Crabby's criteria for effective meetings

So you want to call a meeting. What's the best way to do it? And once everyone is gathered together and staring at you, anticipating your pearls of wisdom, what's next?

It's your meeting and you have every right to run it how you please, right? I suppose so, and everyone has a unique style of leading a meeting. I think you know what I mean:

• The headmistress  Stands at the head of table with her arms crossed and silently waits until all eyes are upon her before calling the meeting to order. Great technique for keeping order and scaring your attendees; lousy if collaboration and brainstorming are part of the plan.
• The free-wheeler  Lets everyone shout out their ideas, go out for snacks, talk amongst themselves, and make paper airplanes out of the handouts. Fun times? Heck, yeah. Organized and productive times? Probably not.
• The stickler  Total control freak; keeps a copy of Robert's Rules of Order on hand and is constantly thumbing through it to ensure there are no infractions. Orderly? Of course. Successful? It depends on what your idea of "successful" is...

In my column on Office Online, I've outlined three steps to creating and running a successful meeting. IN a nutshell

Step 1: Determine the purpose of the meetings

What's the best way to get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, practice. And what's one of the best ways to ensure a successful meeting (on your part, anyway)? Plan, plan, plan.

And wouldn't you know it, we have many free agenda templates on Office Online.

Step 2: Call the meeting:

Now that you have your game plan, you'll need to get everyone you need in the same room together. The easiest way I know to do this is to send out a meeting request using Outlook. Even though you've probably done this a zillion times, my full column on Office Online offers some hot tips for you.

Step 3: Get all your documents in a row

Now it's time to actually start the meeting. First, it's good to go over what you're going to discuss, and make sure everyone knows everyone else. Then you can jump right into your presentation, documents, spreadsheets, or whatever else you've brought to talk about. The time-honored way to keep track of all that's being discussed is to have someone take meeting minutes. I like to volunteer the person right in front to do it (hey, if he's going to show up early and play teacher's pet, he has it coming).

For more detailed information about calling and running effective meetings, as well as links to the various templates I’ve mentioned, read my column on Office Online.

-- Crabby