Design an agenda for an effective meeting

Meetings are one of most time consuming and demotivating events in daily corporate life.

Either for simple communication or complex decision making, the only two justified reasons to organize a meeting, a structured preparation and execution can deliver quite efficient results.

In this article from HBR, a framework to plan efficient meetings is presented, based on the following tips:

• Seek input from team members
• Select topics that affect the entire team
• List agenda topics as questions the team needs to answer
• Note whether the purpose of the topic is to share information, seek input for a decision, or make a decision
• Estimate a realistic amount of time for each topic
• Propose a process for addressing each agenda item
• Specify how members should prepare for the meeting
• Identify who is responsible for leading each topic
• Make the first topic “review and modify agenda as needed”
• End the meeting with a plus/delta

All items should be integrated into a comprehensive agenda and distributed in advance to participants.

Source: How to Design an Agenda for an Effective Meeting.