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As you leave today, don't forget to wish Stella luck on the weekend.The next time you see her she will be happily married.

Follow Up: In the closing remarks, the chairperson, or participants may want to discuss the date and time for the next meeting, when the minutes will be available, or when a decision should be made by. This is also the time to give contact information, such as how to send a question by e-mail or who to call regarding a certain issue.

We'll meet again on the first of next month.

Next time we meet I'll be sure to have those contacts for you.

If anyone has any questions about anything we discussed today, feel free to send me an e-mail.

The minutes from today's meeting will be posted as of tomorrow afternoon. I'll send out a group e-mail with the voting results.

QUESTIONS:

1.Speak about the common scenario of a meeting.

2.How to open a meeting?

3.Why is it important to follow the agenda and to watch the time?

4.How to keep the meeting centred on the items?

5.By what you should close a meeting?

Business Meeting Self-Assessment Test

Are the following statements True or False?

1. The person who is in charge of the meeting is the person who takes the minutes.

8. When there is a tie vote, it is customary for the chairperson to ask one participant to reconsider his/her decision.

Business Meeting Assignments

Assignment 1: Meeting Facilitation: select a meeting associated with some project, team, or business function in which you are involved. Before the meeting, create an agenda that meets the requirements above, then attend or facilitate the meeting, and create minutes for the meeting. Submit the documents to the instructor. Students creating a strategic communication portfolio will submit a short (2 paragraph maximum) assessment of the meeting facilitation. Your assignment will be scored on the basis of

completeness of information in the agenda, including time, date, preparation requirements, time allocations, and intended outcomes. Be particularly careful to indicate the purpose of each agenda item; this is a list of things to do in the meeting (e.g. decide, discuss, evaluate, etc.) not topics that will be covered in some unspecified way.

completeness of meeting minutes, including attendance, information presented, decisions reached, and project implications. Meeting minutes should similarly document the decision, the substance of the discussion, or the assignment made. This is not a list of the topics that were dealt with, but a record of how each was dealt with.

(for optional strategic analysis) logic and evidence provided to support your analysis of the meeting facilitation. The basic questions you should answer are, was this meeting conducted according to the principles discussed in the linked readings? and, did that make a difference to the success of the meeting? You might discover that the meeting did not go well because the agenda actually used was incomplete or inaccurate. You might realize that there was "more going on" that either the agenda or the minutes documented. You might decide that the meeting accomplished its purpose (or some other important purpose) even though it was not run "by the book." Whatever your decision, be sure to provide the specific analytical criteria as well as the evidence of the meeting's adherence to those criteria.

Assignment 2: Relationship Analysis: select one set of communication differences on which you and a work colleague are at least somewhat different. Write a short analysis (3 page maximum) of the how these differences effect your day-to-day work communication and methods for making your

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relationship more pleasant OR your collaborative work more effective. Send the analysis as an email attachment to the instructor.

It will be scored on the basis of

your apparent understanding of the selected principles of communication difference

the clarity of your analysis, including 1) specific and complete descriptions of communication behaviors, 2) complete use of the selected principles, and 3) logic of the conclusions.

the quality of the recommended solutions, including 1) clarity, 2) support from the analysis, and 3) likelihood of success in the organizational context.

First, select a framework of differences from the readings (e.g. cultural patterns, status differences, or social/work assumptions).

Don't simply list random things that are different between you and someone else, or thing that irritate you about a co-worker.

Then, analyze the situation in a systematic way, looking for reasons that your communication is different and explanations for any irritations or inefficiencies you are experiencing. Finally, by comparing the readings and the situation, you should be able to predict better success by doing some specific things.

Notice that you will need to decide on your goal; you probably can make the relationship more pleasant OR you can make the work more productive. There is no guarantee you can always do both, although that is an ideal goal.

Assignment 3: Management Discussion Brief: create a brief to prepare yourself to facilitate a problem solving meeting.

The "brief" is a document that outlines all of the decision issues, with a full summary of the evidence, varous stakeholder positions, and potential implementation issues involved. The document is sometimes called a "white paper" when it is prepared for distribution as a written document, and sometimes called "talking points" when the document outlines the points that support an individual speaker's position.

The brief will be evaluated on the basis of completeness of the issue analysis; appropriateness and validity of the evidence provided; preparation of responses to anticipated questions, objections and concerns.

Start with a "real" discussion that will occur at work or within your living group. For example, your work crew might be trying to decide a better way to arrange vacations schedules. Your roommates might need to sit down soon and reorganize the chore schedule.

The most difficult part of this assignment is to locate ALL the analysis issues. Many times roommates will start trying to discuss implementation plans ("who's going to do the dishes") before they've identified the problem ("dishes aren't being done daily"), much less provided evidence to support a claim. (Saying something like, "You never do them on time" without providing an observation log,

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for instance, to validate the claim.) Work groups often do the same sort of thing. For a good score, your brief will probably have to fill in all the blanks.

The second thing to keep in mind is that this is to be a management decisionmaking meeting, not a gripe session or an exploratory discussion. If you realize that information is missing, you will need to locate that information to include it in the brief. A brief is not simply an outline of everything you happen to know right now; it's a document that collects all the information that will be needed to make a good decision.

Assignment 4: Communication Productivity Analysis: To understand the application of principles of productive information management and to locate ways of increasing communication effectiveness. Analyze the management of a specific job responsibility with respect to 1) controlling incoming information flow and 2) managing ommunication events for maximum productivity. The analysis of each should include a) an identification of any inefficiencies, b) at least one principle from the reading that addresses an identified inefficiency OR offers potential for improved productivity, and c) a recommendation for changing current communication processes.

Email your answer, which will be scored with respect to attention to both elements of the question (1 and 2 above); complete analysis of the communication event(s) selected (a, b, and c above); conformity of the recommendation(s) to norms of business communication OR an explanation of the conflict of norms and goals that must be negotiated.

Shadow a business contact or use your own work situation and identify at least one task to illustrate information flow and a communication event. For example, a person's techniques for reading email or filing the department's work orders would involve control (or not!) of incoming information. The preparation and conduct of a conversation or meeting would qualify as management (or not!) of a communication event. Some tasks could involve both steps, as when a customer service representative takes a phone call, screening and selecting the appropriate information to include on a work order that she or he will then communicate to a technician.

Determine whether there is some inefficiency with the current process or a potential for improvement. Make an appropriate recommendation to change the current procedure to better. Be careful not to simply give advice, such as "do a better job of answering emails promptly." Try to figure out WHY a person might be communicating inefficiently, and offer suggestions to change the technology, filing systems, or work processes to make communication more productive. An appropriate recommendation must conform to business norms of reciprocity, action orientation, reliance on objective data, and sensitivity to hierarchy. You might find that inefficiencies are caused by someone who is violating one or more of those norms, or you might find that conflicting goals need to be negotiated in order for everyone to communicate more productively. If so, these issues should be noted in your response.

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BUSINESS COMMUNICATION GLOSSARY