Raise your hand if you’re guilty of calling a meeting to discuss the exact line items of the previous meeting. How about asking questions that could have been addressed via text, phone or email, or to simply talk about a bigger meeting that will happen soon? If you were able to slowly nod yes to any of those questions, you could be pushing your top agents into the arms of another brokerage.
What causes an unproductive meeting?
TED speakers David Grady and Jason Fried aren’t big fans of meetings. They view them as “global problems” and “places to go to talk about things you’re supposed to be doing later,” and for good reasons. Did you know there are more than 3 billion meetings held per year and they are viewed as unproductive and inefficient by 71%?2 If that doesn’t make you take a deep sigh, take a moment to calculate exactly how much time you and your agents spend in meetings each year.
While not all meetings bring your brokerage’s productivity to a screeching halt, those that do usually have an unclear purpose, lack engagement, aren’t timely, miss key participants or are facilitated by someone ill-fit. Overall, when meetings lack effectiveness and efficiency it can cause a variety of issues:
- 92% of workers admitted to multitasking in meetings3
- 69% of attendees check their email during meetings3
- 4% of people multitask during video calls while 57% multitask during phone calls3
- 90% of meeting attendees admit to daydreaming in meetings1
Most shocking of all, research from New York consulting firm Communispond, Inc. showed that 75% of people have received no formal training on how to conduct a meeting.1 If your brokerage falls into that 75%, then you could be all but dropping your agent off at another firm’s doorsteps.
So what can you do? Adopt these 4 tips to ensure your next meeting rocks!
In addition to making your office meetings more productive, learn about the tools available to help your agents work more efficiently and increase productivity.
1 The Muse – How much time do we spend in meetings?
2 The Harvard Business Review – Stop the Meeting Madness
3 ideas.ted.com – The economic impact of bad meetings
