Making Meetings Meaningful

On March 26, 2014, we discussed on #ProdChat, the topic: Making Meetings Meaningful. Here are the discussion questions, articles and other notes that I found, noted or wrote in the process of preparing for the tweetchat. Please add any other resources or links you think would help!

Are you reading with us? Productivity Book Group is reading “Eat That Frog” for an April 5th discussion. Join us! http://productivitybookgroup.org/upcoming-books/

Here are the discussion questions:

Q1: LET’S START WITH THE BASICS…WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF HAVING MEETINGS? #prodchat

Q2: HOW DO YOU DETERMINE THE PURPOSE AND AGENDA FOR A MEANINGFUL MEETING? #prodchat

Q3: HOW MUCH TIME SHOULD MEETINGS BE? HOW OFTEN SHOULD MEETINGS BE? #prodchat

Q4: WHAT STRATEGIES ARE THERE TO FOCUS ON *OUTCOMES* FOR MORE MEANINGFUL MEETINGS? #prodchat

Q5: WHAT NEEDS TO HAPPEN ENDING & AFTER MEETINGS TO BE MORE MEANINGFUL? #prodchat

Q6: WHAT ARE SOME ALTERNATIVES TO MEETINGS WHEN THEY AREN’T THE BEST TOOL? #prodchat

Here are the resources:

• As suggested by @gtdbloke, “Meetings, Bloody Meetings” with John Cleese (YouTube)
• As suggested by @jmmuscarello, The Cost of Meetings
• Running Effective Meetings
• 5 Alternatives to Time-Wasting Meetings
• Beating the Meeting Monster
• 7 Tips for Scheduling Meetings for a Productive Day
• Try Stand Up Meetings
• The Well-Managed Meeting (22 Minutes)
• How to Conduct Effective Meetings
• How to Run a Meeting
• The 21 Unwritten Rules Of Meetings
• 5 Simple Things You Can Do To Get People To Speak Up In Meetings
• Miserable Meetings No More
• What I Learned About Great Meetings from Steve Jobs
• Why All-Hands Meetings Are Worth Every Penny
• Time Starved? How to Keep Meetings Short
• Kill Meetings to Get More Done
• Setting Up Real Virtual Meetings
• How to Prepare for an Important Business Meeting with Someone You have not Met Before
• How And Why To Reduce Meetings
• Cut Your Meeting Time by 90%
• Reduce Meetings, and Make Them More Effective
• Why Meetings Kill Productivity
• How to reduce meetings and influence people
• The Role of a Facilitator
• 6 Reasons Why it Makes Sense to Arrive Early
• Why We Secretly Love Meetings
• 5 Ways to Lead a Meeting: Make 30 Decisions in 30 Minutes
• We’ve Got to Stop Meeting Like This: 7 Reasons to Cancel Your Next Meeting
• How should I prepare for my group meeting?
• Panic-less Preparation: The ‘6 Ps’ to Know Before Your Next Meeting
• Running Effective Meetings: Preparation for Meetings
• Meeting Basics
• Seven Steps to Running the Most Effective Meeting Possible
• Seven Steps to More Productive Meetings
• Productive Meetings