it’s not rare to arrange a meeting, of course for a specific purpose, yet by the time it ends, you realise not much has been accomplished as per plan, and concerns have not been fully discussed. During a meeting, it’s also possible for people to say a lot but this doesn’t necessarily translate to proper communication and it doesn’t mean that the point of the meeting has come across. But this all goes down to proper meeting management. Workplace meetings are an important element of business management. A significant amount of time is dedicated to meetings because they bring a thoughtful groups of employees, stakeholders and beneficiaries together for a specific purpose to collect useful ideas, plan, decisions given in an open discussion, to deliver a tangible result, Pascal Munyeshuli, a communication officer says. He further says that, there are quiet elements that lead to a success of a meeting, such as clearly defining the purpose of the meeting and focus on a one sentence description of the meeting objectives with a list of the topics to be covered. Each topic should include a concise description of the issue, responsibility, status and dates. “Punctuality; check in the participant’s list and make sure the meeting starts on time and the participants list must include correct names, designation, company, signatures of the participants. It should be circulating to each individual, which gives a sense of presence and motivate the individual to participate and prepare for the meeting,” he says. Munyeshuli adds that, control the meeting and establish the administrative rules and ground rules should be established to make sure everyone in the meeting is involved for a fruitful and successful meeting. For local projects, it is highly recommended to adopt one language to get involved with all the stakeholders so as not to lose interest in the meeting. According to CHRON. a business blog, to organise an effective meeting, circulate reading materials in advance and encourage discussions beforehand to focus meeting exchanges and avoid sidebars. For example, as the facilitator of a meeting among local nonprofit leaders who aim to establish an interagency consortium to support community revitalisation, you first remind the group of the meeting’s purpose and then facilitate introductions. You also guide the group’s decision-making process around a mission statement and manage information sharing about each non-profit’s current revitalisation activities. Claude Twishime, who handles public relations at the Ministry in charge of Emergency Management, action items shall be clearly marked and assigned to the participants. Agreed action plan should then be distributed to the participants and continuous follow up of the action items will make it easy to monitor the project performance and result oriented meetings, he says. “Point out decisions and results; decisions should be transmitted in writing to all the participants so that it can help to eliminate confusion and acting on further action plan,” Twishime adds. He concludes that when concluding a meeting; make sure it ends on specified time. Time is key for a successful meeting.
