Meetings taking too much time? Web 2.0 your meetings - Jorbb shows you how

How to conduct effective meetings (Web 2.0 style)

Meetings are always important in all types of businesses and companies. You might have participated in many meetings and sometimes, you may be obliged to conduct meetings. As a top performer, you have to know how to conduct meetings effectively. There are a lot of aspects that you have to consider while conducting meetings. The first thing you should consider is the necessity of the meeting. If the task can be accomplished without meetings, then you need not waste the resources. However, if meeting becomes very important, try to organize effective meetings.

1. Decide the start and end time of the meeting. Depending on the persons you are going to invite, you have to make this decision. You have to decide the duration of the meeting based on its purpose. If you have participants from other timezones, use World Clock Meeting planner to find a common time. Video conferencing is made easy with new web2.0 sites such as Orgoo, Vyew, Snapyap, TokBox.

2. Invite all the people for the meeting and communicate the timings to them. Ensure that the invitees will be present during the meeting. Try Vyew as it includes scheduling / ad hoc invites.
   

3. Use Google Docs to prepare an agenda for the meeting so that everyone can edit 1 single document online. You can also create an open agenda and stick to whiteboard. The participants can add their agenda but they should take the lead during that agenda. After getting suggestions, you decide on what is to be discussed during the meeting.

4. You have to take the lead during the meeting. Know about your audience and talk in their language.

5. Decide who is going to speak what during the meeting. This will help you in taking up the lead position and you can let the non speakers speak up during their turn.

6. For 1-2 hours meetings, do a time check at fixed intervals e.g. 15mins. If meeting is behind time, cover important matters first, and leave the rest to be discussed via email / next meeting. If you are arranging for longer meetings, make sure that you break the schedule for 15 minutes after 2 hours of meeting. The participants can refresh themselves during the break.

7. When you conduct formal meetings, the decisions should be made in the meeting with the opinions of the majority of the people. You can use online editors such as FineTuna and Skitch to allow participants to comment live on images / proposals etc. Vyew allows you to prepare and save slides for commenting before a meeting.
   

8. You must be ready for inclusions during the meeting. The participants may come up with certain new things that can be added to the discussion. You can add the program if it can be completed within the scheduled time. Otherwise, postpone it until the next discussion.
   
   
9. Use Google Docs or Business-in-a-Box to mantain the Minutes of Meeting live, during the meeting itself so that no additional time is needed to distribute / edit / proof the minutes.
   

Image courtesy of Dilbert.
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