Tsung Cheng is one of Chris' Spring 2012 Professional Speaking students at Carnegie Mellon. Here he writes about meetings.
What is a successful Meeting? In my point of view, a successful
Meeting is to use the shortest
possible time to achieve the
goal of the meeting, and all participants reach their expectation and satisfaction. In other words,
we will have to build consensus quickly and effectively while we only
have limited resources and time, and solve the problems we faced together. This concept
is very straight forward, but how to implement it is a big issue. I think I can
apply what I’ve learned in the public speaking course on how to organize a
successful meeting. They have different tunes rendered with equal skill. Here are my thoughts:
First of all,
whenever we want to take an action, the first thing we need to consider is to always
ask ourselves, “What is our purpose?” Different purposes could lead to
different solutions and results. Making the right goal is more important than
working very hard but is in a wrong direction. That is also why people think “do
the right thing” is more important than “do the thing right”. For example, is
the purpose of a meeting is just to let everyone knows each other, and then we
should put too much detail about the business in the content. Another example
is that, if we want to discuss about the marketing strategy for the next
season, then we should not prepare too much irrelevant material such as
technology in the meeting. In other words, state out purpose can let us know
what the right thing to do is. It is commonly seen that people work so hard for
the meeting but they forget the main purpose. In this case, their efforts are
in vain. Thus, a clearly stated purpose can make the participants
go on the right direction. Also, if we want to make some future plans in the
meeting, a clear goal will help a lot!
Second, if we want to have a lecture or presentation, the
other important thing is that “we have to know our audience”. Same concept in
the meeting, we will have to know the participants well, especially for the person who
held the meeting. Knowing people will can not only lead an effective meeting,
but also create a harmonious atmosphere in the meeting. For instance, say we want
to present our new product in a meeting, who is in the meeting will affect how
we want to present it. Presenting to the president or to the new employee makes
a lot of differences. We also have to consider the participants’ background. If
the participants in the meeting are all engineer, then I can express my word
more technically. On the other hand, if I am facing the sales department, even
if the purpose is the same, I may use different terms to describe the things I
want to emphasize. Therefore, it is always better to do some research on your participants
in your meeting, and then you will know the right thing to say.
Last
but not least, I also recalled what professor said in class, what is the key in
interview? He said it is relax! I totally agree with him because relax is not
only a mental condition, but it also means you are ready. We have to be
prepared on every important occasion including meeting. If we want to have an
effective meeting, then every participant should know what material he/she is
going to be prepared and what homework he/she should be done before meeting. Once
everyone is ready, then everything in the meeting can be done in an efficient
way and no additional time will be wasted. Also, if participants are relaxed,
then the atmosphere will no longer be tense. This is the reason way I think “relaxing
theory” can also be applied in meetings.
There are still many key issues are important to a meeting, such as time
control, good interaction and feedback…etc. But I think if we can follow the
three fundamental rules I’ve talked above, then everything else is just detail.
We could definitely enjoy our great meeting :)
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