As someone leading the team during a meeting, you feel excited about calling everyone for a discussion and brainstorming. Whether there is an activity coming up or a project to commence, meeting everyone is essential. However, employees don’t feel the same way. Most of them hate the idea of being in a meeting. They find it too dull. If you know they think this way, you need to evaluate how you conduct the meeting and find strategies to change their attitude. You can start by understanding the reason why they feel bored.
The meeting seems too long
When you organise a meeting, you need to make sure that you have a clear agenda. You must estimate the time to finish the session. Once the time is up, avoid asking for an extension. At that point, people might already feel drained. By controlling the topic and the length of the discussion, you can avoid dragging the meeting on for too long.
Another way to avoid long meetings is to invite only those people who are relevant to the discussion. You don’t need to ask people who won’t contribute anything to the conversation. They might join later if you need their input.
You failed to prepare
When you enter the meeting room, you need to be well prepared. Determine the topics for discussion. Prepare the questions to ask the people in the meeting room. Inform everyone before the meeting what you are going to talk about. If you are pitching an idea, you need to know the answers to possible questions, otherwise, it will become a dry and dull meeting. If you keep saying that you don’t know the answer, people will think there is no point in having the meeting.
You talk for too long
The meeting needs to be a discussion among the people you invited. If it is about you and your ideas, everyone else will feel bored. They will think that there does not need to be a meeting. You can create a memo containing your ideas, and delegate tasks. Meetings are usually for brainstorming and discussion of ideas; avoid being the only source of knowledge in the room.
You don’t have any visual aids
For the first few minutes, people might love listening to what you say. However, as hours go by, everyone will start feeling bored. When you have something to show them, they will feel excited and engaged. You can prepare slides that you can display on a monitor. You can speak and move the slides so that everyone can follow. You also need to invest in a TV mount in the meeting room so that each time you conduct a meeting, everyone can see the visuals clearly.
It is not easy making people feel engaged during a meeting. It is up to you how you prepare for the discussion and the visual aids you use to keep them enticed. Prepare well and invite only the people who need to be there to attend.
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