An Ounce of Meetings Is Worth a Pound of Problem-Fixing

I was doing a brain storming session with a client recently and an issue they were having with the inaccuracy of their website was identified. Several office managers complained that no one was asking for their input, and as a result, the organization had a website that was improperly informing their customers about new services that were being provided.

Good public relations begins at home. Happy staff equals happy customers. Meaningful and regular staff meetings can be a very powerful tool in helping your company meet the needs and expectations of your customers. As situa­tions come up, mini-meetings and brain-storming sessions that quickly solve problems can also be used very effectively.

Regular meetings held with a purpose can keep the lines of communication open.

Often employees feel stymied in their ability to communicate their feelings and viewpoints to management. The staff  feel like second-rate people because they are never given an opportunity to be heard. What most organizations lack is a structure to insure that the meetings are held on a regular basis.

To insure that the meetings are effective, it is important that some preparation be made before each meeting. What are the challenges that need to be addressed? What is being done about the issues that were discussed at the last meeting? What is going right? Why? How can we make things even better?

By asking these kinds of questions, you are building a framework to give commu­nication within your company a place to grow and develop.

By holding meaningful and action-oriented meetings, you make it easy for your employees to communicate with each other as well as with management. Many times, it’s not a “generation gap” that prevents teamwork within a company, but a “commu­nication gap.”

By following through with a plan for communicat­ing, you are insuring a clearer, more effective form of constant communication in your company. As a result, by keeping miscommunication to a minimum, you will have a happier and more productive group of employees.

– Tom