A couple weeks ago I posted a tip on thorough communication between the meeting planner and the facility. If you’ve been wondering what makes a productive meeting, one of the most important aspects is the communication between the meeting planner and the facilitator. The majority of time the person planning the meeting is not in attendance. Although they may not be involved during the actual meeting, they do have the very important task of planning the space, the setup, the catering, and the timing. You can obviously see the importance of clear communication and effective meeting strategies in this scenario.
sparkspace Observation:
Most of the meetings at sparkspace are thoroughly planned out. You know that either the meeting planner and facilitator have been in clear communication with the facility, or the facilitator even booked AND planned the meeting. But..at least once a week, there’s a meeting or two that have lost all communication.
We’ve seen groups that have planned on going out to lunch, but realized lunch has already been catered in. We’ve seen groups have a meeting scheduled for a half day, but have showed up expecting a full day. Clearly there was some miscommunication somewhere.
Tip #9: Talk to your facilitator:
Communication is key to a seamless meeting. One of the most important productive meeting guidelines is ensuring that all the facilitator’s details are aligned with yours. If you will not be attending the meeting you’ll need to get the specifics from the facilitator so there are no hiccups once onsite. What type of AV is needed (if any), what are the arrival and departure times, what type of office supplies will be needed, what time is lunch???
It’s frustrating to everyone involved when a meeting and breakfast have been scheduled for 9am, but the team is arriving at 7:45am. It’s equally frustrating when the room has been setup with AV, but the meeting is focused around flip chart and whiteboard brainstorming.
Useful Idea:
Once the meeting has been scheduled, setups have been requested, and catering has been ordered, simply create a document with all the specs and follow up with the facilitator. This way the facilitator has a draft for their agenda that actually aligns with the flow of the meeting. This is also where discrepancies are caught and can be avoided.
sparkspace has been called “a facilitator’s best friend” by many, many visiting facilitators. Partly because sparkspace was designed by someone who has led countless successful workshops and brainstorming sessions, and partly because we pay close attention to every meeting and we continually learn what facilitators, participants, and planners need to have their best meeting ever.
Not ready to book? How about a tour?