Would You Like to Strengthen Every Meeting Agenda You Ever Put Together?

How many Meeting Agendas have you read where the leader listed topics but gave you no clue as to what outcome she/he wanted?

Or perhaps “Worse Yet” how many times have you discovered during your meeting that the leader had no intended outcomes for the agenda items either?

And on top of all of that – How many times have you discovered that that Leader is YOU?

Example:

Executive Team Meeting Agenda:

1. Sales
2. Budget
3. Customer Service
4. Leveraging Strengths
5. National Conference

When you read though the above agenda do you have any idea what outcome the leader is wanting from the discussion of each agenda item?  You of course could guess – but how often do you think your guess would be correct?

So how can you strengthen your agenda?  It is really quite simple:

Turn Your Agenda Items Into Questions!

The Leader simply asks:  “What ‘Outcome’ am I wanting from the discussion of each Agenda item?  How can I turn that ‘Outcome’ into an easy to understand question?”

If an outcome cannot be identified then there is no need to include that item in your agenda.

Here is the Revised Executive Team Meeting Agenda:

1. What are our top 20% sales force members doing that the rest of our sales force is not?
2. Are your expenses over, under or on track with your budget?
3. How can we turn customer complaints into satisfied customer endorsements?
4. How are you leveraging the unique Strengths of each of your team members to accomplish your Strategic Plan?
5. What can we do to increase attendance at our National Conference?

When you read through the Revised Meeting Agenda above can you now clearly understand what outcome the leader is wanting from the discussion of each item?

Not exactly “Rocket Science” is it?  And yet turning your agenda items into questions is another easily doable example of how “Leading With Questions” can dramatically increase your leadership effectiveness!