1. Planning &
Execution
Planning &
Execution
Improving Meetings and
Productivity
Barry M Cole
cole@opsdoc.com

2. Planning &
Execution
Why Are Meetings A Productivity Issue?
In surveys to identify the biggest productivity killers,
meeting schedules are near the top of every list.
After many years guiding change in organizations around
the globe, I have often made the tongue in cheek
comment; “We live for meetings”. For many leaders, this
is an unfortunate truth.
Another unfortunate truth is that many meetings are much
less productive than they needed to be.

3. Planning &
Execution
Meeting Best Practice

4. Planning &
Execution
Why Are We Having This Meeting?
Ask the simple question at the onset of the meeting, "What is the
objective of this meeting?"
This exercise will prove invaluable in terms of ensuring everyone
is on the same page and focused on keeping the meeting on point.
Otherwise meetings regularly devolve into endless distractions
unrelated to the matter immediately at hand.
A best practice approach is that:
 The objective and expected outcome of each meeting should be
published and accepted by each invitee.
 The cultural “ground rules” must permit each invited attendee to
question whether a conversation is consistent with the meeting
objectives and call that the discussion be tabled to a later time.

5. Planning &
Execution
Who Is Driving?
Each meeting needs one person behind the wheel. If there is more
than one driver and it will be very difficult to keep the meeting on
track without an effective “wreck”.
• The primary role of this facilitator or point person is to ensure the
conversation remains relevant and that no one person (without regard
to position) ends up dominating the discussion.
• This person must have “permission” to ensure that any adjunct
discussions that arise during the course of the meeting are taken
offline.

6. Planning &
Execution
Is There a Common Language?
Take the time to define semantics (and ground rules)…. After
many years facilitating meeting, it never ceases to amaze how
often meetings go off the rails by virtue of semantic differences.
Picture a multi-national gathering without a real-time translation
and you have the right mental picture.
• It is always worth investing time upfront to ensure everyone is on the same
page in terms of what certain keywords, phrases, and concepts mean to the
various constituencies around the table.
• For ongoing meetings, creating and maintaining a reference glossary is
recommended.

7. Planning &
Execution
Why Do You Need a Scribe?
Allow the facilitator to focus on the meeting. Assign someone
other than the facilitator to take notes who is well versed in the
meeting's objectives and who has a clear understanding of context.
• This person is appointed to capture only those most salient
points. These notes should not be a “word-for-word” account,
rather a high-level record of what was discussed and agreed to.
• The goal is to avoid multiple people recalling one event in
multiple ways. Send these notes out after the meetings with a
call for agreement, additions, or corrections.
• This practice can also be particularly valuable for invitees who
weren't able to make the meeting.

8. Planning &
Execution
Is There A Best Way To End Meetings?
Summarize key action items, deliverables, and points of
accountability. Do not end a meeting without summarizing key
conclusions, stakeholder expectations, any external deliverables, and
next steps/action items with the points of accountability for each.
• This summarization is most commonly the first thing to suffer if the
meeting has run up to the wire and people are starting running off to
their next scheduled event. It is however arguably the single most
important thing you'll do at the meeting (and may quintessentially be
considered the reason for the meeting to begin with).
• Work to allow the needed time and create the discipline a ensures
attendees sit tight and remain focused while next steps are being
discussed and agreed to.

9. Planning &
Execution
Do Attendees Agree to the Meeting’s Value?
Ask what can done better….
Gather feedback at the end of meetings, particularly if it's a new
standing meeting, by asking whether or not the attendees found it
valuable and what can be done to improve it in the future.
1. Ascertain: “Is the meeting structured appropriately or even
necessary?”
2. If it is not, either change the objective, format, and/or schedule, or
take it off the calendar.

10. Planning &
Execution
A Typical Format for Agenda and Minutes

11. Planning &
Execution
Addendum:
An Alternative Approach To
Improving Meeting Value
Attribution
The following information was synthesized from previously published materials that offer real
food for thought in making your meeting more productive. Specific attribution is made to
LinkedIn’s CEO Jeff Weiner, Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezo, and materials published in Fortune
Magazine.

12. Planning &
Execution
An Approach To Increasing the Value of
Your Meetings
In addition to the best practices for meetings, I'd like share a relatively
new practice with great effect in increasing the value of meetings.
LinkedIn Corporation has essentially eliminated the meeting presentation. In lieu
of that, materials that would typically have been presented during a meeting are
sent out to participants at least 24 hours in advance to allow people to familiarize
themselves with the content.
Managers at LinkedIn understand that just because the material has been sent
doesn't mean it will be read. They have taken a page from the Amazon CEO Jeff
Bezo's book… “His fondness for the written word drives one of his primary, and
perhaps peculiar, tools for managing his company: Meetings of his senior
executive "S-team" begin with participants quietly absorbing the written word.”
Specifically, before any discussion begins, members of the team -- including
Bezos -- consume six-page printed memos in total silence for as long as 30
minutes. They scribble notes in the margins while the authors of the memos wait
for Bezos and his minions to finish reading.

13. Planning &
ExecutionThis Sounds Odd
If the idea of kicking off a meeting with minutes of silence strikes you as odd,
you're not alone. The first time you read about this practice it may immediately
conjured up images of the last practices you would equate with meeting
productivity. However, after the first few times you try it, not only won't it be
awkward -- it will be welcome. This is particularly true when meetings end
early with participants agreeing it was time well spent.
Executives at Amazon call their meeting documents "narratives," and they
realize that for the uninitiated -- and fans of the PowerPoint presentation -- the
process feels very odd. "For new employees, it's a strange initial experience," he
tells Fortune magazine. "They're just not accustomed to sitting silently in a
room and doing “study hall” with a bunch of executives." Bezos says the act of
communal reading guarantees the group's undivided attention. Writing a memo
is an even more important skill to master. "Full sentences are harder to write,"
he says: “They have verbs. The paragraphs have topic sentences.” The six-page,
narratively structured memo without clear thinking is rare – The presentation
intended to consume 60 minutes without clear thinking is not uncommon.

14. Planning &
ExecutionAdoption
LinkedIn executives adopted this practice beginning each meeting by providing
attendees roughly 5-10 minutes to read through the document or prepared deck. If
people have already read it, this gives them an opportunity to refresh their memory,
identify areas they'd like to go deeper on, or even clarify the position that they
intend to put forward.
Once folks have completed the reading, it's time to open it up for discussion. There
is no presentation. It's important to stay vigilant on this point as most people who
prepared the materials will reflexively begin presenting. If you are concerned about
appearing insensitive by not allowing individuals who worked hard on the materials
to have their moment, constructively remind the group this is a new practice that is
being applied to the entire company and will benefit all meeting attendees, including
the artist formerly known as The Presenter.
If the material has been well thought out and simply and intuitively articulated,
chances are the need for clarifying questions will be kept to a minimum. In these
situations, you may be pleasantly surprised to see a meeting that had been scheduled
for an hour is actually over after 20-30 minutes.

15. Planning &
ExecutionWhy This Works
Of course, even the best prepared material may reach a highly
contentious recommendation or conclusion. However, the good
news is meeting attendees will now be able to dig into the subject
matter and share their real opinions rather than waste time
listening to an endless re-hashing of points they're already familiar
with, or worse still find irrelevant or redundant.
With the presentation eliminated, the meeting can now be
exclusively focused on generating a valuable discourse: Providing
shared context, diving deeper on particularly cogent data and
insights, and perhaps most importantly, having a meaningful
debate.