Negosentro.com | 5 Tips For HR Reps On Holding Successful Meetings In 2020 | Human resource representatives are not blind to just how tricky it can be to hold a meeting of any kind. This is because when you get one or more employees in a room, typically against their will, to discuss matters of HR importance, you are unlikely to get through to many people.
Oftentimes, employees just want to get back to their work or use their time for something else. However, it is possible to grab the attention of the people you work with and communicate with them the importance of whatever topic you are tasked to discuss. Here are five tips that can help you hold the most successful meetings of your career!
1. Offer Incentives
Is it bribing if the people receiving the incentives get important information in return? No, it definitely is not. Sometimes, offering an incentive to encourage people to attend meetings and even rewarding them for getting involved with certain initiatives may garner support among your co-workers. If you are in charge of gathering support for a health initiative, you could offer greens powder to anyone who commits to being involved. You could also offer things like discount codes at a local yoga studio if you are introducing a mental health initiative. There is really no shortage of incentives to offer if you sit down and think about it.
2. Manage the Time
People often want to know how long the meeting they are attending will be prior to attending it. A great way to ensure nobody dreads your meetings is to set a time limit ahead of schedule and make sure everyone knows how long it will be. As a rule, keep your meetings a brief as possible. Twenty minutes is a good general time limit. That way, you can communicate everything that needs to be communicated without losing everyone’s attention.
You can also set a schedule for the duration of the meeting and hand out that schedule to everyone as they enter. This type of organization is not everyone’s style but can be helpful to those who like to know exactly what to expect.
3. Involve Employees
If you are getting blank stares during your meetings, consider adopting a new meeting style. When you get tasked to conduct a meeting concerning a new subject, company rule or other related matter, you could create a group activity. Bring people into the activity by explaining it, then asking for volunteers. If nobody volunteers, as happens sometimes, then you should just pick people at random.
For example, maybe one day you are supposed to lead a meeting to discuss a new company rule concerning sexual harassment. You could have a call-and-response activity where you read an inappropriate phrase to use in the workplace and ask people if it is OK or not. That way, people can interact and be engaged without having to move from their seats or work too hard, while still learning the information adequately.
4. Get Creative
If you are using visuals and slides to explain information, then spice it up! You can have fun with the formatting, use entertaining special effects, include jokes or even add some crazy colors. Little things go a long way in keeping people’s attention, no matter how cheesy.
5. Follow Up
After your meeting, send out an email or pass around a paper. Get people’s honest, anonymous opinions on what they like in a meeting and what they do not like. Every workplace is different, so you can use the responses to guide you to do the best job that you can do. As a human resources representative, you know how important it is to make sure your fellow co-workers are engaged by the important information you are trying to tell them. Following any or all of these tips might help you achieve that goal. As the person tasked with disseminating key information, you need to do everything you can to get it to reach who it needs to reach. You can accomplish this if you work through any difficulties, stay consistent and enjoy the process!
