Each of us has 24 hours in his or her day. A significant amount of that time is spent in meetings of one sort or another - be they meetings with colleagues, potential suppliers, prospects, clients - you name it, we end up in meetings with all these people.

Some of these meetings are exploratory and by their very nature have no real, overt, fixed agenda - I'm thinking of the traditional "networking" meeting here.

The vast majority of our meetings though do have a fixed agenda - or maybe I'd better say, could have a fixed agenda, if somebody actually produced one.

In this Impact Improver I'll give you some thoughts on improving the efficiency of your meetings.

The magic of an agenda
I want you to conduct a small research project for the next two weeks. Count how many business meetings you attend and make a note of all those that could sensibly be conducted via a printed agenda. Also make a count of all the meetings where an agenda is actually distributed.

I'm willing to bet that the number of meetings where an agenda could be used - but isn't - far outweighs the number of meetings in which an agenda is actually distributed.

Rule One this week is simple: If you're in charge of the meeting produce an agenda and distribute a printed copy to each attendee at the start of the meeting.

If you're asked to attend a meeting, ask for an agenda in advance - it might just "tweak" the organiser's sense of professionalism enough for them to produce one.

Having an agenda doesn't by itself keep a meeting on track. Despite the existence of one, people do tend to wander, like sheep grazing the hillside. If you're in charge of the meeting insist that the agenda is dealt with ahead of "any other business". If you're not in charge, you can always politely bring the meeting back on track - provided you have an agenda, (hence Rule One).

The magic of location
Even with the diligent application of Rule One, I'm still willing to bet you'll find meetings will drift on a bit - it's part of the social intercourse of business. You can satisfy the need of social intercourse and improve the efficiency of your meetings by changing their location. Don't have them in "the meeting room" - people associate that with nattering on about stuff and doing a bit of business at the same time. Experiment with having your meeting at a nearby coffee shop - and make sure you have your agendas with you. Once people have finished drinking their coffee, there's little incentive to stay and provided the agenda's been covered, you can close the meeting. The necessary social intercourse can occur during the walk to/from the coffee shop.

An alternative approach is to not to make everyone too comfortable. I used to hold my weekly staff meetings with everybody standing up, in a circle - a bit like King Arthur, but without the round table. The agenda was written on the whiteboard for all to see and items were ticked off once dealt with. Those meetings didn't over-run.

I heard about an ad agency a few years ago that had two meeting rooms.

The first one was a bare room - no furniture of any kind - except for a steel bar running from floor to ceiling in the centre of the room. About four feet from the ground, attached to the bar, was an 'elbow rest'. The idea being that if you needed to meet with someone you could lean on the bar and chat, but in no way was it comfortable. Meetings there rarely lasted more than 10 minutes. When I was working at IBM La Gaude there was a similar layout in the coffee bar next to the canteen. There were small "mushroom" shaped tables, around which approximately four people could comfortably stand - no seats of any kind. Excellent for an espresso and brief meeting.

The ad agency's other meeting room was a glass box, five feet to a side and about eight feet tall. Inside the box were two padded benches facing each other. If anyone from the agency needed a meeting with an outside contractor, that was the place to do it - in full view of the whole open-plan company. Needless to say, meetings there tended to be brief too.

Any important client meetings that would not suit either little room were held in a nearby hotel bar, and presentations were held in the hotel's conference facility.

I'm not sure that such radical solutions would work for many companies outside of the advertising industry, but they worked for them and saved a huge amount of wasted time. Certainly, I really liked IBM's standing coffee tables and would recommend them to any organisation.

Meetings can be one of the biggest drains on your most valuable resource - time. Find ways that you can keep them to a minimum and you will have a massive advantage.

Breathe - you'll live longer and enjoy life more
If you're reading this it's safe more me to assume that you're breathing too. Excellent. I'm willing to bet though that you're not really aware of it - you're letting your breathing run on autopilot, which is fine for the majority of time that you're pottering about doing your bit for profit and excellence.

I'd like you to consciously change your breathing regime at the start of every day. Close your eyes, focus on your breathing. Relax your shoulders, breathe with your diaphragm muscle, slowly and deeply. Remain in this state for 3-4 minutes and you'll be amazed at how much calmer you feel about life and what needs to be done.

What a way to start the day.

That's it folks for this week - as usual, your comments welcomed and appreciated, particularly with reference as to what you'd like to hear about. I do get quite a few e-mails by the way, and I read them all, so please don't feel shy about getting in contact.

Best wishes for the coming week.

Chris Davidson
Editor, Professional Speakers Journal
editor@professionalspeakersjournal.com