What team meetings do you really need?

Team meetings best practices

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Team meetings you need to grow your business

What team meetings do I need to run and what should I cover in my staff meetings? What staff meetings I don’t have to do and how to avoid wasting time on unproductive face-to-face conversations with my employees. New managers and start up business owners who learn to lead their teams often ask those questions trying to manage their employees in the most effective way. To build a well-managed business you need to communicate well well with your people. You need to have a meeting schedule and ensure the flow of information. There is a meeting and communication pattern which the most successful companies follow. Here is the meeting structure that productive managers use.

Become a better leader with stronger community

5 types of staff meetings you need to continue growing your business

1. The daily standup 

How does the daily standup work? The daily standup ideally should be run at the department level (depending on the size of the company and departments).

The daily standup structure:
  • The three things you’ve accomplished yesterday 
  • What are the three most important things to accomplish today?
  • Are you stuck on something, what do you need help with to keep you going? (If anything).  

Give each person 30 seconds to talk about the above. This daily meeting should be a very short review of what everyone is working on.

Now, what is your role as a leader in the daily standups? As a manager you need to ensure that people are working on the right things and unblock anything that may be slowing down the progress. 

2. Weekly team meetings

In this meeting you look at your metrics and make sure you are working towards the big goals. You also remind your team about the vision and make sure that everyone is aligned with it. In the weekly meeting you also discuss any issues which may have arise. 

3. Monthly review

In the monthly review you gather all the departments. The goal for this meeting is to share the achievements and progress, and make people proud of their successes. This is also a good occasion to help people from different company departments to understand and appreciate what others are doing. 

4. Quarterly planning

This meeting should ideally take place outside of the usual workplace. This meeting is crucial for the company’s growth and focus. It is important to evaluate your metrics for the past 90 days and adjust the plans accordingly for the next quarter. 

Tip: don’t plan for more than 90 days ahead, especially if you are a start up

5. Annual strategic planning session

This meeting should also be run outside of the office. If you can, organise a weekend trip to also have some fun together. In the yearly review you look at the following aspects of your business: what you’ve achieved in the past year, 10-year vision, 3-year plan and 1-year goals with a specific action plan. 

I hope this helps you to structure your team meetings and lead your employees more effectively. 

Tip: schedule your team meetings for the entire year ahead to help you keep them going and save tome on planning

 

What team meetings you don’t need?

It is important to run only the face-to-face meetings mentioned above and not to waste time on others you don’t really need. Team meetings may easily become a big time drainer. Here are three quick tips on what team meetings you don’t need:

  • Status updates – you can do it by email
  • Sales presentations from other companies
  • In-person meetings by default
Do what matters. The rest is for losers.

 

Share your experience with staff meetings

What are your strategies to make your staff meetings more productive? What are your ways to make sure that team gatherings don’t turn into time wasters? Share in the comments…

Books and audiobooks about effective meetings

Meetings That Get Results: The Brian Tracy Success Library 
Meetings Suck: Turning One of the Most Loathed Elements of Business into One of the Most Valuable
by Cameron Herold

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