Design Your Next Collaborative Meeting Like a Pro: 6 Key Questions for Success
And avoid feeling like an amateur improv actor on Broadway
Imagine you’re in charge of leading a strategy or innovation meeting for the next three days.
How do you plan the meeting?
How do you design each day to add value to the previous one?
When I started facilitating, I improvised what to do each day. I felt like a stage actor doing an improvisation exercise - reacting and responding to what happened during the session for the following day:
What exercises should I do next?
What icebreaker should I use to get them into the day's purpose?
Don’t get me wrong; improvisation is part of being a pro-facilitator in guiding and adapting to the circumstance.
But, you can say time, energy, and headaches if you design your meeting exercises in advance, especially if you hold a work session for two or three days.
Designing your meeting exercises in advance will help you see the flow and how each activity contributes to the overall outcome. (And save you the anxiety of feeling like an amateur improv actor on Broadway)
And because of the fear of feeling like an amateur improv actor, I learned to ask six questions to help design my next collaborative meeting.
6 Key Questions to Design Your Next Collaborative Meeting Like a Pro:
How can I start the meeting with a bang in an engaging and connecting way?
What exercises will help the group achieve its outcomes?
What are the activities or exercises at the begging, middle, and end of the collaborative meeting?
How can I/we bring the collaborative session to a firm conclusion?
What techniques will I use to keep everyone focused and engaged?
How can I make the work session don’t feel like a work session?