May 7, 2024
While there’s no denying that regular meetings of some kind—whether online or in person—are absolutely necessary for team-building and productivity, are businesses really approaching them with the right structure and strategy?
Research shows that approximately 70% of meetings keep employees from working and completing their tasks. That’s a huge percentage, indicating that unproductive meetings don’t help anyone. In fact, they often contribute to workflow blockages like lack of creativity, lower profits, and interpersonal tensions between team members.
So, what can businesses do to stop wasting time in meetings and build stronger, more collaborative teams that feel inspired and ready to tackle upcoming projects? We explore several effective techniques below.
We live in a world where brands, corporations, and consumer channels constantly fight for our attention—and they’re doing a good job of it. Meetings are a time for focus, and removing common distractions while in attendance is in everybody’s best interest.
Hosting meetings in quiet, pleasant, neutral environments is one of the best ways to get employees focused on the topic at hand. Another is to implement a no-smartphone rule during discussions unless the device is used for a presentation or script.
By minimising distractions, everyone can get through the necessary material as fast as possible and move on to their own responsibilities list after the meeting.
One of the fastest ways to get employees to lose focus during meetings is to talk down to them. Rather than lecturing teams with long tangents and instructions, try to create an environment of collaboration that encourages discussion and debate. This opens up the stage for attendees to share their progress and raise concerns they may have.
By making the meeting style engaging and group-focused, your team can remain in an active mental headspace, promoting faster progress through important topics and keeping minds sharp.
Taking breaks for the sake of saving time might sound counterintuitive to some, but anyone who has worked in a truly functional and sustainable work environment knows the value of a well-timed break.
If you are conducting a particularly long meeting, people’s attention spans aren’t likely to survive. Allow them to gather their thoughts and digest the information being discussed with a 5-10 minute break for every 30 minutes of meeting time. This can keep people’s minds alert and focused while allowing them to handle other priorities in between.
Lack of clarity and understanding of a task or issue can lead to major time wastage. When people don’t fully understand their role or what’s required of them during and outside meetings, they aren’t likely to fulfil them efficiently.
Building a culture of communication within the workplace is crucial for several reasons, one of the most important being time savings.
Delegating roles and responsibilities with clear direction means that people will understand what is expected of them and can deliver it faster and more impactfully. Make sure you know who’s doing what so the risk of confusion and delay is as low as possible.
It is never a good idea to go into a meeting blind to its projected outcome or purpose. Creating an agenda and circulating it prior to a meeting puts everyone on the same page and gives team members advance notice of the talking points. This helps them formulate questions and provide more concise, informed insights.
Whoever leads the meeting should always book the time and reserve the right room. This ensures all team members know exactly where to be and when, rather than leaving them uncertain of meeting times or venues.
When deadlines approach and teams feel overwhelmed, the desire to multitask is strong. But don’t fall into that trap. Despite many people feeling multitasking is an effective strategy for getting more done simultaneously, the outcome is often very different.
While multitasking can help with qualitative productivity, it hampers quality, resulting in far less thorough and exacting work. The minor mistakes and oversights that a person might make while attempting to do too much at the same time often mean they need to go back and fix them, taking more time and resources.
During meetings, encourage people to put whatever else they are working on on hold so that everyone is as present as possible and can focus on the task at hand.
To strengthen our team-building efforts, let's focus on discouraging multitasking, allowing everyone to fully engage in collaborative tasks and enhance our collective productivity
Being intentional about when your meetings happen can be transformative in saving time at work. As we’ve already touched on, many employees feel that the meetings they attend are unnecessary, but while this type of situation is common, it doesn’t need to be the case with your team.
When planning and scheduling meetings, consider whether a full-on meeting is necessary. Perhaps an email will suffice. Over time, you and your team will learn how to identify essential meeting opportunities and weed out the ones that waste precious time.
Time is of the essence in every industry. No matter how big your team is, adopting effective time management techniques is crucial for reaching your professional goals and propagating a healthy workplace culture.
By following these effective techniques for holding professional meetings that don’t waste time and making every interaction value-packed, your team will be stronger and far more productive.
