How to Prepare for Formal Meetings in Teams

Formal meetings in Teams become unproductive in the absence of ample preparation. Companies sometimes neglect the idea of meeting preparation and proceed with informal discussions instead, as it’s easier to just click the call button, compared to elaborate coordination and planning. As a result, follow-up meetings increase, which burns out the meeting participants.

Preparation for formal meetings should be given more importance as it entails a more productive exchange of ideas. According to a recent study, scheduling formal meetings helps increase productivity by 71%. To prepare for formal meetings, some of the things to be considered are aligning and setting clear objectives, selecting appropriate participants, and drafting the agenda. Taking these into consideration will help alleviate the “technostress” rooting from overloaded and back-to-back meetings.

Preparing Ahead in Formal Teams Meetings: What’s in it for you?

Administrators are tasked with ensuring that they conduct efficient pre-meeting workflows for upcoming meetings. Multiple steps are considered when preparing for formal meetings to ensure minimal waste of time. These steps include coordinating with various individuals and drafting topics for the meeting. Organizations may be given more ease in preparing for formal meetings with MS Teams, but that’s not always the case — they can still face a few hiccups when preparing for formal meetings.

Formal meetings are usually strict in terms of outline, which means that both administrators and meeting participants should have ample time and proper tools to prepare for them. Such meetings are more structured, as they have a clear direction and action list to tackle during discussions. However, to achieve effective formal meetings, the preparation should be rigorous as well. Here is what’s in store for you if you prepare ahead for formal meetings:

Productive coordination and automated processes in meetings

For meeting administrators, tools for productive coordination help build a clear and defined agenda. Preparing for formal meetings in Teams can help facilitate better discussions and deliberations by automating preparation, review, and other functions for better collaboration during the meeting. Defining the agenda prior to the meeting gives the participants a more concrete outline and structure during the formal meeting. However, to amplify your company’s productivity, a unified tool that automates all pre-meeting processes is a must-have. While Teams is designed to simplify coordination, manual putting up of an agenda pack can take too much time.

Timely send out of information and documents

Initial surveys or questionnaires help define objectives and agenda for the upcoming formal meeting. Once administrators have gathered the attendees’ input, they can narrow down the topics for a more productive session.

Sharing files in MS Teams can be easy as dragging and dropping from the local desktop to the app, but looking for the latest version of the file can be a hassle. There’s a need to scour among channels, chats, and folders to get the right file. With sufficient preparation, meeting administrators can send the agenda and documents hassle-free to the participants. However, there’s a need to manage the files for easy access to the participants.

Access meeting files ahead of time for more fruitful discussions in the actual meeting

Ample meeting preparation allows meeting participants to receive the meeting files in advance. By having access to the meeting documents ahead of time, participants can prepare questions and recommendations for fruitful conversations.

Aside from checking out the files, participants can already take notes on the meeting files. Even before the formal meeting, they can review the agenda and relevant documents, and even annotate them for easier collaboration during the actual meeting. However, this means that meeting participants would have to access multiple platforms to annotate the files and take notes.

How to Gear Up for Formal Meetings in Teams

While it’s easier and tempting to just click the call button and discuss matters, holding too many meetings can burn out both organizers and meeting participants. Instead of holding ad hoc meetings to prepare for upcoming formal meetings, asynchronous preparation can be done. As administrators or organizers, it is your task to ensure that the meetings held in your company are worth everyone’s time.

Convene in Teams (CiT) is the one-stop Teams-based productivity tool that will help you prepare for all your formal meetings to achieve your internal and external goals. Here’s how CiT enhances your meeting preparation for both the administrators and participants:

Prepare the meeting files and other information needed in one place

To ensure an effective meeting preparation, you will need a productivity tool within MS Teams. CiT is a centralized tool wherein you can find all the meeting files and information without having to leave the MS Teams app. CiT also removes the need to manually send information through group channels, group chats, or individual chats.

In just one place, all important files and information can be accessed. CiT has a dedicated built-in repository that integrates with your SharePoint repository for easy access, removing the need to look for files and information across different platforms. It also provides a drag-and-drop function for agenda files and attachments and automatically consolidates them into a meeting pack.

With just a click, administrators can publish the formal meeting and circulate the needed documents to all participants. All of these happen on just one page, removing the need to open multiple tabs. Also, with CiT, there’s no need for a meeting link since it automatically directs users to the video conference.

Ensure that meeting participants get their hands on the latest and correct version of the files

No need to worry about revising documents and sending them again to the participants before the formal meeting. CiT accommodates last-minute changes to documents and agendas and notifies participants of these changes.

It also ensures that all the participants get the latest and correct version of the meeting documents. It has a feature that allows administrators to upload new versions of files and retain old versions for participants to refer to if needed. This will reduce the time spent on looking for the latest version of the documents, resulting in time-convenient meeting preparation.

To secure your files, CiT ensures defined permission controls for your formal meeting files. If some of the agenda items or files should only be visible to some attendees, CiT allows you to restrict and define the permissions on such levels.

Provide time and tools for the participants to review documents

Formal meetings can be overwhelming with the amount of information to discuss, which is why it is better to review the documents in advance. CiT gives you a variety of annotation tools, such as text, highlighter, and sticky notes. Participants can take private notes for individual note-taking, and shared notes for collaboration. Notes on documents can also be turned into action items for easier delegation of tasks. CiT’s voting tools and signature tools also allow participants to make formal decisions within and outside meetings.

With such robust tools, you wouldn’t need to create a separate file outside the MS Teams to open your notes during the actual meeting. CiT is your sharing canvas in Teams, ensuring that every participant is aligned before and during the formal meeting.

CiT is Your Ultimate Teammate in Formal Meetings

Formal meetings are rendered unproductive if preparation is taken too lightly. CiT automates your preparation as it allows you to connect and store information in a centralized space, resulting in more productive formal meetings. As a productivity tool, it compresses even the most tedious process of collaboration and alignment in your company, with its annotation tools, version control function, and many more.

Learn more about CiT’s features for effective meeting preparation and collaboration.