(More On Meetings Cont. 1)

Introduction

Many meetings are poor on time management, especially for senior management.

To explore and improve this you need to know
"...How much time do top managers spend together as a team, and, when they meet, how are priorities set, how to time managed, and how successful do they think they at reaching important decisions..."
Michael Mankin, 2004

Unfortunately many organisations spend too much time discussing issues that have little or no direct impact on the company's value.

Research has shown

i) top management teams spend relatively little time together (survey found that senior executives only spend an average of around 20 hours a month in a  leadership team meeting)

ii) agenda setting is unfocused and undisciplined (usually the agenda was the same from meeting to meeting or ad hoc; priorities were set by
        a) current crisis (immediate problems, challenges, etc),
        b) historical precedent (what happened in the past, ie certain topics are discussed regularly, perhaps once a year)
        c) egalitarianism (every participant gets his or her chance to speak).

Furthermore, no one is exclusively responsible for developing the agenda; sometimes the process is 'first in, first on'.

As a result
"...the urgent crowds out the important, meetings end late, frustrating team members, or worse yet, end on time without reaching important decisions..."
Michael Mankin, 2004

This can result in important management decisions being made at lower levels of the organisation where decision-makers are more focused on their own functions, needs, etc than the whole organisation.)

iii) too little attention is paid to strategy (with an ad hoc way of addressing priorities (see above). 

It has been revealed
"...80% of top management time was devoted to issues and account for less than 20% of the company's long-term value..."
Michael Mankin, 2004

 iv) top management meetings are not structured to produce real decisions (many of the meetings are about information sharing and group discussion)

Some ways to improve meetings and make better decisions faster; these include

i) deal with operations issues in separate meetings from strategy (as operational and strategic issues are distinctly different activities, they require different modes of discussions and different mindsets; need to prevent daily operational issues from dominating substantive strategic debates, ie have a separate meeting.)

ii) focus on decisions, not on discussions (explore issues prior to the meeting through written communications; eg reports should be distributed to attendees days before the meeting so they have time to read and digest before the meeting; this results in the meeting making strategic decisions rather than requiring lengthy explanations)

iii) measure the real value of each item on the agenda (when setting the agenda,  rank the importance of each item on its potential to create value for the company)

iv) get issues off the agenda, as quickly as possible, and keep to a clear implementation timetable (need to have a clear way to resolve the important issues
"...such a process must include an unambiguous timetable, detailing when and how team members reach a decision on each issue and who will be involved in approving the final strategy..."
Michael Mankin, 2004

v) put real choices on the table (make sure that all viable alternatives are considered before deciding on a course of action, etc; a minimum of 3 alternatives is recommended; need to constantly focus on reinventing the business)

vi) adopt common decision-making processes and standards (use common language, methodology and a set of standards for reaching decisions, eg decisions must create and sustain competitive advantage, must be fact-based, consequential, by creating shareholder value, be better than the alternatives, etc)

vii) make decisions stick (once a decision made, debate must end; commitment and implementation starts; develop an action plan which includes resource allocation (labour, money, etc), time schedule, performance criteria as a basis for continual review, etc )

Summary

Strategic planning
"...should be a matter of ensuring the top management team focuses on the most important issue, considering all viable alternatives, and making the best possible choice in the shortest period of time. Meeting agendas would be systematically managed and continually refreshed so that the right issues come on-and off-the agenda as quickly as possible. In short, strategic planning would be designed to exploit valuable time and drive for better decisions fast..."
Michael Mankin, 2004