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22Jun

The Undeniable Worst Mistakes to Make in a Meeting

By | 22 June 2021 |

Effective meetings can be a significant asset to any organisation. Leading productive meetings and making a valuable contribution can lead to better decisions, achieving goals, and resolving conflicts. In the end, meetings can help organizations drive progress.

However, anyone who has attended a meeting knows that an enormous amount of time can be wasted. Team members turning up late, not participating, or going off-topic are just some of the worst meeting mistakes. For meetings to be effective, the team leader and team members should all have a clear input to the meeting.

In this article, you will learn about the top seven mistakes to avoid when attending meetings. Whether you are a team leader or team member, avoiding these meeting mistakes will lead to more productive meetings.

The Undeniable Worst Mistakes to Make in a Meeting

1. Arriving late for meetings

One of the most common mistakes in meetings is someone arriving late. Latecomers to meetings cause disruption and affect productivity. Either the meeting is delayed, or someone must spend time getting the person up to speed.

Arriving on time for meetings is vital to the smooth running of an organization. It also shows respect and courtesy to other team members when you are there on time.

2. Meetings that finish late

Another mistake that team leaders make in meetings is allowing the meetings to go over time. A good meeting chairperson will keep the discussion moving forward to ensure that all items are discussed. The mistake is when there are only a few minutes left, and the team leader decides to moves on to a new point.

It’s better to reschedule the items up for discussion for another time. Or maybe it could be possible to assign the task to one or two people to ensure that valuable time isn’t wasted.

3. Not participating in the meeting

For meetings to be productive, every attendee must participate in the discussion. If someone doesn’t take part or contribute, then it leaves the question—why were they there in the first place?

Of course, everyone is different, and not everybody likes talking in front of others. Therefore, it’s essential to prepare well for meetings to have the confidence to contribute something valuable. If some team members seem hesitant about speaking up, the chairperson could invite them to share their thoughts.

4. Using mobile phones during meetings

A common mistake to make during meetings is checking your smartphone. Like turning up late, checking messages or emails while someone else is speaking shows a lack of respect. It could mean that you miss important points.

Before the meeting, either turn your smartphone off or put notifications on silent. This way, you’ll not be tempted to check your phone every time it pings or buzzes.

5. Engaging in side conversations

Avoid the mistake in meetings of getting involved in small discussions. According to Harvard Business Review, 71 percent of managers said that meetings are inefficient and unproductive. One of the reasons for this is sidebar meetings.

There are several ways to stop side conversations. Usually, simply asking an attendee to give their attention to the main person talking is enough. Or you could implement some ground rules for meetings. And one of them could be that team members contribute to the discussion when invited to do so.

6. Not using technology correctly

Technology can help make meetings more productive and interesting—if used properly. Some team leaders use technology too much, and this can stifle conversation and innovations. However, the biggest mistake in meetings is not getting technology to work.

Technical issues can cause embarrassing situations in meetings. Trying to figure out how to get a video or presentation to work takes time and causes frustration. If you plan on using technology, then make sure everything is prepared beforehand. This also applies to online meetings.

7. Going off-topic

Meetings can only be effective if everyone makes contributions to the topics on the agenda. It’s easy to get side-tracked if an interesting subtopic comes up. Try to avoid the temptation to stray from the original topic. If you’re a team leader, then it’s vital to steer the conversation tactfully back on track.