People are creatures of habit, and that’s why meeting cadence is important in a business setting. People come to expect a routine at work, and as a manager, setting a meeting cadence can help establish that routine for your team.
Team meetings are critical to team success, so you want to find the right balance – not enough team meetings can result in a lack of communication, while too many meetings, and you risk employees rolling their eyes and not being engaged. Meeting cadence is important to get right, although you may not get it right away. Once you find the right cadence for your team, it’s best to stick to a routine.
Meetings can play a big part in your management style. Whether you’re a new manager, or you’re a manager looking to re-evaluate your current meeting cadence, this guide should help with weekly, monthly and quarterly meetings.
What is Meeting Cadence?
The definition of the term “meeting cadence” means the pattern, or rhythm of meetings, both recurring team meetings and the protocol of when to schedule one-off meetings. This pattern can vary depending on your work team, environment, and many other factors.
Meeting Cadence Checklist
To establish a meeting cadence, here are some things to consider:
- Meeting Types
- Meeting Frequency
- Meeting Formatting
- Meeting Feedback
Meeting Types
One part of establishing a meeting cadence is to find a rhythm for recurring meetings, both in a team setting and for 1v1 meetings. As a manager of a team, you’ll likely utilize many different types of meetings on a recurring basis.
Recurring Meetings:
As a manager of a team, you’ll likely utilize many different types of meetings on a recurring basis
- 1v1 meetings with employees – help achieve personal goals and check in on employees
- daily standup meetings – check in on projects and small tasks
- weekly team meetings – can be used to touch base, bigger picture things,
- monthly team review meetings – review monthly progress made as a team, reporting
- quarterly review meetings – check in to review quarterly progress made.
One-off Meetings:
In addition to recurring meetings, you’ll likely find a need for calling one-off meetings that can pertain to various purposes.
- brainstorming meetings
- innovation meetings
- team-building meetings
Determining Meeting Frequency
How do you know how often to schedule a meeting? The frequency of meetings should depend on a few things:
- Team size – with a larger team, you may find that more meetings are essential for staying on the same page, whereas smaller teams may not need to meet as much
- Purpose of meetings – for recurring meetings, you can base the meeting frequency on the purpose of that meeting. Defining the purpose of each meeting may lend itself to how frequently your team should meet.
Whatever you determine the frequency for your meetings to be, try to stick to a set schedule of recurring meetings, so long as the frequency benefits the team.
Meeting Formatting
Again, formatting can depend on the type of meeting. The important thing here is establishing a cadence for how the actual meeting goes.
- Who provides an intro to these meetings?
- Is it an open discussion or one person speaking?
- Meeting roles: who is the leader, who is taking notes, who should be involved in making final decisions?
What to Do to Reinforce Meeting Cadence
Establishing a meeting cadence is critical for your team, and for your performance as a manager. Here are some ideas on how to enforce your meeting policies.
Communicate your Meeting Policies
Start by setting an agenda for each meeting to communicate what the purpose of each meeting is, how long the meeting should be, and what to discuss. It should also plainly state what each member should do to prepare for the meeting so there’s no question or doubt about its purpose.
Monitor Meetings Discussions
As a manager, you’ll find that meetings don’t always happen how you envision them progressing. In cases where discussions get off track, don’t be afraid to step in and get the meeting back and track. The quicker this is done, the more productive the meeting will be.
Manage Meeting Attendees Agendas
Each meeting, whether recurring or one-off, should have attendees that need to be present for the meeting. Manage meeting attendees for each meeting by ensuring those that don’t need to be at a meeting are not there, but that the information or next steps that result from the meeting are delivered to them.
Stress The Importance of Meeting Notes:
A way to keep on task with what goes on during meetings is to take meeting notes. Documenting discussion points, decisions, and follow-up action items that result from meetings seems pretty straightforward, but taking meeting notes that are detailed is critical for communication. Stressing meeting notes with your team will even get your employees to utilize them correctly for meetings that you can’t attend as a manager.
Meeting Feedback
The ultimate meeting cadence is one that works for everyone on the team. To get a better understanding of how meetings from an employee’s perspective, consider creating a way for employees to provide meeting feedback will help managers tell how effective meetings are.
If you determine that the way your meetings are currently constructed isn’t working, don’t be afraid to change the meeting cadence for the greater good of the team. Every change should be justified, and should only be made if it improves meetings for everyone.
Don’t Be Afraid to Change Cadence
If something isn’t working, or you find an opportunity to scrap a meeting, or not meet as frequently, don’t be afraid to change the meeting cadence. This should be an ever-evolving process.
yoyomeeting helps set meeting cadence
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Here are a few great features of yoyomeeting:
- Agenda Management
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- Attendee Management
- Meeting Notes
- Task Assignment
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- Timeboxing Meeting Planner
- The Parking Lot
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