Why wonderful meetings make an amazing culture
How the quality of your meetings reflects and shapes your organizational culture.
Meetings are one of the most critical, yet overlooked areas of company culture.
Did you know the average employee spends 6 hours in meetings. 23 hours a week is the average for senior executives and managers are almost 4 times as much at 23 hours a week in meetings. With the recent changes in how people work means that these numbers are only growing. Meeting activity is a serious part of everyone's day and energy at the workplace. Culturally they often get little thought. They are a known problem, but even with all the effort spent on them, the issues persist.
Culture first, then meetings
A company's culture is its soul. It is the beliefs and values that direct both how people act and in how they interact with others. When new staff join it is the vibe and community of the current employees. Meetings are usually the first experience they have with your culture.
How does culture sing in meetings?
- Do people invited to a meeting know what the meeting is about?
- Do they know what outcome the meeting is set out to achieve?
- Does the meeting leader share information in a timely manner?
- Do participants feel comfortable sharing their ideas?
- Are meeting outcomes and decisions available for people who did not go to the meeting?
What all these questions mean is: do the people there value other people's time!
Meetings can define the culture you want to build
Given the amount of time we spend in them, that time is the crux of interaction in the workplace. Some meeting practices can move you away from your desired culture if you are not careful. Meeting practices should reinforce a positive culture.
Better outcomes of a framework that is clear, simple and easy to adopt:
- Set an objective, make sure it is specific and actionable.
- Set an agenda to make sure that nothing gets missed in meetings.
- Agendas also make sure your team is all on the same page when the meeting starts.
- Pre-work when there are knowledge gaps that need to be closed by meeting start.
- Notes, even small reminders help increase information sharing across the company.
- Assigning notes to actions helps accountability in between meetings to ensure project success.
Culture affects your meetings, your meetings affect your success
A good culture should direct you to good meetings. Good meetings encourage effective communication, employee empowerment and equitable accountability. In the new work of blended work models and remote teams new tools are needed. Tools that help teams keep track of decisions, save time and stay on target.
