Organise Meetings Topics
BSBADM405 Organise Meetings
Make meeting arrangements
Prepare and distribute documentation for meetings
Record and produce minutes of meeting
TOPIC 1 – MAKE MEETING ARRANGEMENTS
- Identify the type of meeting being organised and its purpose
- In a meeting, two or more people come together to discuss one or more topics, often in a formal setting.
- Meetings are held for many reasons, such as making decisions, generating ideas, making plans, communicating and receiving information.
Meeting types can include:
- Annual General Meeting (AGM)
- Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM)
- Board meetings
- Committee meetings
- Management meetings
- Sales meetings
- Conferences and ‘away days.’
- Departmental meetings
- Staff meetings
- Steering group meetings
- Project team meetings
- Team briefings
- One-off informal meetings
Identify and comply with any legal or ethical requirements
- Early in the planning stages, but after deciding on your purpose and type of meeting, you must consider the legal and ethical requirements. These include:
- Codes of Practice
- Legislation Relating to Companies or Associations
- The Disability Discrimination Act (1992)
- Regardless of whether your meetings are formal or informal, consideration must always be given to safety
Identify the requirements of the meeting and its participants
The next step is to understand the actual requirements. To do this, you must know if the meeting is to be:
- Formal
- Informal
- Self-managed
- Semi-formal
- Structured
In is common for structured meetings to contain a similar number of participants to a Public Meeting.
Voting
- There are various ways to vote or agree on a decision in a meeting. Some meetings just discuss until there is a consensus agreement, while others require a majority vote.
- For example, in the cases of many formal meetings, public companies and large entities, there are policies and procedures or standing rules that will apply to the voting procedures. Seek assistance from the Chairperson or initiator to see if there is a preferred method for voting in this meeting.
Make meeting arrangements under meeting and participants’ requirements.
The arrangements you make must ensure the success of your meeting. It should run smoothly and achieve all the desired outcomes.
They can include:
- Budget
- Transport
- Accommodation
- Choosing a date
- Location
- Meeting equipment
- Catering
Advise participants of meeting details
You will need to advise attendees of the meeting. If it is a public meeting, you may have to advertise it in newspapers. Ensure you also have quotes for this and factor it into your budget.
Information that you may need to prepare and supply in advance might include:
- Chairperson’s report
- Committee reports
- Draft documentation
- Financial reports
- Itemised meeting papers
- Minutes of the previous meeting
- Research reports
TOPICS 2 – PREPARE AND DISTRIBUTE DOCUMENTATION FOR MEETINGS
Prepare notice of meeting, agenda and meeting papers per meeting requirements
Depending on the type and structure of the meeting (formal, semi-formal, or informal), the agenda will list many of the following items with corresponding time allotments:
Meeting documentation & papers
The agenda or other meeting papers are the tools that you must have for the meeting participants
These documents may include:
- The Agenda
- Notice of Meeting
- Chairperson Reports
- Written Motions
- Committee Reports
- Any correspondence
- Financial Reports
- Minutes of the previous meetings
- Any papers, reports, or proposals to be presented during the meeting
Check documentation for accuracy and correct any errors
If you are responsible for preparing or distributing any of the meeting papers, you will need to check each document for accuracy.
- This may mean you must make corrections if you find any errors.
- Once these documents have been issued (e.g., emailed, hand-delivered, posted to the company intranet, etc.), any changes may make you look unprofessional.
Distribute documentation to participants within designated timelines
- Timing the distribution of documentation to meeting participants and attendees can be a bit a little tricky. If you send it too early, they are likely to lose it. On the other hand, if you send it too late, they won’t have time to review it.
- The best way to organise the timing is to distribute it in two phases. The first phase is to send out information to meeting participants, such as officers and presenters. This should happen approximately two weeks before the meeting to allow them time to review the materials and get back to you with any problems or changes.
Prepare spare sets of documents.
Regardless of how well you prepare documentation prior to a meeting, some people will forget to bring it.
- You may also find that people attended the meeting even though they were not on the invite list! This might be an unusual event, but sometimes a manager or stakeholder will attend even when the meeting is not really relevant to them. Of course, that is their right, but you won’t have notes for them.
TOPIC 3 – RECORD AND PRODUCE MINUTES OF MEETING
Take notes with the required speed and accuracy to ensure an accurate record of the meeting
The reason for “taking minutes” in a formal meeting, or “notes” in an informal one, is to create a record of what was said for a number of purposes:
- Remind the attendees of what they said, committed to and what decisions were made
- Inform people who could not attend the meeting of the meeting’s results
- Provide a permanent record of decisions made
- Ensure that everyone has the duplicate records of the meeting
Produce minutes that reflect a true and accurate account of the meeting
When creating the minutes of a meeting, accuracy vital; simple yes or no can change the meaning of essential decisions
Minutes are more formal than notes. As such, they need to include a little bit more information. Your minutes may consist of:
- Meeting details (title, place, date, time)
- Agenda items
- Apologies
- Names of absent and attending participants
- Approval of the record of the previous minutes
- Correspondence
- Lists rather than complete sentences
- Matters arising from the previous meetings
Check minutes for accuracy and submit them for approval by the nominated person
Once you have completed your minutes, you should distribute them soon after the meeting has ended but before the next meeting convenes.
The secretary and leader of the group are always responsible for signing the final “approved” minutes.
- There are two ways this can be done:
- You can read the minutes out to meeting participants
- Refer to the minutes that were earlier distributed
Dispatch copies of minutes within designated timelines
The last thing you will need to do is to distribute the meeting minutes.
This will include all meeting participants but can also include:
- Staff members who have a responsibility to complete action items that were decided in the meeting
- Members of management who have supervisory responsibility for those who have to accomplish action items that were decided upon in the meeting
- Affiliate organisations that may be affected by decisions made in the meeting
- People who were unable to attend the meeting
- Sometimes, you may need to provide copies to government organisations for their archives.
You may also need to provide copies to corporate headquarters.