To make more than just a lot of noise in your business, you have to have rhythm. The faster you want to grow, the faster you have to pulse. At the heart of team member performance is a rhythm of tightly run, daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual meetings – all of which happen as scheduled, without fail, with specific agendas?
With these meetings you’ll have opportunities to focus your team members on what’s important. You‘ll solve problems more quickly and easily, you’ll achieve better alignment around strategic decisions, and you’ll communicate more effectively.
Structured meetings enhance team performance!
In working with fast growth companies or those aspiring to grow quickly, the winners are those leaders or business owners who have established a rhythm and a routine of having meetings. The faster the business is growing, the more meetings they have. This may sound crazy to those of you who have worked for large corporations, where meetings are dreaded interruptions that eat up hours or even days. What I am referring is NOT these wide-open, poorly defined meetings, but of the more effective short, punchy meetings with a structure, time limits and a specific agenda. The later type of meetings leave everyone motivated, informed and sets employees free.
Take a look at the meeting rhythm of your company. Quarterly / Annual meetings should be given. However to be effective, to hit your goals, to grow at the rate you want you HAVE to have Daily, Weekly and Monthly meetings also. Why? Because these meetings’ agenda drive the deliverables outlined to hit the quarterly or monthly goals. These meetings allow everyone to be on the same page, addressing issues, planning actions and empowering employees to the Plan.
The meetings must be short (20 – 30 minutes), they need to have a structure, timely and with an effective agenda. If you the business owner / leader ever go into these meetings without all three well defined and implemented you have just lost your team and have caused more harm than good. So Stay on top of this, Work ON your Business with these meetings vs. IN your business and always keep the agenda crisp and focused on the quarterly targets.
Now only running a crisp meeting is important, the faster your company is growing the faster your meeting rhythm needs to be. A suggestion is if your business is growing 15% per year, you can treat the year like a full 365 days from a strategic thinking and actions time frame. However if your business is growing 20% to 100% per year you need to think of every quarter like a year from strategic thinking perspective. This means putting a new strategy every 90 Days as you are treat your business growth of doubling and all the actions, issues, plans increase in timing.
So now that we have the Why you need to do this, How shall you do it? Here are a few helpful actions / ideas.
- Daily meetings – Set them up and run them for 30 minutes. Set the time at irregular hour such as 8:07 AM or 4:33 PM. People tend to be more attentive to being on time when you do this.
- Setting – Meet wherever you want. However do not have a comfortable cushy sitting arrangement. These meetings are crisp, punchy and effective. Have the meeting in an area where the team is standing or sitting on stools. The breakroom, the lunch area, the boss’s office, the “floor” anywhere where you keep the meeting sharp, crisp and effective.
- Attendance – Make these meetings required attendance. If you have a morning staff and a different afternoon or evening staff, have two meetings. YES same message, same agenda to the second audience. A little time now will save you unmeasurable time later – Promise.
- Facilitator – Pick someone who can run an effective, structured, punchy meeting. It may not be the Owner. It may be the supervisor. It is more critical to be crisp, structured and effective than the ego of having someone without the characteristics running the meeting.
- Agenda – Remember this is critical. The agenda must inspire, drive and provide motivation. It is not a tell all or complain session. A suggestive, effective agenda is:
- Good news – 5 minutes
- The Numbers – 5 minutes
- Customer / Employee feedback – 10 minutes
- One issue or “Big Rock” to address – 10 minutes
- Do not get caught in trying to resolve or address all issues, items. Pick one per meeting to address and stay with it to resolve. Then move on to the next “Big Rock”.
- Closing – End each meeting with the attendees summarizing in one or two sentences their reaction to the meeting. This will provide you with understanding of message being received and the buy-in or not from the team.
If you would like to learn more about this you can read the book: Mastering the Rockefeller Habits by Verne Harnish or reach out to a business coach who can guide you through this for your business. This is an excellent opportunity for you to start that which will of course allow you to WORK ON YOUR BUSINESS vs. IN YOUR BUSINESS.1.610.768.7774
– By: Mark R Steinke – Elite Business Coach / Area Representative Focal Point Business Coaching of Pennsylvania