Are you working in a business with flexible working options?

Flexible working means that business practices have had to change, particularly around team meetings. Once team members could be reliably found during the work day in the office, now you may be a little harder-pressed to have everyone available for a team meeting in person.

But that doesn’t mean that it’s not impossible.

A team meeting, at its core, has the purpose of sharing information efficiently and provides scope for discussion around what is being shared.

If you have employees working away from the office, it can be a good idea to connect with them through a regularly scheduled meeting. It’s also an opportunity for those within the office to organise a time for effective communication about work.

A good team meeting assists teams in aligning on the topics of discussion, airing any concerns or obstacles, and clarifying future actions.

Generally, it can be used to glean an update on how the projects are overall progressing and if there needs to be further action from other members to assist in the progression.

The exact purpose of a team meeting is decided by the topics in the agenda, the business needs of the meeting, and your organisation.

Your team meeting might be business-critical, where company developments or valuable information or training are shared. It provides them with an avenue to ask for help or to gain answers to their questions about tasks. Team meetings can also allow your staff to spend time together informally and share their thoughts.

Not only does a team meeting allow you to catch yourself up on what your team is currently working on (and get you acquainted with how things are travelling), a team meeting also allows you to:

  • Improve and boost team morale
  • Ensure that your team is constantly learning and upskilling
  • Provide transparency within the team about what is happening, when and why
  • Allow the team to have the chance to recentre themselves and know their set priorities and goals for the next month.

As long as there is regular communication between team members during the meetings, issues can be brought up, actioned and resolved quickly during team meetings.

So that your team meetings are run effectively, ensure that you are fully prepared with what you require from them. Making a list of topics for discussion, how the projects are progressing, and any immediate concerns you might have will help facilitate discussions during the meeting.

Make sure to schedule them in advance so that all team members involved can attend, as this allows for both remote and face-to-face members to have their say.

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