An effective, successful meeting boils down to purpose. It’s easy for attendees to feel frustrated and overworked if they regularly attend sessions that lack proper structure and intention. Meetings — especially ones where attendees have to travel long distances to be there in person — must be well thought out and thoroughly organized. And one of the best ways to do this is with an effective meeting agenda.
A meeting agenda is much more than just a list of tasks to get through or topics to discuss. It requires strategic planning and insights. If you think of your meeting objective as the overarching destination of a meeting, your agenda needs to act as a roadmap to get attendees there. It’s one of the most crucial parts of a meeting’s success — it steers the session, ensures you cover the high-priority topics, and keeps the meeting on track.
When sent in good time, a meeting agenda also enables attendees to prepare for the session ahead of time, helping everyone make the most of their time together in-session and reach important discussions more quickly.
Here are some things to keep in mind when creating an effective meeting agenda.
It’s incredibly hard to create a meeting agenda without first understanding your overarching meeting objective. If you're struggling to define your objective, it’s often a sign the meeting needs more planning, better communication, or even an entire rethink. It’s also important not to have too many objectives for one meeting as this can dilute the main purpose of the session. Instead, stick to one or two objectives, maximum.
Once you’ve confirmed your meeting objective, your agenda should then act as a step-by-step journey to reach your chosen goal.
An effective meeting agenda should have a deliberate and logical order. The more strategic you can be, the more successful you’ll be at hitting your objective. To do this, understand what the most important or urgent sessions are to fulfill the objective of the meeting, and plan for those first. Other sessions can then be moved up or down the agenda as needed.
It’s also important not to overload the agenda. Time together in person is valuable, so it makes sense to want to fill the itinerary with a lot of activities, working time, and team-building moments. However, this can leave attendees exhausted and overwhelmed. Be sure to schedule breaks throughout the day and provide attendees with ample downtime. This will ensure all attendees have time to digest information and allow optimal productivity when in-session.
Keep in mind that every agenda item should circle back to that original objective. If it doesn’t fit, perhaps it’s not for this particular meeting or can be a follow-up item after this meeting concludes.
Alongside prioritizing your sessions, it’s just as important to consider how much time is needed for each topic and to allocate accordingly, as not all agenda points will require the same amount of time spent on them. Typically, you’ll want to allocate the most time for the high priority sessions in case they run over.
Likewise, the time of day scheduled for each session matters, too. Mornings are optimal for creativity and alertness. Post-lunch, attendees are typically engaged but sleepy. End-of-day sessions are the toughest as attendees could be on information overload, tired, and likely ready for happy hour. By choosing the right timing, you can ensure maximum productivity.