Meetings

Meetings are an important communication tool. Nothing can replace a gathering of people for a sharing of ideas and knowledge.

Some examples of meetings are Open Meetings and ConCom Meetings. Meetings can be associated with a party or other event to make them more social, or not, to keep them focused on business at hand. The formality of the meeting and its format is largely dictated by the type of business to be conducted, and its urgency. Meeting new people and familiarizing them to the organization might be best done in a reception or party atmosphere, whereas discussing the terms of a contract may not go well with beer and chips.

A Board Meeting is another common type of meeting, which can either be public or limited to a Board of Directors.

In any case, a meeting should have an Agenda published in advance, as well as some sort of rules of order with regard to how the meeting proceeds. Formal meetings, and larger groups, often adopt Robert's Rules of Order. Robert's Rules are an excellent way of maintaining meeting efficiency, but they are lengthy and can be a bit unwieldy to learn in depth. Smaller groups will often amend Robert's Rules to a bare minimum for conductinig business.