Meeting Preparation Checklist for 2024

Your meetings are not productive and you are missing structure? You're not alone. In a recent survey, 71% of the participants said meetings are unproductive and inefficient and, 65% said that meetings keep them from completing their own work.

But there's hope! By following this meeting preparation checklist, you can learn how to prepare your next meeting in no time.

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Meeting Preparation Checklist:

1. Define the purpose of your meeting
2. Choose a date and time that work for everyone who needs to attend
3. Decide the format of the meeting (in person, or virtually)
4. Send out a meeting agenda ahead of time
5. Decide who takes meeting minutes during the meeting
6. Follow up after the meeting to make sure everyone is on track

Define the purpose of your meeting – what do you hope to accomplish by having this meeting?

When preparing for a meeting, it is important to define the purpose of the meeting beforehand. Having a clear objective helps to create a successful meeting that reaches its desired outcome. Meeting planning should be a crucial part of everyone's work life to ensure successful meetings.

As the organizer of the meeting, it is also important to make sure all meeting attendees are aware of its purpose and expected outcome. This will help everyone to streamline discussions and avoid unnecessary shifts of topics. An effective meeting should be focus on action-oriented goals, productive participation.

Choose a date and time that work for all meeting participants

When trying to select a meeting time that works for everyone in attendance, it's important to ensure that you give meeting participants enough time to successfully complete their tasks. Consider factors such as the amount of work they may need to do before the meeting or other colliding events.

Additional tips: In today's business world, inviting others can be done by the click of a button. That makes it more important than ever to think about meeting management, and only invite who is really needed. By minimizing the number of attendees, businesses can drastically reduce costs and increase efficiency. This is because, inviting too many people can lead to confusion and a lack of focus, while also potentially decreasing the quality of conversation. This is also an important aspect of meeting preparation.

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Decide the format of the meeting (in person, or virtually)

When deciding on the format of a meeting, there are many factors to consider. In person meetings provide an opportunity for participants to engage in conversations and collaborate in a more meaningful way than in virtual meetings. They also allow for more flexibility in terms of maintaining an agenda, as conversations often take more creative directions. If an in person meeting is the right choice, make sure to book a meeting room in advance.

However, sometimes, virtual meetings offer more possibility and are often more cost-effective. This is because participants can attend from all over the world without the need for extensive travel. They also offer a range of technological tools that make collaboration easier, such as file sharing and collaboration tools. Ultimately, it comes down to considering which format will best suit your particular needs and goals.

No matter which format you choose for your next meeting, it’s important that all participants are able to engage meaningfully. Clear communication is key to making sure everyone feels respected and valued.

Additional Tip: If you’re running a virtual meeting, it may also help to create an online chat or Q&A forum where people can ask questions and share their ideas in real-time.

Send out a meeting agenda ahead of time

Another part of the meeting preparation are agendas. Meeting agendas can give everyone that is attending the meeting already an idea of what will be discussed in the meeting. Not only does this provide an outline of the meeting's overall goals and objectives, but it also helps ensure that meeting participants are up-to-date throughout the meeting. It provides an opportunity for everyone to prepare any notes or materials beforehand and make sure that everyone is on the same page for the discussion. Additionally, having a meeting agenda ready before the meeting starts will help cut down on any potential distractions or questions and keep the meeting focused and efficient.

Have someone take minutes during the meeting

Taking meeting notes is an important process of meeting preparation and should be part of any meeting. Having meeting minutes can help capture key decisions and action items to keep everyone aligned and accountable for moving forward with the task at hand. When meeting minutes are taken, you have a roadmap to go back to in order to reference the decisions that were made or ensure that tasks have been completed properly. This can be very significant to the decision-making process later on. Taking meeting notes means there's no need to worry about forgetting crucial details since everything will be documented. Therefore, in order to have effective meetings, having someone committed to taking meeting minutes is a must!

If you want to find out what techniques are the most efficient to take meeting notes, read more here.

Additional Tip: If you want to save time and resources, you can also ask jamie (your personal AI Assistant) to take notes for you. jamie will make sure that all important information is captured.
If you are interested you can try jamie for free here.

Follow up after the meeting to make sure everyone is on track

Following up after a meeting is essential to ensure that meeting objectives are met, and desired outcomes are achieved. It also allows meeting participants to check in with each other and exchange updates on the previous meeting. This can prevent any miscommunication or misunderstanding of tasks or expectations. It also helps to keep everyone on track and stay in sync with each other, making sure that all tasks are completed in a timely manner and any questions or concerns can be addressed.

Overall, meeting planning is an important part of the work day, but they can also be a huge waste of time if not done correctly. By following these tips, you can make sure your meeting preparation is on point and your meetings are productive and contribute to a meaningful decision-making process.

Productive meetings with jamie

If you want to boost your meeting productivity even more, use jamie - your personal AI Assistant - to take notes for you and summarize your productive meetings in a few minutes. With jamie’s help, you’ll have more time to focus on getting things done rather than taking manual notes. You can use jamie across every online meeting platform and even in an on-site setting or conference room.
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I hope this meeting preparation checklist helped you to get a better overview of what is important before, during and after a meeting to ensure high productivity.

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Other Blogs that will help you

• 10 Best Meeting Management Software 2024‍
• 10 Meeting Rules to Boost Productivity in Online Meetings
• How to Win at Meetings
• 10 Tips for Making Your Virtual Meeting More Productive‍
• How to Take Meeting Minutes in One-on-one Meetings