Facilitating Effective Meetings

About this course

Meetings are often seen as one of the biggest time wasters. The problem is not the actual meeting, but rather how the meeting is managed. Poor planning and facilitation are guaranteed to result in a nonproductive meeting and a waste of company resources. 

According to Forbes, "Effective meetings produce useful results. Effective meetings have high participation, good energy, constructive collaboration, and meaningful conversations. In short, effective meetings are those which tap into the wisdom, expertise, and energy of the group. Effective meetings are interactive and valuable to both the meeting leader and the meeting attendees. Effective meetings stay on topic and use people’s time and energy well."

Facilitating Effective Meetings: Tips for success

In addition to being aware and focused, an effective facilitator takes a proactive stance when facilitating, scheduling, and organizing the meeting. Their responsibilities include:

• Be clear about your objectives and purpose
• Make sure the right people are involved at the right time
• Invest your time in a way that gives you the best return.

Is there anything that distinguishes a great meeting facilitator from a good or average one?

A combination of education, skills, and experience.

Meeting facilitators should possess these characteristics:

• Meeting facilitators aren’t biased in their decisions.
•  Rather than focusing solely on participation, the facilitator strives to achieve a balance between the two.
• It is advisable that facilitators refrain from expressing their opinions during meetings or offering their own points of view.
• When leading a meeting, a good facilitator promotes equality, transparency, and inclusiveness.
  

Facilitating Effective Meetings Course:

An effective meeting involves more than just announcing that a meeting is to be held on a particular day and time.

In order for meetings to be effective, they must be structured and have ground rules. Unless they possess these elements, they will never achieve anything.

For more information about this course, please check this blog from P2L.