Optimum meetings at the end of the working day: 4 tips

For many professionals for whom meetings are commonplace, the working day doesn't end at 17.00 hours. Whether you work at a comprehensive school, hospital, government institution or commercial company: it's not always possible to get all colleagues together in the daytime. Other things often just need to be done from 9 to 5. Evening meetings? They're everywhere! After a hard day's work however, the clogged conference lurks just around the corner. Not in your veins this time, but in your organization. Especially when faced with regularly recurring and time-consuming meetings.

Are you ready to clear the clogging in the conference room? It's time to dump the detergents and start using the following tips:

Tip 1: ditch deep-rooted conventions

Does your organization regularly have lots of evening meetings? Try switching off the auto pilot and checking whether each and every meeting really is necessary. Are there insufficient points on the agenda? Postpone the meeting, until there are enough points for discussion. Are there only a few points on the agenda but they absolutely need dealing with? Why not simply invite only the relevant colleagues? Get used to it, it works!

Tip 2: price tag your meetings

The numbers tell the tale, and meetings are no exception! So how many hours do you spend in meetings each year? And what's the average hourly rate for all those present? Once you know that, it's easy to calculate what meetings actually cost. That price tag will help you and your colleagues use your meeting time more prudently.

Tip 3: own responsibility

The previous tip also helps assign responsibility to employees regarding their attendance at meetings, where possible. Do they have relevant input? Then they must certainly attend. They don't? Let them decide for themselves whether they should attend. People who only attend to interfere with agenda points simply slow the meeting down.

Tip 4: Flex meetings

Flex is the new abracadabra. For meetings too. And rightly so, because why do you all need to sit together in a conference room for each meeting? Why not break with routine by including conference calls or online meetings? It's a nice, lean way of meeting, without wasting time on latecomers and tête-a-têtes, while also saving travelling expenses and time. No magic wand is required, because a digital meeting tool makes flex meetings as simple as ABC. It also provides you with all the meeting documents digitally on your laptop or tablet.

Leave to soak

Change doesn't happen overnight. Are you planning to implement these tips? Allow yourself and your colleagues enough time to get the best results. After all, Anti Calc needs to soak for a while before it works. Be patient therefore and persevere; some time in the near future, you'll reap the benefits of unclogged communication channels,

Would you like more tips for optimum meetings? Download our e-book ‘The 7 Rules of New Meetings'

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iBabs is a leader in paperless meetings and enables you to reduce these piles of documents to the thickness of your tablet. Thousands of organizations have been using this system for more than 15 years.

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