Effective Meeting Management

Agenda Creation

Question 1

The structure of the meeting will be determined by a number of factors including but not limited to the purpose, the attendees, and the context among others. This will help in the smooth running of the meeting. For this meeting, the purpose is to facilitate the communication between the executive and the lower level management in response to unimpressive financial results in the previous quarter and to come up with a long lasting solution on the same. The structure should, therefore, be as formal as possible with a clear distinction between the lower level management and the C.E.O. the formal structure will help in question and ease handling of response and most questions will be raised by the junior staffs being directed to the CEO. As a result, the meeting will be held in the boardroom and will entail an opposite facing setup rather than a roundtable meeting, this set up will help in the distinction between junior and senior staffs.

Question 2

1. Ensure the venue meeting is booked in advance.

The guidelines from the organization structure state that the meeting must be available for attendance and be able to accommodate the attending numbers.

1. Ensure that the attendees have all the necessary gadgets and that any electronics to be used during the meeting is working.
2. Ensure that all the requested documents are furnished to attendees before meeting time. The guidelines and procedure for the organization discourage late distribution of papers.
3. Then we should get apologies for the meeting absentees.

Question 3

• Introduction: the meeting should be well introduced and all members play their role respectively.
• Summary of meeting deadlines: we should have the previous meeting in place, and members get the reminded of the last meeting. They will be free to raise a matter arising from the meeting.  
• Document agenda: all members should have agenda on hand to actively participate in the meeting.
• Attachment: Any necessary thing that needs to be present at the meeting need to be available, this includes the policies and the constitution if they are necessary.
• Minutes: There should be the secretary who will properly record the minute for future reference and good record keeping.
• Action item: every item that is necessary for the meeting is supposed to be present at the meeting place.
• Chair reports: the chair is always supposed to give some information on the proceedings of the organization. The chair can also give the report from outside partners to the meeting
• Record management: the minutes should be recorded and be easily read, be clear and succinct for all the members.
• Meeting preparation: all that is necessary for meeting preparation, need to be put in place before the meeting, this includes, the venue of the meeting, items necessary among other. The information about the venue and other things need to be well informed to members in time.

• Introduction: this is the necessary condition for a meeting, as the meeting has to be called in ordered and all members welcomed.
• Agenda and minutes for the meeting: all agendas need to be with members beforehand and members need to have the minutes when they are ready.
• The form of decision: the decision arising from previous meetings need to be addressed in the meeting, for instance, having a policy for child protection.
• Decision issue: there some issues that will provoke decisions to be made, at that time the decisions can be postponed to other meetings for the decision to be well deliberated on.  

Question 4

1.    The purpose of the meeting             15mins
2.    Need for the meeting              5mins

III.    Preliminary Agenda                10mins

1.    Place and time for the meeting      2mins
2.    Sending invitation                          2mins
3.    Sending agenda for the meeting      2mins

Question 5

1. Venue; the venue of the meeting need to be decided upon beforehand and all members are conversant with it.
2. Catering; if there will need to prepare the meal for the meeting, then all necessary requirement for catering has to be there.
3. Accommodation; if the meeting will take more days, then the plan accommodation of members needs to be in place.
4. Transportation; it needs to be clear if members will use public means or private means of transportation. If it is public, is the place accessible by public vehicles?
5. Entertainment and recreational activity; all properties pertaining to entertainment need to be in place. This is in the case they will be used.
6. Stationery; all office stationery that might be necessary for the meeting to be in place, this includes chairs and record keeping equipment and any other stationery.
7. Handouts; if members will be given some token after the meeting, then this is a necessary provision.
8. Speaker and entertainment fee; the public address system need to be in place, the guest of honor need to be planned for.
9. Public materials; brochures and flyers. This is necessary and they need to be in place in time.
10. Staff; all staff that should be attending the meeting need to be invited in time. Staff must be there for the meeting to proceed
11. Indirect cost; there should be emergency cost funds for the meeting so that in case, there arises an emergency issue it can be properly dealt with

Question 6

1.    Typing the meeting agenda                               5mins
2.    Sending the meeting agenda through emails     5mins
3.    If it is hardcopy, I will print the meeting agenda and send them through post office or messenger.     10mins

Question 7

I will use the phone SMS. This is because each and every person can easily access the phone and get the service. It is also cheap to send an SMS and members can easily reply to the SMS. Unlike other media like which at a time are not accessed by everybody, for instance, few people will rarely read the emails if they are not in their offices. This implies that SMS is easy to write, easy to send and easily received by the participants.

Question 8

1.    A laptop
2.    A meeting minute template
3.    Microsoft word in place
4.    Tape recorder
5.    Paper and pen
6.    The meeting agendas

Question 9

Before the start of the meeting, I will ensure everything I will use for recording minutes is in a good condition, if it is laptop it is well charged and if it a book is well kept and a pen operating well. I will arrive at the meeting in time, to be there when the meeting starts and sit in a strategic place where I can listen to everybody, sitting in a strategic place would also help me in case I will need to charge the laptop, I will sit where I can easily access the socket for charging. this might include choosing the central place at the meeting center in order for one not to strain to listen to anybody. I will keenly follow what the members are saying and ensure nothing said goes unrecorded, and if I fail to capture any point I will humbly ask them to repeat the point for me to accurately record it. This will be helpful for future record references.  I will rarely enter into discussion in the meeting, this will help in I being very attentive in what others are saying and record keenly and every point. Frequently entering into a discussion, I might enter into the serious argument with members and forget to record appropriately as I want to defend my point. The rare entry to the discussion does not rule out the possibility of me giving my views on different opinions, I will always give my views when the need arise and record them. In case I learn that I did not capture something during the meeting and it was supposed to be recorded, I will seek clarification from the chair or the member who raised the point to ensure everything is properly recorded.

Participant Organization

Question 10

We use the API style guide documentation. This style will be very appropriate because it is easy to read. It is clear and succinct and it makes the content engaging. If our agenda, meetings, and reports are in this form, then they will be clear and engaging. The minutes and all documents should always be easily accessible, succinct and clear to all the members the members.

Question 11

1. Board of director that include: current values, mission and statement, member recruitment system, member orientation system, attendances policies, membership and term limitation policy, organization chat, chair and officer job descriptions, committee charters, board operations and policy manual, by-law review policy, chief executive performance review policy, board self-evaluation process, board calendar.
2. Planning: current strategic plan, diversity plan, marketing plan, fundraising and development plan, board and committee work plan, yearly operations plan.
3. Program and outcome evaluation: the valid method for client needs, service outcome, and data collection method established target indicators
4. Information management: client, volunteer, personal, financial. Contributor and donor record. Mailing list, description for workflow, manual for operation, computer hardware, and software.
5. Volunteer and personnel management system.

Question 12

Due to the increasing number of volunteers and lack of volunteer appreciation, the volunteers through their chair Tom Carney have requested for a meeting with the management on 22nd April 2018. The members who have confirmed to attend the meeting include all volunteers, some of the staff members, the Human resource manager, and the accountant for the organization. In total, we have 57members who have confirmed their attendance. Another staff has received the invitation and they are attending to confirm their attendance. The venue of the meeting is yet to be confirmed have some strategy has been put in place.

The meeting is expected to start at 8 am and take two hours, the main agenda for the meeting will be to discuss how to appreciate the volunteers in our next activity. Some of the form of appreciation that volunteers have requested include the increase in monthly stipend, come up with team buildings, be assured of the job after the expirer of their volunteer contract among other forms of appreciation.  Another agenda that will be discussed in the meeting in the relationship between volunteers and staff. Those are two main agenda for the meeting.

The meeting is bound to face a number of challenges. One of the challenges we are likely to face is, if no better solution is arrived on the issues of volunteers’ appreciation, the volunteering to terminate their contract, we, therefore, to request some of the senior staffs to attend the meeting in order to offer a long lasting solution to this problem. Since this is an impromptu meeting, there is no budget for the refreshment and other major services for they are required in the meeting, this might make it difficult for the running of the meeting, and we humbly request the office to assist us in financial need of the meeting.

Since the meeting has been scheduled to happen at the time of work, then it will be fair if the grievances of volunteers are solved in time. If the grievances are solved in time, then the meeting will take short time and not hinder the normal operation of the organization. This is why there is the high need to have senior staff in the meeting for quicker resolution

Thanks, and we hope to have a long-lasting solution for the grievances of all the volunteers in the coming meeting. Coming up with a solution will help in the easy operation of the business in the organization.