How to Run an Effective Board Meeting
A successful board meeting will improve decision-making and efficiency increase time-management and collaboration skills and help bring companies closer to their objectives. However, to run a successful and efficient board meeting requires a fluid agenda structure, a good template for the board book, and clear governance practices.
Create clear meeting goals and make them clear to members ahead of time. This will help everyone prepare and prioritize discussion topics to avoid meetings that are too long and unfocused. Focus on issues rather than updates and limit meetings to 30 minutes per topic. This will keep discussions productive and reduce fatigue.
Be clear about how decisions will be taken at the time of the meeting, and whether it will be based on consensus, voting or some other method. Encourage a dialogue that is open, respecting differing opinions. However, be open about difficult topics and bad news. If it’s necessary to have a formal process for voting make sure the procedure is well-defined, with a specified number of votes required for a vote to be considered to be agrement. The meeting minutes can accurately document the results of the vote which allows for accountability and follow-up.
When the meeting is finished review all the decisions made and create actions items for each chief executive to present to their departments. This will help to reinforce the new strategies agreed upon and ensure that each department is in line with these goals. In subsequent meetings, review and assess these actions to create a culture that is based on accountability.