Tag Archives: purpose

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Meeting Primer: Make Every Minute Matter

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So you’ve decided to call a meeting. Maybe you and your client’s team are due for an update/ check-in; or has an unexpected glitch created a project roadblock that demands a problem-solving strategy? Let’s look at the bright side—-has what appears to be an opportunity revealed itself and the purpose of your meeting is to verify that the opportunity is not a mirage and deciding how to proceed?

Oftentimes, a meeting means a decision must be made. When it comes to meetings one thing is certain—the purpose is always about finding the way forward, where you’re going and how you’ll get there. Moreover, there are always action items to follow-up on.

Meetings have a checkered history; there is an unfortunate tendency to deviate from the agenda and get lost in the weeds. Salvation is within reach, however, when the convener—you!—thinks through the key components of the meeting so that you will enable the meeting to both fulfill its purpose and leave the participants feeling energized, engaged and effective.

Agenda

It is your job as meeting convener to create the conditions for a successful meeting. Begin by identifying the purpose of your meeting—must potential solutions to a problem be explored, or must the team determine strategies that will advance a certain goal? Once the meeting purpose is confirmed, the convener will then consider which information and/or actions will be needed to support the meeting purpose and inform the creation of the meeting agenda—which will be the meeting journey roadmap. To create the agenda, allow yourself to do some some free association thinking to get a mental picture of what must be discussed and resolved.

Attendance

Next, decide who should attend, as well as those who perhaps for political reasons you would be wise to invite. There may be certain stakeholders or power brokers who must be in the room (or in virtual attendance), whether you want them there or not. Those on the must-invite list could be a net-positive, however; you may be able to convince one of the VIP attendees to troubleshoot, green-light, recruit allies, approve funding, or somehow advance your vision of what needs to happen.

Following the list of heavy weights, you’ll be free to draw up a list of those who should attend, who you want to attend, because they have the subject expertise and insight that will benefit the meeting purpose. Finally, there are those you should ask to attend because they know how to get things done and can be trusted to carry out important action items—and just as valuable, if there’s a vote taken, they’re with you!

Bear in mind that there may be stakeholders /VIPs who simply appreciate receiving info regarding the outcome of your meeting, but they do not need or want to attend. If someone doesn’t need to be there, offer them alternatives, such as asking them for pre-meeting input or sending them a follow-up meeting summary. Fewer attendees mean more-focused conversations—and ultimately better outcomes.

Use the “Five W’s”—who, what, where, when, and why—to generate the participant list. Who needs to be there? What, if any, special information should you bring in resources to support the conversation (meeting handouts or presentation slides? What information can drive decision-making and needs to be shared and what is just a distraction and doesn’t need to be included?

You must also consider the most inclusive and welcoming format for the meeting—in person or virtual? It’s entirely likely that your meeting will be hybrid and it will be necessary to design logistics that will make those who attend virtually feel fully present.

Engagement and participation

As you know, the best meeting outcomes are achieved when you bring together participants who have the means and motive to contribute something relevant to the proceedings. Lackluster participation in meetings weakens the result by reducing collaboration, hampering decision-making and eroding team unity. How can you encourage more fruitful engagement? Step One is to create an agenda that directs attention to the core purpose of the meeting, whether check-in, problem-solving, or decision that must be made, or opportunity to exploit.

Start by clarifying expectations for the meeting and participants by outlining some of the supportive behaviors you want to see in your meetings. For example, you might emphasize mutually supportive behaviors such as nonjudgmental communication, collaborating to tackle challenges together, sharing of resources and information. It’s also helpful to offer team members different ways to contribute—for example, allow for written input before, during, or after meetings. Giving those who are typically less vocal a structured role can help empower them to speak. When participants know that their insights and wisdom are valued, they’ll find the motivation and courage to speak up and they have the potential to perhaps bring an unexpected idea or perspective that will greatly improve the outcome and relevance of the meeting.

Finally, make every minute count and don’t run over. Set meetings for the shortest time necessary, not by default increments like 60 minutes. Honoring to the agenda and ending on time helps people sustain focus, reduces frustration and communicates to everyone that your meetings are worth attending.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: ©Siphosethu Fanti/peopleimages.com for Adobe Stock

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2022 Prediction: How You’ll Succeed in Business

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If we’re honest with ourselves, we’ll acknowledge that the ground beneath us began to tremble at least two years before the coronavirus appeared and since its arrival, the instability has intensified. Unquestionably, the economic landscape has changed. As the global economy hungers for signs of a robust post-pandemic recovery in 2022, business owners and leaders have no choice but to adapt to the new reality in order to survive and thrive.

You are not in Kansas anymore. The assumptions and practices that were considered prudent even three years ago will fall flat today. Forward thinking business owners and leaders are taking a fresh look at every major aspect of their organization—sales, marketing, customers, operations, finance, HR / staffing and technology-—to reassess how each job function contributes to sustainable profitability, the brand and the values, vision and mission of the company.

Define the purpose of your products and services

We’re accustomed to communicating benefits—-use this or do that so your boss and colleagues will think you’re a genius and your company’s customers will be happy that their needs are being met. But defining purpose is subtly different.

To figure out purpose, you’ll need to understand the pain point, goal, or challenge that compels prospects to search your website and look for information they hope can move them forward. If you want to provide the information they’re looking for—-and you’d better!—-you must know what prospects have in mind, basically know what they need to resolve, when they reach out to your organization.

Define your customer segments

Regardless of the product or service based solutions that your company provides, there will nevertheless be differences among those who buy from you based on factors such as motivation, budget, maybe age or gender, maybe also geography or education level. The more you can discern those differences, the more successful you’ll be in bringing business to your door, both new customers and those you’ve retained.

Expectations and the journey

Marketing research experts agree that customers have high expectations these days; they’re quite used to getting what they want, the way they want it and when they want it. Maybe the expectations started with next-day deliveries? Whatever, it’s a thing now and you have to keep up. Your only option is to make each customer touch point with your company seamless, that is, easy, fast, meaningful and pleasant. You’ll only achieve that nirvana by:

1.) accurately communicating the purpose(s) of your products and services

2.) knowing the motivations and other defining characteristics of the various customer segments

The customer journey that your company presents requires intentional creation. So much is at stake, and first impressions matter. The information and call-to-action you devise to showcase its presence influences the prospect’s decision to further engage (or not), depending on its perceived relevance to the problem or goal the prospect wants to address.

Info that supports the purpose and efficacy of your products and/or services will be contained in a white paper, case studies, archived newsletters or blog posts, customer testimonials and your website’s “About us” page. Does the information that you make available effectively support the purpose of your products and services? If it doesn’t, rewrite or replace.

The Yellow Brick Road known as your customer journey must be seeded with a series of positive and relevant encounters with information that demonstrates your expertise and builds trust. Trot out the info equivalent of the Mayor of Munchkin Land, the Wizard of Oz and Glinda, the Good Witch to persuade prospects to do business with you.

Digital support

The very thought of incorporating digital tools can be intimidating but you can start small, so long as you start. Don’t imagine you must immediately dive into the digital deep end. You’ve been clicking on chat bots for 5 years, so why not put that AI-powered tool to work on your website?

Do that and visitors to your site will be favorably impressed with the sophistication of your company, which is a confidence-booster, and if you know your customers well enough to program in answers to the 6-7 questions they’ll most likely have, you will contribute positively to the customer journey. Other AI/ digital tools can take the form of marketing analytics that you sign up to access. As noted in a December 2021 post, Micrsoft Excel or Power BI, Python, Jupyter and Apache Spark are among the most highly rated data analytics tools.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: Dorothy and Toto, the Lion, the Tin Man and the Scare Crow take the Yellow Brick Road into the Emerald City in The Wizard of Oz (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1939)