How to Have Effective Team Meetings

Jul 1, 2022 | Listen

How to Have Effective Team Meetings

Chances are, your business currently has a team in place to help it run and grow. To ensure that everyone is working towards the same common goal, you’ll have to have regular team meetings. They are part of the working world, yet many feel dread, annoyance, and anxiety when they see them on their calendar.

When not managed properly and done wrong, they lower employee morale, are unnecessary (“this meeting should have been an email”), and waste time and employee productivity.

However, when done right, team meetings are a vital tool and secret weapon for your growing business. They foster teamwork and boost creativity, innovation, and help with collaboration to achieve your business goals.

So how do you run focused, productive, and effective staff meetings that will engage and motivate your team?

In this episode of Help! My Business Is Growing, our guest Danny Hadas breaks down the importance of team meetings and how to run them well.

He’ll provide actionable tips on how to make them more effective, sharing his four-part meeting structure which will not only foster a sense of collaboration, teamwork, and camaraderie amongst your employees but also have a direct effect on your business finances as well.



Timestamps for this week’s episode

  • 03:03 What happens in businesses that don’t have regular team meetings?

  • 09:19 What is the best way to structure your team meetings? Is there an optimum or best time to hold them?

  • 16:43 Is it possible to overshare KPIs or financials, or is it good to have transparency with your team?

  • 16:43 What is the third item on the agenda now that you’re done sharing KPIs and how the business is doing?

  • 16:43 Are there any topics that should never be discussed in a team meeting environment?

  • 36:20 What is one tangible step business owners can take this week to get closer to getting into the habit of having regular, efficient, and productive team meetings?

“If you think meetings are a waste of time, think again. By not having team meetings, you’re giving people permission to say goodbye and walk out.” – Danny Hadas

What happens to businesses that don’t have regular team meetings?

While one-on-one meetings are important, when you don’t make time for team meetings in your business, your people will begin to feel isolated.

They won’t know what anyone else is doing or what’s going on in the business. They will soon feel disconnected from the company’s mission and what part they play in bringing it to life, or why their role even exists.

The intention of team meetings are three things - foster a sense of collaboration, teamwork, and camaraderie.

What is the best way to structure your team meetings?

There is a four-step structure to conduct productive and high-value team meetings:

1. Reconnect with your brand, your corporate mission, vision, and values.

This will give your employees a chance to remember why they are working in your company and to get inspired again. You can also use these values to measure team and individual performance, reinforcing their importance to the company and its mission.

2. Discuss the current state of the business and how it is doing.

You need to discuss your numbers, targets, and KPIs:

  • Are you on track? What are the current sales trends?
  • What are we accomplishing individually and together as a team?
  • Open your books and share how the team is performing. The goal is to get the employees to start thinking in terms of, “How am I doing in my role, and what am I doing to contribute to the team so we achieve our common goals?”

3. Start up the “conversation.”

  • Have your team share the upcoming goals they want to hit, current challenges they face, and recent victories they’ve achieved.
  • Other team members listening will then start to think about how they can help each other.
  • You have laid the foundation for an environment that fosters teamwork and collaboration, with everyone encouraged to share solutions, ideas, and even past experiences that might help.

4. Share important updates.

This could be about your business, the industry, and even team members – especially if they have been promoted, are moving on, or had a big win that month.

Take this time to address anything that you think might be on the minds of your people so they don’t get distracted and lose focus and productivity by thinking about it.

“If all your company values are just up on some pretty posters on a wall, they’re meaningless. The best companies use their values to measure team and individual performance.” – Danny Hadas

Is it possible to overshare KPIs or financials, or is it good to have transparency with your team?

You can’t go wrong with being transparent in your business, especially with your employees who are your junior partners in growing your business.

Being transparent is never a bad thing, and depending on the way you share this information, it can have people operate with a sense of gratitude and get them inspired to do even more work so that the company can grow even faster.

When properly handled, being very transparent can rally your team to work smarter and perform even better than they already are.

Bad meetings are typically dominated by a single person. A bad meeting is one where you're listening to someone and it's really relevant to what you're up to.

Are there any topics that should never be discussed in a team meeting environment?

A strict “no gossip” rule is a great policy to have during team meetings.

Avoid discussing individuals who are not there in such a way that the team’s feelings, attitudes, or perceptions towards them will change, either positively or negatively.

It will nip gossiping outside meeting times in the bud as well and promote compassion and kindness.

“If you’re a business owner and you have a team, you have to realize that the only reason why you have profits is because these people are doing this work that you’ve assigned to them.” – Danny Hadas

Actionable Step

Schedule your first regular team meeting immediately.

Send a calendar invite to your entire team and light that fire.

Your people power your performance, and your profit, and you, the business owner - power your people.

Summary

  • Without regular team meetings, your employee issues will increase, as your people begin to feel isolated, disconnected, and unsure of their value to the company.
  • Use this four-item agenda to ensure effective meetings.
    • Review your brand, mission, vision, and values.
    • Share how your company is doing in terms of KPIs, sales and revenues, and financial targets.
    • Discuss individual and team goals, problems, and past wins to encourage collaboration and teamwork.
    • Share any news, urgent business or industry updates, and more so your team can be reassured and have peace of mind.
  • Full transparency, when handled properly, will create trust, build compassion and make your teams work smarter and more efficiently to the benefit of your growing business.
  • Avoid talking or gossiping about people who are not physically there during the meeting and won’t be able to explain or defend themselves.
  • To start a regular team meeting habit, go ahead and schedule it already. Work on the 4-step structure, and you’re well on your way to conducting effective meetings.

Transcript

Read More

About guest – Danny Hadas

Founder, CEO & Best-Selling Author

The Emovation Project

Danny Hadas is an entrepreneur and former advisor to the world’s most iconic brands.

He is also a #1 best-selling author, and his work has impacted millions of people across 500+ companies worldwide, including Disney, BMW, and AT&T.

As the founder of The Emovation Project, Danny teaches service-based small businesses how to double their revenue without doubling their effort using Minimalist Leadership.

Website: https://www.emovationproject.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielhadas

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emovationproject/

Resources:

Brilliant Breakthroughs for the Small Business Owner by Danny Hadas

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ZYBR68P/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0


About host – Kathy Svetina

Kathy Svetina is a Fractional CFO for growing small businesses with $10M+ in annual revenue.

Clients hire her when they’re unsure about what’s going on in their finances, are stressed out by making financial decisions, or need to structure their finances to keep up with their growth.

She solves their nagging money mysteries and builds a financial structure with a tailored financial strategy. That way they can grow in a financially healthy and sustainable way.

Kathy is based in Chicago, IL and works with clients all over the US.

Explore More

How to be Franchise Audit Ready

How to be Franchise Audit Ready

Stacy Farber and Kathy Svetina discuss how to prepare for a franchise audit for your growing franchise business in the Help, My Business is Growing podcast.

How to Pick the Right ERP

How to Pick the Right ERP

Allison Cummins and Kathy Svetina share how ERP implementation and change management can help small businesses in the Help, My Business is Growing podcast.

Table of Contents