Over the past few years, Langley City’s Corporate Officer and Council have
been updating our processes and procedures as part of our overall “Achieve Organizational Excellence” core focus area for the City. As you can imagine, meetings are important to
local governments as this is how business gets done. How we manage these
meetings and ourselves during them is important. While I normally don’t post
too much detail on process improvement work at the City, I’ve attended and
participated in enough government, strata, and non-profit meetings (spicy and
not) over the years to know that this information may be useful for many other
community members. Better-run meetings lead to better outcomes.
There are key things to consider for meetings to be successful and to protect
the rights of different people or stakeholders.
Majority Viewpoints: The majority viewpoint is what moves forward.
Minority Viewpoints: People with a different viewpoint from the
majority viewpoint have the right to be heard and to present their views.
People Absent from the Meeting: People must be informed of when and
where a meeting will take place with adequate notice and have the right to
know the outcomes of a meeting.
All Individuals Attending a Meeting: Following the correct procedure,
everyone who has the right to participate in a meeting can participate, put
forward recommendations, and vote.
The Organization for which the Meeting is Held: The organization has
the right to good governance and well-run meetings.
Now, I know these fundamental principles seem super basic, but I’ve seen
meetings go off the rails because these principles aren’t followed. I’ve
attended strata meetings where people didn’t have the right to fully
participate, where people didn’t accept the outcomes of a vote, and when
things degraded into yelling matches.
Now diving a little deeper, there are some best practices to help ensure your
meetings will run smoothly.
Order and Efficiency: Have an agenda and follow it. Add suggested
timings for each topic to ensure the meeting runs on time. The meeting chair
must ensure that the meeting runs on time and adheres to the fundamental
principle.
Focus: Ensure that you have a focused discussion that avoids repetition
or rehashing. Focus on the topic at hand.
Equality: Ensure that everyone has the opportunity to share a view, and
also limit the time someone can speak on each topic. This protects both
majority and minority viewpoints.
Decorum: Do not yell, use crude language, question someone's motives,
or interrupt someone who is sharing a viewpoint that you don’t support. When
you feel the temperature rising in a room, it is okay to ask for a quick break
to help cool things down.
You may find yourself in a meeting where someone is intentionally creating
chaos and disruption. I’ve seen this happen in strata meetings I’ve attended
in the past. By incorporating some of the recommendations outlined in this
post into your meetings, you can help ensure that they run as smoothly as
possible, allowing for good discussion and informed decision-making. If you
want to learn more, I suggest you read the book “101 Boardroom Problems and
How to Solve Them.”
Langley City Council committed to continuing the process of improving our
meetings at the October 20th meeting.
