waiting. i usually issue punishment for the ones that come in late, sometimes
just the latest, sometimes everyone who's late, buy coffee, do pushups,
whatever it is.

14\. i have a no phone and laptop policy in my meetings, sure you could be one
of those new fangled flower power children that like to take notes on
ipad/surface, or evernote on your laptop, but don't do that. you should,
however, bring in a paper notebook. i know you have photographic memory, but
bring that notebook, means you're well prepared and expecting something out of
the meeting. i had a friend that brought his laptop to play nba live to his
harvard law school class. i also had this senior director during a 3 on 1
interview doodle penises on his laptop while the candidate was talking.
there's potential for a lot of mistrust in these circumstances. i think for
the meeting owner to project onto a screen is obviously fine, but there's
nothing concealed. assholes that answer phone calls or email during my
meetings, unless you're sre/devops, should be banned from meetings. the goal
should be to get out of the meeting as quickly as possible, everyone focused,
if you cannot focus then things will drag on.

15\. avoid meetings if possible...

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jcooke89
'an all-electronic, multichannel, microwave, fiber-optic video display dream
console in his living room' ..phroar!

