12MinuteLeadership

Episode 27: Mastering Your Meeting - 4 Keys for Leaders | 12MinuteLeadership

• Elise Boggs Morales • Season 1 • Episode 27

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Ready to breathe new life into the meetings you are leading? Today's episode provides four simple keys to turn meetings many dread into a tool for clarity, trust, and results. Four simple keys—purpose, agenda, motives, and ground rules—show how to design conversations that people want to attend and that move work forward.

In this episode we cover-

• defining a clear outcome and attendee list
• building and sending an agenda 24–48 hours ahead
• designing for people, performance, and process motives
• creating ground rules that build psychological safety
• balancing airtime and inviting quieter voices
• ending with decisions, owners, dates, and AI-assisted notes
• celebrating wins to reinforce momentum
• reflection on one change to improve meetings

Like what you heard on today's episode and want to go deeper? Subscribe to this podcast so you never miss an episode.You can also pick up my book, Lead Anyone, on Amazon.Then go to my website to check out ways that we can support your leadership goals. From executive retreats to customized training and coaching, my team of experts will help you level up your leadership and accelerate your results. Go to www.eliseboggs.com for more info.


Share it with another leader who wants to breathe some new life back into their meetings.




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Speaker:

Welcome to the 12-Minute Leadership Podcast, where in 12 minutes or less, I'll share small things that you can put into immediate practice that will make a big difference in your leadership effectiveness. I'm your host, Elise Boggs Morales, leadership professor, consultant, and coach. For the last 17 years, I have helped thousands of leaders level up their influence and achieve remarkable results. If you want to treat compliance for true commitment and create your dream team, you are in the right place. Get ready for a quick hit of practical wisdom to increase your team's engagement, inspire top performance, and retain your best talent. Ready to level up your influence and get better results? 12 minutes starts now. Hi everyone, Elise here. Welcome to episode 27. Today's topic is one we can all relate to: meetings. We've all been in those meetings that feel like they last forever. Go nowhere and end with everyone wondering, why did we even meet? In fact, there's an entire book called Death by Meeting by one of my favorites, Patrick Lencioni, which tells you how common and painful bad meetings can be. But here's the thing: when done well, meetings can be one of your most powerful leadership tools. They can align people, clarify direction, and even strengthen culture. Recently I've been leading some high-stakes meetings and had people tell me that was one of the most productive meetings I've been in. For me, that is very meaningful feedback because I'm very intentional in how I lead meetings. So today, I want to share the principles that make meetings not just bearable but genuinely effective. We'll cover four keys to maximizing your meetings and creating the kind of meetings people actually look forward to. So let's get started. Key number one, every meeting needs a purpose. If you remember nothing else from this episode, remember this. If you can't define the purpose of your meeting, you probably don't need to have one. Before you send the invite, ask, what outcome do I want from this meeting? What decisions need to be made, and who truly needs to be in the room. Meetings should drive results, not just share updates. Here's an example. If your goal is to make a decision in a meeting, structure the time around that. Review key data, discuss implications, and confirm ownership before ending. When the purpose is clear, people show up focused, not frustrated. Key number two is the power of the agenda, specifically sending it ahead of time. An agenda may seem basic, but it's one of the most powerful leadership tools you have. It creates clarity, focus, and inclusion. And here's why it matters. First, it gives direction. It keeps everyone aligned on what's important. Two, it invites input. If you send it ahead of time, people can add things that got missed, they can adjust things based on their areas that are going to be covered. And generally, people are given the opportunity to also prepare. And three, it reduces anxiety, especially for your process-oriented team members who like to think things through before they speak. When they get an agenda ahead of time, they can prepare thoughtful input rather than feeling put on the spot. If you have the same people not participating in meetings, this could be why. So try sending the agenda 24 to 48 hours in advance. So you may be wondering what should a standard agenda include? Here's some direction on that. First, the objective of the meeting, then key topics or decisions, who's leading each item, and desired outcomes. Then ask, is there anything we're missing? That one question turns an agenda into a tool of engagement where people can weigh in and nothing gets missed. Key number three, lead with motives in mind. If you've been following this podcast for some time, you know about a training I do called Core Strengths. In that training, I share three core motives that people have, or the three Ps, which are a people motive, a performance motive, and a process motive. You can go back to episode 12 for that series. The insights of tapping into motives give you a major advantage in leading meetings. As I mentioned, every person in your meeting brings a different motivational lens. And when you lead with those motives in mind, engagement and collaboration go way up. So let's break that down. Let's start with our people motivated, our blues. Blues are relational, they thrive on connection and belonging. So start meetings with a moment of connection, a brief check-in, gratitude, or recognition. You could ask a question like, What's one win from your week? That few minutes fills the relational tank and sets a positive tone. And for your performance-motivated people or your Reds, Reds want results. They like momentum, action, and outcomes. Keep the meeting focused and purposeful. You could say something like, Our goal today is to finalize our priorities for quarter four. By the end of this meeting, we'll have three clear objectives and owners for each. When you're clear and decisive, red stay engaged. And for our process motivated people or our greens, greens want things done right. They value clarity, accuracy, and good follow-through. So set agendas early, pause occasionally to summarize key points, and end with the written recap of decisions, owners, and next steps. Structure builds trust with your greens and it actually helps everyone. So the key takeaway here is that leading meetings through the lens of people, performance, and process motives helps every personality feel seen, respected, and engaged. All right, key number four. Create ground rules to build and maintain trust. Ground rules are what transform meetings from transactional to trustworthy. They're the invisible guardrails that keep communication open and respectful. So here's the essentials. Obviously, you'll come up with your own ground rules, but here's a couple ideas. One, be on time. Respect everyone's time. If someone joins late, they're responsible for catching up without derailing discussion. Two, create opportunities for everyone to contribute. Avoid the loudest voice wins dynamic. Invite quieter voices in. You could say, hey, let's hear from a few people who haven't spoken yet. Rotate facilitation or use round robins to balance air time. Three, create psychological safety. Encourage curiosity before critique. Replace, "I don't think that'll work" with "help me understand how that would work". You can even say, "let's take a pause before we respond. There may be something valuable in that idea we haven't seen yet". Next, determine next steps before ending. Agree that you will end with clarity, recap what was decided and who owns it and when it's due. So somebody could summarize what we're walking away with. No one should leave guessing what happens next. One of my favorite modern practices is having AI take meeting notes and generating a recap afterwards. This keeps everyone accountable and allows you to stay present instead of typing. So when you receive the notes, you can quickly review them and edit the summary before sending it to the group, ensuring that you've got key decisions, action items, and owners and timelines. This step adds polish and demonstrates strong leadership follow-through. Alright, and finally, another ground rule can be celebrate the wins. And on a positive note, recognizing even small wins create momentum for the next meeting. So, in closing, meetings are where leadership shows up in real time. They can either drain your team or drive your mission forward. When you lead them with purpose, structure, and an understanding of what motivates people, they become one of your most valuable leadership tools. So here's your reflection question for this week. What's one thing you could change in the way you lead meetings that would make them more engaging and effective? And one more, whose needs might you be overlooking and how could you adapt for them next time? I hope you enjoyed today's episode. Share it with another leader who wants to breathe some new life back into their meetings. I'll see you next time. Like what you heard on today's episode and want to go deeper? Subscribe to this podcast so you never miss an episode. You can also pick up my book, Lead Anyone, on Amazon. Then go to my website to check out ways that we can support your leadership goals. From executive retreats to customized training and coaching, my team of experts will help you level up your leadership and accelerate your results. Go to www.eliseboggs.com for more info.