How often have you sat in a meeting, utterly bored, feeling your creativity and energy proverbially dribbling out of your ears?What makes a meeting an energy flop? Do you want to avoid meetings you are running falling into the same trap?
It’s simple. No-one likes being ‘talked at’, and if a meeting isn’t a dialogue, then it’s a lecture. If you want a meeting to build energy and creative ideas instead of destroying them, then it’s vital to develop interactions as an integral part of the meeting.
Interaction is too important a part of any meeting to leave to chance. You need to plan the opportunities for your attendees to interact and participate fully in the purpose of your meeting. In order to achieve this, here are some tips to maximize your meeting’s potential and encourage participation:
1) Structure the Start: Before you start, prepare the room in a way which encourages interaction. If people are able to face each other, they are more likely to communicate naturally and effectively. If numbers allow, try and seat everyone around a table, as opposed to a theater or classroom-style room arrangement.
2) Avoid ‘Power Blocks’: As people arrive, get them to sit with different people than their normal ‘clique’. To avoid people feeling pulled away from their friends or allies, why not use innovative or interesting ways to seat people – like dividing people by shirt color, letter their first name starts with, favorite football team – basically, any excuse to get them working with new people and extending their natural group.
3) Fresh Opening: To get everyone introduced and set the tone for participation during the meeting, use an icebreaker, such as asking each person to describe their weekend using only 3 words. It will get people thinking laterally, give your participants a starting point to open conversations with new people during coffee breaks, and get everyone warmed up and ready to actively participate.
4) Break Out: Get your participants to break into small groups at set points during your meeting to discuss particular issues. The change of pace, coupled with an expectation to interact, engages people and draws them into the subject. Small groups or pairs mean that no-one can do the equivalent of ‘hiding at the back’ – everyone is forced to participate.
Above all, the most important part is to get people talking. They will be much more engaged and feel like an active part of the meeting, rather than someone being lectured at. This gives you energized and motivated people who are much less likely to dread your meetings, and much more likely to bring forward some fresh ideas!
