Team meetings can make or break your team’s success. As a key part of this, laying the foundation for an effective meeting cadence is vital to keep your team members both motivated and engaged.
There is a time and a place for everything, and meetings are no exception. You should know when it is time to gather the whole team together to ensure that everyone hears the same thing and has an opportunity to be heard.
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But a team is a group of individuals, each of whom want attention and care for needs that are as unique as they are.
Here is a suggested meeting cadence that addresses both the team communication and individual attention concerns and a whole lot more.
Weeks 1 & 3
Team meetings should allot 55 minutes to cover announcements, updates and coordination in an open, transparent manner. Reminders of your organization’s mission and progress toward your team’s quarterly goals are important topics to cover at least monthly. Attach an agenda to the meeting invitation that starts with items brought forward by team.
Open with the team’s agenda items first, and set time for the manager (or delegated to a team member that wants experience leading meetings) to cover the team agenda.
It can be positive to finish these team meetings by asking each team member to briefly describe one challenge and one win that they have encountered in the past two weeks. It is also important to have someone take minutes for each team meeting.
Week 2
Productivity one-on-ones‘s of 25 minutes to connect with each person on your team and get updates from them on what they are working on and where they are at with each initiative. Each session should begin and end with a plan of what they will accomplish to create accountability. Document each meeting.
Week 4
Developmental one-on-ones’s of 25 minutes to again connect with each person, but this time avoid talking about projects, initiatives or clients. The focus of these meetings will be to have your employee identify a few things that they want to become “better tomorrow than they were today.” This is called coaching.
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At the beginning of a quarter, ask them to identify one or two skills or skills, habits, competencies or capabilities that they want to develop in relation to your team’s mandate or organization’s mission. Keep it simple, only one or two.
Then brainstorm with them to come up with what actions they can take to achieve these developmental goals. This will help you co-create a developmental plan. Hold these meetings in a break-out room or somewhere where you can create a peer-to-peer dynamic.
During developmental one-on-one meetings, you want to be a partner in their development, not a directive boss. At the end of each meeting, ask them to commit to one thing that they will do to improve before you meet again, which again reinforces accountability. Also, ask them what you can do to support them.
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Encourage them to keep moving the needle by setting one or two new goals each quarter, and again, document each meeting. This co-creation and collaboration will lead to continual improvement and a better bond between you and your team members.
More and more often, our team members want to feel like they are in on things, to be heard, to feel like they matter and they want help to grow and become even better. This team meeting cadence will help you meet each of these needs while co-creating an environment where accountability, trust and motivation flourish.
We love your feedback. Try it and let us know how it works for you.