Simple tools to help keep your meeting to time
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The one thing we all know about presentations is that unless they are properly controlled, many of them will overrun – often to the cost of meeting efficiency and participant energy and mood. Furthermore, in presentations that are poorly disciplined, the additional content is no better retained, and it can often be that earlier key points are forgotten.
In physical meeting rooms, positioning a clock at the back of the room can help the more disciplined presenters, but it does not always work with those who are less disciplined or prepared.
Where meetings need to finish on time (and they all should) overrunning presentations either means that the remaining content gets squeezed, or that some points get postponed or missed out entirely, and this can be detrimental to the overall pace of the programme of work, or to the quality of the subsequent actions.
In situations where the risk of presentations overrunning is high, I tend to stand at the back of the room and hold up signs for 10 minutes, 5 minutes, 2 minutes, 1 minute, and STOP. It does not always work, but in general it makes the point, and it avoids the worst excesses.
However, in virtual meetings, there is no clock, and there is no back of the room, so what to do?
There are various solutions depending on whether the presentation is being delivered via a whiteboard or via a slide deck or screen share.
If it is being delivered via the whiteboard, which is the preferred option, because it better allows for participation at key points, then the timer can be set in a slide deck, and there are a number of options for this – see PowerPoint Timers.
But if it is being delivered via screen share, then the timer has to be located in the meeting software – guidance on this can be found here.
It is important to note that, in many cases, overrunning presentations arise as a result of it simply not being sufficiently important to the presenter to finish on time. One way of rectifying this, by prior agreement with both the presenter and the participants, is to clarify that presentations should ideally finish with a minute or two remaining, and that the presenter will be automatically muted at the designated finish time. This raises the importance of focus on the key points, and helps the presenter prioritise making them in plenty of time.
It is useful to position whatever clock you adopt beside the mood indicator (if it is also being used) so that the presenter can see at a glance where they stand, and can make adjustments accordingly.
Track your progress to ensure the efficacy of this strategy.