Reducing the Cost of Meetings

In the current climate, most businesses are looking to improve efficiency and reduce costs. One aspect that can be overlooked is meetings. A survey showed that, on average, British workers spend 10 hours/week in meetings and 70% felt they did not need to be there. Imagine what that is costing the UK.

Our clients tell us that the effectiveness of their meetings is about 50-60%, with some as low as 25%. Obviously this is a subjective measurement, but it gives an indication of how people feel about meetings. What about your meetings?

• How many hours a week do you spend in meetings, whether internal, group or one-to-one, with customers, networking or with other organisations?
• What is that costing the business?
• How effective do you think each type of meeting is, as a %?
• How would you describe your meetings – excellent, good, OK, poor, nightmare?
• How would your attendees describe them? Are you sure?
• How many identified actions  are actually carried out?
• How many of the meetings’ success criteria are achieved?

The purpose of a meeting is to provide a forum for enabling people to bring their collective ideas to the table in the hopes of reaching a mutually agreed outcome, which may require action. The overall objective is usually to prompt decision, action or change with constructive goals in mind.

Someone once said meetings are like cocktail parties, which people groan when they are invited to, but complain if they are not! How do people feel about your meetings?

We are offering a new service, The Meeting Doctor, to help increase the effectiveness of meetings. Our focus is on meetings’ methodology and behaviours. The service includes observation and feedback of meetings, as well as corrective advice and development.

Please contact us for more detail, or if you have any queries about your meetings.