The experts’ opinions are unquestionably clear: the meetings are synonymous with exasperating work for a multitude of managers.
Regardless of where you work, the concept of an endless meeting sounds familiar to you. The notion of wasting time in meetings is a fact, but what about the actual cost $$$ of your meetings? How much do your meetings cost? Do you have any idea?
Keep reading and you will be able to know the costs and have easily applicable solutions to save on all your meetings.
You’ll find in this article:
- Meeting cost calculator
- ROTI, an indicator of efficiency
- Promote a positive organizational culture
- No agenda = no meeting
- Define everyone’s roles
- Invite the right people
- Respect the time allotted
- Do not allow stragglers
- How to calculate the ROI?
Calculate the cost of a meeting
With no big formulas to learn, Beenote offers you a calculator to help you estimate the real cost of your meetings.
In North America, the average cost of a meeting is 650$US.
Read on until the end of this article to find out how much you’ll save by using Beenote.
ROTI, an indicator of efficiency
Some say that the biggest corporate theft is the theft of your work time and done by meetings that pop up unexpectedly in your calendar.
Notifications make us all nervous: we are seized by their display on our screens. When they are linked to events, they give you the choice to attend or not. Many people are inclined to think that an invitation is more of an obligation to attend.
You’re wrong! This phenomenon can be called MAS, the mindless acceptance syndrome. Should I really be attending? If you are in doubt, you can contact a co-worker, consult the agenda. If you are dispensable, decline! Not comfortable doing so? Want to know how to decline an offer? Learn more about declining invitations.
If the invitation does not contain an agenda, you can always answer “maybe” (in the three choices offered in your agenda) and ask the person in charge to let you know what will be discussed. This will help you determine whether your time invested will be worthwhile for you and the organization.
Now let’s look at the solutions available to you to make your meetings more cost-effective, the impact on the time invested in them.
How can you reduce the cost of your meetings?
Promote a positive organizational culture
That goes without saying! However, applying them is easier said than done. It starts with an organizational culture that values the meeting, that presents it as a time of productivity, openness, and interaction.
No agenda = no meeting
Every meeting deserves to have an agenda that presents the topic(s) to be discussed at that meeting. Such an approach allows both the person who invites to have participants who will be informed and prepared and those who are invited, to know what is expected and whether indeed their time invested will be the best.
Define the roles of each participant
Knowing what is expected of us allows us to better prepare ourselves beforehand. Therefore, it becomes important to define the roles initially at the beginning of the meeting process. These roles are those of the meeting leader, the person in charge of notes or time management, and other responsibilities.
Invite the right people
Having the right people around the table is one of the main ways for an effective meeting in terms of cost $$$ and time.
Who should cover this topic? Who can help make the right decision? Who will bring the right arguments? Here are the main criteria for determining who should be present at the meeting.
You will save time, increase efficiency and, most importantly, improve quality.
Respect the time allotted
In the same way, we must consider that everyone’s time is precious! Meeting time exists for a reason, and adding even 10 minutes to a meeting can lead to a “nightmare” of meetings, a disease that is not as easily cured as one might think.
We recommend that you determine the total time of the meeting on the cumulative time allotted to each topic instead of the traditional 60 minutes. Determining the time for each topic helps to better measure whether you are early or late for the meeting.
Do not allow stragglers
To this end, it is advisable not to tolerate late arrivals. Close the door at the beginning of the meeting and do not interrupt the thread of discussion for newcomers.
A meeting management tool such as Beenote allows you to take minutes of meetings that will allow latecomers to view the content that has been covered in their absence, allowing them to be up to date with all participants.
How to calculate the ROI?
You have decided to go ahead and use our Beenote solution to manage your meetings, a great decision.
But you’re wondering, because there’s always a but, what’s the cost? And what’s your gain beyond having more efficient meetings? You can fill in some information in this calculator to help you better validate the impact of such an approach.
Conclusion
Of course, the implementation of all these solutions listed above can make your meetings less expensive. But even better, the purchase of an intuitive and efficient meeting document management solution will quickly pay for itself in meeting time savings.
Use Beenote. Besides quickly making it profitable, you will add up to 14 hours/month of time to your agenda.
Serial Technology entrepreneur with over 25 years of experience in managing and marketing of new technology. Beenote, 1st paperless meeting management portal for boards, committees and their teams.
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