Meetings don’t have to be a boring waste of time

To some of us, meetings at work are a colossal waste of time. But Timmins Chamber of Commerce past-president Christine Bender enjoys meetings… and has chaired a lot of them over her work life.

On Wednesday morning at the Chamber, she’ll be presenting a workshop called “Managing Effective Meetings.”

Bender says one of the most effective ways of doing that is setting a clear objective, so that participants know what the meeting is about… and what should be achieved. “We can do that by having a really clear agenda and then when people leave that meeting, they’ll feel like they’ve met those objectives.”

Bender also says the chair of a meeting can keep participants from going off on tangents and repeating what’s already been said… by setting clear rules.

“By ensuring at the beginning of the meeting that people understand what the rules of engagement are,” she comments. “so it’s not necessary to repeat and repeat and repeat what other people have said, but encourage people to stay on track.”