I never knew, when I signed up to be a worship leader, how many meetings I’d be asked to run. When you work on a church staff, you’re inevitably asked to lead a meeting or two. Or a lot more than two.
I’ve been told I have the gift of leading good meetings. Honestly, if this is true, it must be because I don’t generally enjoy meetings. When I hear the word “meeting” I instinctively start looking for the closest escape hatch. So, when I lead a meeting, I’m leading it with two goals in mind: First, let’s end this thing as soon as possible. Second, let’s actually make this thing worth all of our time.
You can read three thousand books and attend conferences and seminars and take classes on how to run effective meetings. I bet those books and conferences and seminars and classes are written and taught by dudes with more management training than me, and have some better advice. But, in the hopes of encouraging worship leaders like myself who find themselves being asked to lead meetings, here are my succinct tips for running good meetings that people will actually want to attend.
1. Always have an agenda
2. Never lose control
3. Don’t dominate but lead it clearly
4. Don’t let any individual dominate
5. Let there be vigorous discussion but keep it focused
6. Resolve vigorous discussion with clear decisions
7. Don’t let unresolved decisions go without someone being assigned to work on them in the meantime
8. Most meetings should last no longer than half an hour
9. No meeting should last more than hour
10. Start and end the meeting on time and keep it fruitful. Make a joke or two. People will look forward to this kind of meeting
What am I missing?
Worthily Magnify 