The Six Ws of Meetings

At any point in your meeting, are the participants in the meeting clear on the “who, what, where, when, why and how” of the meeting? If you can cover these, your meeting will be much more inclusive and much more likely to succeed. Let's go through each:

Who

Who is at this meeting? What company do they represent, and what is their role on the team? This is especially important for multi-stakeholder projects. Additionally, who is facilitating the meeting? Who is taking notes? Participants and roles can be listed on the agenda. This contains symbolic power in communicating the value of each person.

What

Have you ever been in a meeting and thought, "What are we even talking about right now?" It should be clear which topic is on the table at any given moment. Does everyone understand what's going on?

Where

Where are we? This has multiple meanings: where are we as a team in the context of our work together? Where are we on the agenda? Where are we "meeting"? Where are we taking notes? I recommend being in a shared document together so that notes and action items can get written down during the meeting. This is superior to one person sharing their screen.

When

When are we handling each topic on the agenda? When does this meeting end!?

Why

Why are we meeting? This is an essential question and one that should be clear to all in attendance. If you as the meeting organizer can't answer it, then you're not ready to hold your meeting yet.

How

How are we handling each topic? How are we going to decide on our next step? If the 'how' isn't clear, then you'll find yourself herding cats. A clear step-by-step process that lays out how the group will achieve what it is there to achieve will help attendees understand how to best participate.

These questions will orient your meeting attendees so that they stay focused and contribute to the conversation and goals of the meeting. Someone who is lost or spending their mental energy trying to figure out what's going on cannot contribute their best thinking to the business problems at hand.