Cooperation is the key to successful work at both large and small businesses. Many employees sometimes consider Board Meetings to be a routine and boring way of interaction. Check how to make a Board Meeting schedule in the article below.
The Importance of the Board Meeting for Your Company
Regardless of how often and in what form they are held, ineffective Board Meetings can only be a waste of your most valuable resources – time and people. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that American companies lose billions of dollars each year due to unnecessary meetings.
For managers, holding a Board Meeting is a routine matter. But few people think about the fact that 50 percent of meetings are a waste of time because, for most employees, the information provided or the issues discussed are not necessary or interesting. Therefore, each Board Meeting must be clearly planned and contain the necessary information for all its participants.
Effective Board Meetings are used as feedback from the staff. However, the main goal of the meeting should be to increase the effectiveness of the work process both for an individual employee and for the entire company. Make sure you really need a meeting before scheduling one. Maybe the question can be solved in 10 minutes by phone or e-mail?
Which Are the Three Main Steps of the Board Meeting Schedule?
The Board Meeting should have a schedule. It is not needed for a tick but so that meeting participants understand what will be discussed. When you have many parallel projects, it can be difficult to guess what the meeting will be about from the meeting name alone. It is impossible to prepare for such meetings.
Follow three main steps to make a Board Meeting schedule:
- Create a document in which all topics for discussion and decision are listed.
- Be critical: only select topics that affect the entire board.
- Complete this list with other mandatory agenda items like approval of the minutes and any other business.
Board Meetings are now held with all physically present in the same room or even with virtual participants. Invitees from different parts of the world and from different time zones, can be at the meeting in the format of an online meeting. Nowadays, only the time and not the venue are often determined for the meeting. Meetings limited only in time are more convenient to attend, but this does not mean that there should be more of them.
Methods of Conducting an Effective Board Meeting
There are several strategies that can come in handy when conducting multi-faceted meetings. Each of the methods will definitely help to solve this or that problem in the shortest possible time:
- Exchange of ideas. Each employee expresses his position and offers a solution to a specific task. Based on the received opinions, the team can form a single correct decision and a complete picture of the project.
- Report. One participant gives a speech on a certain topic. It is important that the report or presentation takes no more than seven minutes. After all, this is exactly the time during which listeners are able to hold their attention on average.
- Discussion. Any of the participants can take the floor and start the discussion, but it is not necessary for everyone to participate. This method is useful when the problem has already been discussed, and everyone has had the opportunity to speak.