4 Responses

1. personal feelings on meetings
   As a lecturer in an FE college, one of the main things that annoy me are un-necssary and time consuming meetings.
   Far too often meetings are called to satisfy managers ego’s and to generate more paper excercises; does no one think of the rain forests we are destroying! A dictionary definition of meeting is ” to make the acquaintance of”, which to my mind implies a brief encounter.
   My personal formula for a satisfactory meeting would be 1) a strong chair person that is fully conversant with the contents of the agenda and will keep the meeting to the time schedule
   2) a well structured agenda
   with allocated timeslots for each subject, that is sent out to those attending several days before the date of the meeting
   3) a well ventilated room with comfortable seating, set out with necessary papers etc. beforehand. (no coffee etc but plenty of fresh cool water)
   Final thought for the day, perhaps the best way to cut down on the number of meetings we go to or hold, is to have a meeting about “what is a meeting”!!

2. CBT options
   I fully agree with Laura and her comments about meetings about meetings, they are sometimes a total waste of time producing very little other than delay in the decision making process.

   That said, your question also asked about CBT options, and from my experience the range of courses provided by Learndirect http://www.learndirect.co.uk are extensive (they include taking meeting minutes, charing a meeting etc..)and should be used to compliment any kind of training plan so that different learning styles can be accomodated. The reflector likes eLearning because it allows them to absorb the information in their own time and space, the pragmatist likes the chance to apply own situation to the case studies and questions. The activist finds it a bit dull if there is limited interactivity, but enjoys the games (if there are any) and the theorist becomes bored, if the material has not reference points and signposting to other websites or books or theoretical concepts.

   Hope this helps.

   Józefa Fawcett
   Independent Learning and Knowledge Consultant
   http://www.thepolexperience.com

3. a good web page
   I’d spend some time browsing this web site for the meeting topic. http://www.effectivemeetings.com

4. Don’t forget technolgy tools.
   Stella,

   First off there was a Video Arts package entitled Meetings Bloody Meetings. This may be a bit old now but was at one time required viewing in a company I worked for.

   Secondly, I also think in todays technology based environment any discussion on meetings in a modern day environment should include the use of tools such a video and telephone conferencing. But also rememebr to cover the pitfalls of such devices and a discussion on when they are best used.