people for their good work and motivating them for the work ahead before the next meeting. People like to feel appreciated and also like seeing results – often people do not realise how much they have really achieved in a meeting.
SOME QUIC
K DO NOT’S
!
Do not pat ro long, do no nise, do not talk for too t talk over people, do jargon and not use do not alw ays assume people kno that w what you are talking do not let about, people dow n, do not g prepared, a o poorly nd ultimat ely, do not your privile abuse ges as a co ordinator.
5- Keep a balance between personal benefits and organisational benefits. Although some things will be achieved through the work duty members have with respect to the group, this cannot be done alone. The organisational benefits cannot and must not outstrip the personal benefits individuals will also achieve – making new friends, accreditation for work, something to put on their resume. So make sure participants are getting something out of it for themselves in the meeting!
Minutes Short intro to minute-taking Taking minutes can be quite stressful - especially if you - the minute taker - want to contribute to the meeting as well. Therefore the following paragraphs will give you some tips to make your job as easy as possible.
teamwork! In fact, energisers do not just need to be used at the beginning of meetings, use them when you feel it is most appropriate! If you can see that people need something to give them a blood-rush, get them up and get them to shake their bits and have a bit of shaking if the mood is right! At the end of the day, taking 5-10 minutes to do that will improve everyone’s overall level of work. Take a look at the online annexes of this Manual for some of our own suggestions for what you can do, as well as some great links that can give you some ideas! 2- People will interact well in different ways. This can be through visual, hearing or hands-on methods. In order that people get the most out of meetings, try and include all of these three learning styles. By varying the approaches used in your meeting, you keep people more engaged. 3- Conflict within a group could definitely be a downer, so having some ideas up your sleeve, on how to deal with conflicts, could come in useful. People will feel demotivated if they think things are not going well – it could well lead to disengagement and loss of membership! Therefore, take a look at our leadership and teamwork section for more info on how to mediate and deal with conflict situations. 4- At the end of the meeting: be positive! Round it up on a good note, summarising what was achieved, praising
If you have time, try to layout a minute structure before the meeting starts, so that you can get on with the job as soon as the meeting begins without falling behind. Decide whether you are more comfortable writing minutes by hand and either photocopying them or typing them up after the meeting, or maybe you are a quick typist and prefer typing them directly and have the possibility to circulate them to members straight away. At the top of your page write which meeting it is (e.g. what group it is, such as your local school organisation/ council or national group meeting), the venue and at what time it was being held. Underneath, it is always good practice to include who was attending the meeting. This might sound like a waste of time, but there might come a time when you need to go back and look this up. Then you can start writing your minutes! It is ideal to outline them in almost a chart format. In the first column, number the different items of discussion, as numbered in the agenda. The next column should show a record of the discussion that took place. This does not mean you need to write down what was said word by word. These should be brief notes that summarise the key points that were made, with a variety of arguments (you may want to decide in advance of the meeting whether you want to record who said what and whether names should be included - but these may have implications if the minutes are to be publicly circulated), but should definitely state any decisions that were made. This should be followed by a column stating all the action points that need to
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