Effective meetings create a positive experience for attendees and help them provide worthwhile contributions. Follow these tips to make the most of your meetings:

• Provide sufficient advance notice. Allow at least four weeks. However, give as much as two to three months if your community includes a significant number of out-of-area members, or if your meeting topic is potentially contentious; this allows for a second notice and gives potential attendees a reasonable opportunity to arrange schedules.
• Make the meeting notice clear and concise. Include the location, date, time, purpose, and intended audience. Cast as wide a net as possible by publishing notices by your newsletter, e-mail and Web site. For regularly scheduled meetings, such as committee meetings, consider asking members whether a different time or location would be more convenient.
• Provide background in advance to help attendees understand the issues and think them through. Consider posting this information on your Web site with a copy of the meeting notice.
• Arrange ample space to set up the meeting site. Use a circular arrangement for smaller groups so attendees can see each other. Try to place seating around a table so that attendees will have a surface for quick access to their materials.
• Announce "three minutes to start." This helps ensure pre-meeting socializing will not detract from the meeting's opening momentum. Take this opportunity to remind attendees where the restrooms are located.
• Show respect for attendees by starting on time. Habitually starting late to accommodate stragglers makes meetings begin later and later. Begin by restating the meeting's purpose
• Provide an agenda in writing at the meeting to keep attendees on track. List the allotted time for each topic and the anticipated ending time for the meeting. This keeps expectations clear, especially when there are multiple inputs on a single topic. Keep your meetings predictably productive-and as short as possible-to encourage better attendance.
• Serve as the meeting's Spirit Leader. Welcome attendees. Then stay engaged, smiling and interested because attendees will take their cues from you as leader. Provide a sign-in sheet or nametags, and address attendees by name. Foster free expression by showing you appreciate participants and have confidence in them. During the meeting, recap and rephrase attendees' comments positively. When something is learned or a goal reached, state this accomplishment. Cultivate humor. At the end of the meeting, ask attendees to indicate what they believe was positive or helpful about the meeting and then summarize the mission of the group or reason for holding the meeting.
• Function as the Gentle Reminder. The manager often can help the work stay on track by providing the institutional memory for the group about what happened in the past, including how the policies or rules changed. Honestly appraise the past performance of yourself and your staff and admit mistakes if "the way we used to do it" neither is the best way nor helpful to the present discussion.   
• Gather viewpoints and insights. Seek input from each attendee. With a small group, go around the room person by person to let the quiet attendees provide input. This balances power so that the loudest ideas are not only ones heard. Ask that one person speak at a time, and avoid distractions by discouraging side comments between attendees.
• Create a platform for differences of opinion. Strive to let conflict bring items to light rather than burn them to cinders. You may need to remind attendees that differences must be considered on a platform of mutual respect.
• Build consensus. Summarize all agreements reached and end the meeting on a unifying or positive note. Ask each attendee to provide further consensus insights they have noted. Set a time, date and place for the next meeting, if applicable.
• End on time. Thank attendees for their valuable insights and time. Try to end earlier than stated on your agenda, if possible.
• Provide minutes afterward. Include the "To Do" list in bold, specifying who agreed to do what by what time. Send out the notice of the next meeting with the notes or minutes. Follow up to ensure the successful completion of "To Do" items.

By Joe Bunting, AMS, PCAM. Mr. Bunting is General Manager of Kiawah Island Community Association, Kiawah Island, S.C.