Board Meeting Tips – How to Keep the Discussions Focused and Stick to the Agenda

Board meetings are a crucial element of successful businesses. With the right preparation and follow-up, your board of directors is able to make decisions that push the company forward. Staying focused on the agenda and adhering to it is the best way to increase the effectiveness of your board. This will ensure what is a common board that the meeting is smooth and all important subjects are covered thoroughly.

Plan and distribute an agenda for the board meeting ahead of time. This allows the board members to review the materials before the meeting and be ready to share their ideas. This also ensures that the board members are on the same page so in terms of what needs to be covered and when.

Start at the correct time. This can make everyone energized, engaged and encourage punctual attendance. It is tempting for committee members to spend too much of their time reading reports. However, this can be an unnecessary time-waster since the chairs of the committee should have already reviewed these reports prior to the meeting.

Keep the discussion on agenda items and set time limits for each subject. This shows respect for the board members’ commitments to their time and ensures that all necessary discussions are held during the meeting. Noncontroversial items can be voted on by a consensus agenda, saving the time needed for more detailed discussion of strategic issues at the board meeting.

Keep the minutes as concise as you can. Make use of a template based upon the agenda that includes items like a list of the people who are in attendance, headings for the topics to be discussed and draft resolution language to support the decisions that are being made. Visual project management tools will allow you to record notes in the same way as the board’s discussion and organize them afterwards to make it easy to distribute.