How many of you have been in a meeting and start thinking to yourself, “Ughh, This is such a waste of my time!”, while drawing fanciful doodles of bunny rabbits parachuting out of airplanes or in a meeting mumbling to yourself  “I wish John was here. He would do a much better job at explaining this than I can.”  I know we have all been there and done that at some point in our careers. Now the question is, what can we do to prevent this and have more productive meetings when it’s our turn to serve up a hot plate o’ meeting and you’re the one asking who should be there?

If you don’t already know meetings are very expensive activities considering the cost of labor and how much can or cannot get done in them.  Therefore it is important that serious time and consideration is put into making sure the right people are in the room.

Let’s take a look at some of the factors that are critical to ultimately having a successful meeting.

1. One of the first things you need to address and understand is, “Why are you having this meeting?” Is it a kick off meeting? Are you reviewing a design or maybe technical specifications? Take some time to understand the purpose of your meeting before thinking about who needs to be there. This may seem too obvious to state, but without a clear understanding of what you hope to accomplish your meeting will wind up without the right people there. After you know why you are having your meeting it should be more obvious who to initially invite or exclude.
2. Next, none of us work in a vacuum, so you do not have to depend on your own judgment about who should come. Take a moment to explain the purpose of your meeting to your supervisor, subject matter expert, coworkers, clients, or your friendly potted plant and ask their opinion as well. Though, if you are talking to your plant you may have bigger issues at hand.
3. Once you have identified all of your potential attendees, when feasible, briefly meet or call each person to tell them about the meeting, its overall purpose and why their attendance is important. If you involve them early you can identify whether or not they truly need to attend or it can lead to recommendations of additional attendees you may not have thought of.
4. Last but not least implement all of your hard work by inviting your list of meeting attendees and meet away.

You will see that if you take the time to identify the purpose of your meeting, reach out to your peers for advice, and confirm you have invited the right attendees the overall success and productivity of your future meetings will go up. Unfortunately, if you done your job right the para-trooping bunnies may have seen there last days.