14 February, the day of love. Can you not wait to see what your (secret) love has in store for you? Or do you hate the commercial cloud hanging above the day and therefore consciously shun all romantic thoughts? Valentine's Day: you love it or you hate it. Generally speaking, the same cannot be said for meetings. At least, I cannot recall anyone who actually loves meetings. Do you? And sometimes we simply enjoy the chance to have a moan. We love to hate! Don't we? But... How can we find a way to start loving meetings again?

Sailing, motorcycling, travelling and horseback riding are among some of the most expensive hobbies around, but meetings are another one. Having said that, they are not exactly everyone’s favourite pastime; yet we still do a lot of it – roughly 300 hours a year (per employee!). In fact, over a year, the Dutch spend 60 billion euros on meetings. But they can be handled smarter and less expensively. If you want to keep more time and money back for more pleasant activities – or your real hobby – try some of the following tips.

Are you often just too busy? Is it hard to keep up that balancing act? Well, you’re not the only one! At least not according to TNO’s health & safety survey Arbobalans 2016 published in December 2016. According to the survey, a lot of working people are overburdened by a combination of pressure of work and not enough autonomy. In healthcare and education, 25% of personnel are regularly balancing on the brink of burnout. Now that the economy is improving, it’s pretty obvious that pressure of work is increasing further in many organisations. So it’s time to work as effectively as possible. Too complicated? Not if you use the right tools! For example, have you ever considered digital meetings? They are faster to implement than you might think and will save you a lot of time.

2017 is an important year for Dutch municipalities. After all, it was agreed in the coalition agreement that companies and citizens should be able to handle all of their official matters digitally by this year at the latest. This means digitizing  lot of work processes. But digitization is also penetrating the meeting room, which is no less than logical. Why should we continue to hold meetings in the old-fashioned way when the municipal organisation is changing as a whole? The following trends show that although municipal meetings will continue to exist, they will inevitably change in terms of form.

Lists of trends – what’s hot and what’s not - are always a popular item at the start of any new year. We think that a list of meeting trends for 2017 should certainly be among them. So that’s why we’ve identified a number of trends of which we would like to feature two in this blog. Both trends relate to one of the most common New Year’s resolutions - to live healthier and with less stress! Although it’s not always easy to keep to your resolutions, we’re sure that you would like to succeed this year. So why not take full advantage of these meeting trends? 

Did you know that in the Netherlands we spend a quarter of our working hours in meetings? You have only to calculate how many hours that is per year to see that it should really be rather less in 2017. Or more efficient anyway. And certainly if you’re the one who has to prepare the meeting.
In this blog, you’ll read how to make a fresh start with your meetings in the new year.

Are you ready for the holidays? The day after Christmas we will hold a dinner party, so we’ve been busy preparing for the last week.  I enjoy the holidays but it can get quite hectic.  Thus even at home I prefer to have a systematic approach.

Pop your VR glasses on. Have they started already? No! “Welcome”! says a colleague, with a smile. “Take a seat!” You sit down on your virtual chair and the meeting can start. Is this the future? Maybe, but if so the meeting of the future is closer than we think. Perhaps not yet with Virtual Reality, but certainly digitally and in the cloud.

It’s not just employees in commercial companies who are increasingly working with a laptop, tablet and apps – (local) government too is using digital tools more often. And also during meetings. Because it’s exactly there that major savings can still be made. Perhaps your first thoughts go to saving money on paper and ink, but you can also save a lot on the meetings themselves. How can you do that? The answer is simpler than you might think: with a digital meeting tool.

We’ve got good news for lovers of the paperless office: the trend for organisations to use increasingly less paper continued undiminished last year. This was announced by the Association for Information and Image Management (AAIM) on 4 November this year on World Paperfree Day. Which department contributes most to using less paper? HR!