One of the interesting aspects of moving from a development role to QA is that I have become much more involved in managing process rather than just managing projects. Part of this is the nature of QA and part of it is the result of going from having to just manage my own work to having to coordinate a team of 25 people. Process now becomes just as important as technology to get the most out of each day. In today’s world I am asked to respond to changing needs at an ever increasing pace. And while we now live in a much more connected (social) world, meetings still form an important part of these processes. They allow decisions and consensus to be reached amongst teams and other related groups of people. That is why we still need events like Lotusphere. There are still some important things that are best done by taking people away from their desks and daily tasks and putting them together (hopefully physically) to focus on discussion about important topics.

I was recently reminded of the experience I had working for a large company in Australia with over 100,000 employees. As you can imagine with a company of that size it had accumulated a lot of inefficient processes. They decided to make a significant investment to improve those processes. One of the key areas that were identified to be addressed was meetings. Not only where meetings found to consume a significant proportion of many people’s time, it was established that the outcomes of meetings had a huge impact on the operating performance of the organization.

1. Take the average salary of an employee and double it to factor in the costs of providing an employee a desk, keeping them happy, and the opportunity cost of not having them doing something else. Multiply that by the number of people you have in a meeting and you soon start to see the true cost of each meeting.
2. Don’t schedule meetings without considering the availability of attendees. If you don’t your meeting may trigger any number of other meetings having to be rescheduled, or you having to reschedule this one. Lotus Notes has an awesome capability of displaying the availability of attendees and finding suitable time slots. Not everyone uses it. Of course this only works if everyone keeps their availability updated at all times.
3. Insist that meetings start on time. If key people vital to the success of the meeting don’t arrive within five minutes of the starting time, reschedule for a later time. It becomes too expensive to have people sitting around doing nothing, even for 15 minutes. If meetings start being cancelled you find attendees are more likely to be on time, reducing the need for further cancellations. If there are no vital people missing start the meeting on time. People who arrive late soon learn the importance of being on time. Note: Allow 2-3 minutes for people having time devices that are out by a minute or two (in those days these were always watches!)
4. It is even more important to end meetings on time than to start them on time. The ripple effect of meetings ending late is enormous as attendees from one meeting will often flow into a range of meetings being held immediately following ,causing these meetings to be late or rescheduled.
5. Don’t schedule meetings to run 30 minutes, 60 minutes etc. Instead schedule them to run for 25 minutes, 55 minutes etc. People need time to transition from one meeting to another. They need bio breaks and the chance to check their messages or maybe just the chance to collect their thoughts for the next meeting. Note: This doesn’t work unless meetings end on time!
6. Make the most of meeting time by keeping the content of the meeting focused on just those things that can only be done during the meeting. Meetings are not an effective way to present new information and then expect people to absorb that information in real time. Wherever possible ensure people are provided with as much information as possible beforehand so they can absorb it and provided meaningful dialog during the meeting where ideas can be discussed , debated and decisions made.
7. No Surprises!  Meetings tend to be more effective if there are no surprises in the meeting to which everyone must react/adjust.
8. Always have an agenda for the meeting, and stick to it. People can only be well prepared for a meeting if they have a clear understanding of what is to be discussed. Attendees have the chance to seek additional information and clarification before the meeting rather than wasting everyone’s time while in the meeting. Sometimes attendees may be able to suggest additional/alternative attendees that will lead to the meeting being more effective.
9. Keep meetings on track. Too many meetings get bogged down discussing side issues or detailed discussions between a small set of attendees that is often better taken offline rather than wasting the time of others at the meeting. Add up the cost of having all the other people tied up merely observing those private discussions.
10. Before the meeting ends take the time to recap the key decisions made and the action items that were assigned during the meeting to ensure everyone is clear of the meeting outcomes and their responsibilities coming out of the meeting. If the meeting is part of a series of meetings start the next meeting with a review of the action items to ensure they have been completed. If action items vital to this meeting were not completed reschedule the meeting to a later time.
11. Keep regular meetings to the same time/day. Too many times there is someone who participates in a series of meetings who feels his/her time is more important than everyone else’s and every time they have a scheduling conflict they force everyone else to reschedule to accommodate them. This often causes everyone else to have to reschedule other meetings resulting in chaos. Notes may be a great tool for helping you find suitable time slots for a meeting but it still can’t deal with the issues caused by having an attendee list where there is no common empty time slot. The solution… Force yourself to schedule new meetings that don’t impact on the schedule of others or train delegates who are empowered to represent you at meetings where you have a conflict.

Sadly I feel I may have forgotten some of the key points/recommendations made that are still highly relevant to what I am trying to deal with in my current role. Too often I am guilty of merely thinking of a meeting title, selecting an attendee list, and finding a time slot that is empty for everyone.  I click send and my task is complete. I may be scheduling plenty of meetings, but I can probably be doing a lot more to conduct effective meetings. Meetings that don’t waste quite as much of the company’s time. Meetings in which I have empowered attendees to make effective contributions leading to better outcomes for my employer.

So how are the meetings you attend or organize? Are there things you do, or can do, that make a difference?