Effective Meeting Communication and Facilitation

Course overview

Course outline

1. 1Day One: Purposeful Meetings

   • The cost of unproductive meetings to organisations
   • Deciding whether a meeting is the right tool
   • Types of meetings and their different purposes
   • Setting clear objectives and expected outcomes
   • Choosing the right participants and roles
   • Self-assessment of current meeting practices
   • Exercise: redesigning an unproductive regular meeting
2. 2Day Two: Planning and Opening Meetings

   • Designing agendas with objectives and timings
   • Pre-reading and preparation for participants
   • Room layout and technology preparation
   • Opening the meeting and setting ground rules
   • Clarifying roles of chair, facilitator and note taker
   • Keeping to time without cutting off discussion
   • Practice: opening and framing a meeting
3. 3Day Three: Facilitating Discussion and Decisions

   • Asking questions that open up discussion
   • Encouraging quieter participants to contribute
   • Summarising, paraphrasing and checking understanding
   • Brainstorming and idea generation techniques
   • Prioritisation and decision-making methods
   • Reaching consensus or making a clear decision
   • Practice: facilitating a decision-making discussion
4. 4Day Four: Managing Difficult Situations

   • Handling dominant, negative or silent participants
   • Managing disagreement and productive conflict
   • Bringing discussions back to the agenda
   • Dealing with late arrivals and side conversations
   • Staying neutral as a facilitator
   • Handling emotional moments in meetings
   • Role play: a meeting with challenging participants
5. 5Day Five: Virtual Meetings, Minutes and Follow-Up

   • Running engaging virtual and hybrid meetings
   • Using online tools for collaboration and voting
   • Closing meetings with clear decisions and actions
   • Writing concise minutes and action logs
   • Following up and tracking action completion
   • Evaluating and improving meeting effectiveness
   • Personal action plan for better meetings