Professional Meetings & Professional Interviews

1.0 Professional Meetings

1.1 Overview:

Meetings in general come in all shapes and sizes. They can be informal as a simple conversation between people to formal presentation with many participants. They can be the everyday meeting, board meetings, and even conferences.

Of course, there are a lot of meetings happening everyday some of which are good and effective and some are nothing but a waste of time. Sadly, most of the meetings held are not well run which can make them very undesirable.

Our objective is to present a professional way of conducting a meeting by showing what the participants in the meeting and should do

• Pre-meeting

• During

• Post meeting.

1.2 Pre-meeting preparations

Every professional meeting should have certain characteristics in order to achieve its goals. Some of these characteristics should include the following:

• Purpose and expected outcomes should be clearly stated

• Purpose and subject is communicated to participants through email, meeting agenda, written invitation, brochures or in the registration forms.

• Consider logistics which cover location, time, transportation, and materials for the meeting.

All of these should be ready before the meeting. People attending the meeting are looking forward to learn something new out of the meeting. Hence, you have to put in your mind what new things would you present to participants. That is what would motivate them to attend your meeting. Another thing to consider is the use different styles in the meeting, for example: board, a projector, diagrams and group discussions. This is very helpful in addressing different learning styles and consequently maintaining the attention of the participants. Participants also attend the meeting to have a chance to interact with people from different backgrounds or positions.

1.3 During the meeting

Activities and actions during the meeting are concerned with the efficient use of the meeting time and it should be used to produce commitment and to instill a feeling of accomplishment from the participants’ side. In particular, a few things to focus on should include the following:

• Keeping people attentive and well-focused on the subject at hand

• Ensuring the accomplishment of expected objectives

• Providing a good facilitation, and pre-work information that help achieve the desired result.

• Use whatever pre-meeting preparations