004: How to Host Meetings People Actually Want to Come To

Episode 004: How to Host Meetings People Actually Want to Come To

Intro: 0:01
Hey, this is Laurie Graham. Welcome to The Small Church Ministry Podcast.

Laurie Graham 0:15
Hey, welcome back to episode four. Today, we are going to jump into the details and talk about how to host meetings that people actually want to come to. There’s a meme out there these days, you can find it on coffee cups, plaques, paperweights, and tons more. And it says this, “I survived another meeting that should have been an email.”

The first time I saw that on Facebook, I nearly spit out my coffee because that’s funny. I survived another meeting that should have been an email. How many of us can totally think of the last meeting that really should have been an email. It’s funny because it’s so true. If I think back to all the jobs I’ve had in the workplace, evaluation meetings, planning meetings, vision meetings, you know, whatever those would be. Community associations, outside groups, schools, oh, school meetings. How terrible can those be right? Band parents, open houses, tons of meetings that really could have just happened in an email. Without the commute, without dragging myself out or finding childcare, whatever it would be. Braving the wind and the rain and the snow just to get to a meeting, but should have been an email.

When I relate that meme to church though, that’s where it makes me a little sad. Like I just don’t think church should be like that, a place where people avoid meetings because they know that their time is going to be wasted. 

Today we’re going to talk about how to quit having meetings that really should be emails and how to turn the meetings you actually have into parties that no one wants to miss.

If you’re in a church that’s bogged down by committees, or you get an eye roll. If you bring up the thought of having another meeting, there’s a reason for that. But there’s also a solution. 

Maybe you need Sunday school teachers, and you’ve told them that it’s required, that they come to training. They say they’re going to come and then they don’t show up. Well, why don’t they come? 

The bottom line is they don’t think it matters. Either, number one, they don’t think it’ll make a difference, or number two, they know you’re desperate and you’re going to let them teach anyway. 

Why do they think that? Because number one, they’ve been to meetings that don’t make a difference. And number two, because you are desperate and you’re going to let them teach anyway. 

Now I know that’s not true for every one of you, but would you agree that it happens? Especially in small churches? And if you know what happens, so do they, and they’ve probably experienced it. 

So here’s my best piece of advice.

Stop having meetings that don’t make a difference and stop being desperate because we don’t need to be desperate. 

As I’ve mentioned in past episodes, I totally believe God is at work right now in your small church. Whether you have three or 12 or 25 or one hundred. God is totally at work; we don’t need to be desperate. 

Let’s take a step back and recognize that the reason people don’t value meetings like you wish they did, isn’t because your meetings aren’t worthwhile. It’s not because people aren’t committed or that they don’t care. It’s also not because you don’t have something important to say. It’s because people have sat through enough meetings that waste their time and everyone else’s and no one wants their time wasted.

Time is a really interesting thing. On one hand, it’s totally infinite and limitless. We have eternity. This is why I teach a lot on the fact that Jesus was never rushed. There’s no need to hurry. God’s got this. We don’t need to feel desperate. We don’t need to rush around like chickens with our heads cut off, trying to cram things in. 

On the other hand, as far as our days on earth are, our time is one of those things that is finite. It’s the way God set it up. We only have so many minutes before the sun sets on any given day. In the entirety of our lives, we cannot add a single day. We should want to invest our limited time in things that bring a return.

Please hear me. I’m not saying cram things because we have limited time. That’s exactly the opposite of what I teach. That actually leads to frustration and defeat. That’s not an investment, but when it comes down to people wanting you to value their time and make meetings matter, that is the way it should be.

I’ve heard people complain that most people would rather give their money than their time to a cause, to a church, or to help someone in need, and it’s totally true because they can get more money. Time is one of those really precious things. It’s more precious than money every single minute of time. So don’t waste it and also don’t waste theirs. 

So back to meetings. Many meetings, probably most meetings, truly are a waste of time. Now, this isn’t just specific to small churches or even churches in general. This goes for meetings at work, school, nonprofits, government agencies, and more. Have you ever sat through a meeting thinking it was a waste of time? Thinking of things you wish you were doing instead?

We waste people’s time by having meetings that could have been emails–by running meetings too long, not having a clear purpose, not staying on track, not planning ahead, or even not following through with the input that we’ve received. 

While it’s true that there are as many personalities and preferences as people on the planet. We definitely can’t keep everyone’s attention or make everyone happy a hundred percent of the time, but we can do better. There are some general principles about meetings that are pretty wise to follow. 

Here’s the thing in small churches, there are usually two different types of people who start leading ministries and small churches.

One, we’ve got people with experience leading meetings. They are leaders in business or the community or educators or people who grew up in church ministry. They’re used to meetings. 
Then we have those who are kind of accidental leaders. People who found themselves taking over a ministry because someone left or they saw a need for something that didn’t exist. They stepped up and showed up and now they’re wondering how to do it better. 

Maybe you’re trying to build a team from nothing, make a change in what’s always been done, or persevering just to keep things going. Whether you’re a pro at leading meetings, or you feel like a total newbie at the starting gate, this podcast is for you.

We’re going to shed some light on what might be missing and hopefully a few things to add to your skillset.

Running a successful meeting isn’t as easy as saying, “Hey, let’s meet, we should talk about this.” If you’ve tried that, you know what can happen–different ideas on what should happen. Then, people can end up leaving frustrated, tangents taking you way off track, someone forcing a different topic, agenda disagreement arguments, or just a general apathy, a mix of opinions on a topic, or a meeting that goes nowhere. 

Maybe you’re super excited about an idea. You bring a group of people together and you’re like, “Hey, what do you think? What else could we do?” And everybody just kind of looks at you with a blank face and nothing to say. 

Maybe the way you’ve led successful meetings in the workplace just isn’t translating well in your church. 

We’ve all seen meetings gone bad or just going nowhere at all. But before we get into the key elements to include in every meeting, I just want to talk about a few reasons when and why you should not have a meeting, like don’t even go there. 

First off, information. If all you need to do is share information … If you’re just going to tell people what’s in a brochure, update them on a program, changes, or anything that could be typed up on a piece of paper, please don’t have a meeting, send an email.

Remember that coffee cup I mentioned? Another meeting that could have happened in an email. We’re tired of that. This is not a good use of people’s time for them to rearrange their schedules to commute. Having to participate in a group when people come late, interrupt, or whatever. If you can read it, please just send me an email.

Secondly, another reason not to have a meeting. If you want to inspire people about what’s already happening, but you have no plan to respond or adjust with their input. I’m not saying there’s no place for inspiration, but if that’s the whole of it, don’t do it in a meeting–if it’s a done deal and people already know ahead of time what the conversation will be and what the result will be. That’s a waste of time. 

I’ve seen leaders do this. They present an awesome idea, people have input, questions, and their own ideas. You might even ask for input, which is totally worse unless you’re open to making changes. It happens all the time in churches. 

Let’s meet about children’s ministry. Every single year, someone has a meeting, casts a vision to get people excited and nothing changes.

When we rehash the same issues over and over again or have a meeting just to make sure everyone’s onboard, it is not worth anyone’s time. Remember we have limited time, a finite amount. 

Please don’t have a meeting to inspire people if you don’t have any authority or commitment to follow through. 

Early in ministry, I was a youth director at a church and I had a vision meeting with the kids. I was so excited, but no one else was. I’m talking about painting the youth room and letting them put their hands up and finger paint, you know? And I couldn’t understand why nobody cared. We’re talking about redesigning things and all new stuff. Then one of the students stood up and said, “Are you actually gonna stay?” 

You see, other people had come and gone in this youth group and they lasted about six months. One lasted 18 months, one lasted nine months. So these kids, since they were young, have had a turnover of children’s ministry leaders, youth leaders, and all these people would come in with this great idea, but they never followed through, and they didn’t stay.

Sometimes, even when you’re starting fresh because you’re new, you also need to know there’s a history to catch up on. If they are used to meetings that caused no change, it’s pretty difficult. Don’t have a meeting to inspire people if you don’t have the authority or the commitment to follow through, or if you really don’t care about their input. 

There’s one last meeting I’m going to tell you not to have. 

Please don’t have meetings to scold people. Sometimes I call them sour meetings–meetings that are meant to reprimand people. Don’t do it. Don’t scold your team. Don’t have a meeting to correct their behavior. Things go bad, if you want to reprimand your volunteers for not coming on time, please think again.

Now, if you want to have a meeting to cast a vision of why it’s important to come on time and get their input, ask them what their obstacles are and why they’re not coming on time. Talk about why it’s so important, and how you can help them. That is worthy of meeting. 

Something else to be aware of. And maybe you don’t even mean to scold but it comes off that way. If you are frustrated, if you are not filled with hope, if you are not looking to the future of how things can change, but you’re stuck in your circumstances, the problems, what’s going wrong. If that’s you right now, please don’t leave me. 

I’m not saying you need to step down from your position, but maybe you can find somebody else to lead up the meeting. Maybe you can find some rest and some healing in the midst, but if you are in a sour place, please don’t lead a meeting. 

There are probably a bunch of other meetings I could tell you to never ever hold, but we’ve covered enough. Information, inspiration, scolding. Let’s move on.

You might be wondering, “If I don’t hold meetings to inform, inspire or scold, why would I hold a meeting? 

I want to propose to you that meetings are a collective. Meetings exist to share between people. They’re about gathering input. It’s a collective of wisdom, relationships, learning from each other, being the body, being together. It’s how God set the church up to be. We need each other. We’re supposed to be in it together. 

In the old days, meetings could have been held solely for information because it was needed. There was no printing press. There was no internet. There was no email. You’d actually have to stand on a soapbox outside or a tree stump, right? To get people’s attention, to get the word out. But we have quicker communication now, and time is precious.

These days, meetings have a bad rap for being boring, a waste of time, a platform for one person to exert their dominance or their opinion. It’s no wonder nobody wants to come to meetings. Please stop shaming people for avoiding meetings. They have every right to use their time wisely, and if their time has been wasted over and over and over again at work meetings, school meetings, church meetings, etc. Why would your meeting be any different? 

I want to show you how it can be different. 

As the church, we’re created to be interdependent as Christ’s people. To live and serve in community. So how do we get people to come together? To meet together? This is where you have an opportunity to embrace some principles that lead to change in your culture. To make your meetings edifying, impactful, influential. A time when people not only feel heard but are heard. When they are loved, when they are cared for, a place where people belong. When they walk into a meeting, your eyes light up and so do theirs. A time when their input is valued and it makes a difference. 

Wouldn’t you love that? Like right now I’m getting all tingly. Oh, I wish all meetings were like that. I would love to attend meetings like that. If I knew that my time was making an impact, I’d be there in a second. 

How about leading a meeting like that? Wouldn’t that be cool to be a person who leads meetings that people actually want to come to? If they miss, they feel sad, they feel left out.

I’m going to walk you through a few essentials that every great meeting needs. Each of these is totally non-negotiable and I want you to hang on to that picture of, yes, this is my kind of meeting because this can totally be done. After these four essentials, we’re going to talk about how to turn a meeting into a party for an even better impact.

Every great meeting needs these four things. First, there needs to be a clear purpose that is linked to an action, a specific result, like after this meeting, this will happen. Or, with your input, this change will occur. It is a why and a result. Why are we doing this? And what the results are going to be. Specific and actionable. 

The second thing every meeting needs is intentional connection, and care. Again, we’re meant to be together. People need to be seen, known, loved, feeling a sense of belonging. 

The third thing is collective input where every person actually is heard in their feedback, they feel significant and valued. 

And number four, follow through and follow up. The purpose and action the meeting was set about to do was actually accomplished.

I’m going to walk through each of those four, just a little deeper, just to give a little review. 

Here we go. 

Number one, a clear purpose. What result do you want to see from this meeting? Not what do you want to talk about while you’re there, but what’s the next step? This is how you know if you’re just giving a meeting for information.

Begin with the end in mind. What happens differently as a result of this meeting? 

Again, why are you having this meeting? 

If it’s information, this is not a good enough reason to make people leave their homes. If it’s for team training and developing others, that’s a great reason. Building relationships, stronger relationships means a stronger team. Getting input to make a change is a great reason.
I’m not saying there’s no value in sharing information because you will share information at a typical meeting, but other things have got to be woven in to make it worth it. Building a team, developing relationships, opportunities to encourage, to share input, to make changes even to help- these all make a meeting worth it. 

Now a frequent question that comes up is, “How often should we meet?”

Well, that depends on your purpose. Your why. That actually determines your when and how often. 

What do you want to see happen? How often do you want those things to happen? How much would it benefit others for it to happen? What’s needed? What’s the season? What’s everyone’s capacity? Do they have time for these meetings? How does that work with their lives? 

If you’re trying to build a team, once a month is very typical and really standard. We need to be meeting enough to get some feedback, to build relationships, to be able to see how things are going, and support each other. This question comes up a lot: Sunday school teachers are teaching each week, do they have time to have another meeting? I’ve seen a lot of creative things happen here. There are little times after each Sunday where they just get together for five or 10 minutes to debrief. Maybe they have quarterly meetings. 

How often you meet is going to depend on your why, which means again, you need to have a very clear purpose for why you want to meet.

The second essential for your meetings is connection and care. 

How do we actually ensure that people feel connection and care? You have to plan this. This doesn’t just happen because you’re sharing the same space. 

You personally need a connection as the person inviting people to a meeting. You need to love each person you’re inviting. Your eyes actually need to light up when they walk into the room. They need to not just feel important to you, but they actually need to be important to you. 

How does this happen? 

This is all about building relationships, which is often very slow. If that frustrates you, just remember Jesus. He did the slow route too. 

The other part of building connection and care is that people really need to be seen.

How does this happen? 

I don’t mean “seen” like, they were there and we check them off the list. I mean, when they speak, they’re listened to. This can happen a lot with icebreaker questions for building a relational commonality. If you get sick of icebreaker questions, please understand why they exist. Questions from, “Do you fold or crumple your toilet paper?” to “What’s one food you’d never want to eat again?” to “Where would you go if you could go anywhere in the world right now?” 

Do not skip this. Everyone does not know each other. Truly they don’t. 

Everyone does not remember names. They don’t know people well enough to know things like what didn’t happen over Christmas vacation. This is an opportunity to grow deeper in relationships.

As you’re building connection and care, don’t skip the light stuff because the light stuff helps people feel seen.

The third thing I mentioned was collective input. 

Collective input is super important, but it is also something we screw up a lot. 

Here’s the thing. We all have a brain and we all have a voice. But a big difference between us is that some humans speak before they think, and other humans think before they speak.

Some people speak before they think, and other people think before they speak. I want you to think about what happens in a typical meeting. Who gets heard? Generally, it’s the talkers or it’s you if you’re the talker. The talkers monopolize the conversation – the ones who speak before they think. 

Some of the wisest never even put anything on the table because these are the people who think it out first. 

But we’ve moved on to the next thing before the thinkers even formulated or taken the time to really feel secure about what they are speaking because they don’t speak until they’ve thought it out ahead of time. If we’re trying to create a community where every person is heard, we’ve got to figure out something new.

I’m going to give you a couple of tips.

Don’t let your talkers talk before your thinkers. 

Yes. I’ll say it again. Don’t let your talkers talk before your thinkers think, and then start the talking with the thinkers, prioritize them. 

Try this. “Hey, I want to know what you all are thinking about this.” Then take a minute and have them write down a few words. Before anybody’s allowed to share, you’re going to have them write down what they think about the idea.

If you have time or a larger group, you can even have them, after they write it down, share in pairs or in smaller groups. Let them know that everybody’s input is important. 

You can even call on people. “Matt, what did you write down?”

I promise you–just giving people time and space to write down some thoughts is going to slow down your talkers, and it’s going to give your thinkers time to think and feel very, very valued. 
Your thinkers are going to have a completely different take on your meetings. If you do this your talkers are also going to learn a few things too. 

At the end of your meetings, another great tip is to make it a habit to share a highlight from the meetings. “Why are you glad you came?” Or maybe the meeting was kind of rough and you say, “Hey, I know the meeting was kind of rough today. Can everybody just share one highlight or one reason they’re glad they came? One thing you learned.”

These are takeaways. Go around the circle again, everyone shares, but you end the meeting on a high note and this helps solidify collective input that what other people are saying and thinking is important. You’re giving them space and time to do it. 

All right, the fourth thing that is absolutely essential in meetings is to follow through and follow up. 

If you had a specific purpose that had an action linked to it. (Which I told you is absolutely essential.) We’re doing this meeting so we can have this change result or this action is going to happen.

You’ve got to think about what you are going to do. Then you actually have to do it. Not just think about it, add it to a binder, and consider doing it later. 

What specific action steps do you take from this meeting? 

Do them, put them on a calendar, and send out an update. 

I highly recommend sending a recap of the meeting and highlights to everyone who was present and everyone who was not. Yes, it’s one more thing to do, but you’re changing a culture. It’s so exciting and so amazing to let people know that meetings matter. If meetings matter, you want to share what happened at the meeting. If you want to change a culture, you need to show that it’s changing. 

This update or these meeting highlights can be super simple. They even can be fun, but it needs to be something. An acknowledgment that something happened and that it mattered. 
If you’re anything like me, you would probably forget to do this as much as you intend. So two ideas for you. 

Number one, have somebody else do it. Just let them know ahead of time. “Hey, you know, Sue, can you make sure a memo goes out after the meeting that has a recap and the highlights?” 
Or send out the recap before you leave the meeting space. That’s what I do sometimes because by the time I get home, my brain’s in a different place and I might forget. It’s that important that you do it right away. 

What about follow up? I’ve got a couple of thoughts for you on follow up. 

Have you ever had someone thank you after you came to a meeting? 

I don’t mean just at the end of the meeting, say “Thanks for coming.” I mean, later, like a note, a text, a call. “Hey, thanks. You made a difference being there. I really appreciate it.” 

What about those who didn’t come, but were invited? Do you follow up to see if they’re okay? To even get their input? 

Again, not to reprimand them for missing the meeting, but to say, “Hey, we missed you. And by the way, we talked about this, do you have anything to add?” 

Those couple things, thanking people for attending a meeting and following up with those who weren’t there, also communicate that your meetings are important. That they matter.

Here you have these four elements that are central to every meeting. Number one, having a clear purpose with a specific action. Number two is connection and care. Number three is collective input. Number four, follow through and follow up. 

If you have a community that is less than enthused to add another meaning to their calendar, don’t expect this to change overnight, but it might.

However, once you start proving yourself to be a team player, to value their input, to leading differently, to leading forward, to not wasting people’s time, you will start to see the culture shift, and it might even begin shifting in your entire church. 

Please remember most people have a negative feeling about meetings. It’s not because they’re uncommitted, too busy, or don’t value what you’re doing. It’s because they’ve had terrible experiences in meetings and we all have. And we also kind of need to own that. Some of that’s our fault. 

We’ve all been to meetings where we’ve not been listened to and where we’ve not listened.

We’ve all been to meetings where we didn’t feel included or even liked. And also where we have not included someone and not liked them. 

We’ve been to meetings that are boring, a waste of time. Many of us have also led those. 

We’ve been to meetings that feel “same old, same old,” and don’t lead to anything. Many of us have also led those. 

We’ve been to meetings where we have anticipated being scolded. And we already know we’re failing. 

So let’s stop setting up people to fail. 

If you want to be the person who everyone wants to work with, where everyone says, “Boy, when Dave has a meeting, I totally want to be there.” “When Sheena has a meeting, oh, you don’t want to miss it.” 

How do you get that reputation? I have one more thing that’ll help. 

I want to suggest that you turn meetings into parties and anytime you can, don’t even use the word meeting. There’s just too much baggage hanging all over that word. Meetings gone bad, wasted time, boring, sharing your heart, and not being heard. 

In The Small Church Academy, I teach our members step-by-step how to have amazing vision parties, planning parties, team trainings, development events, team celebrations. 

Did you even hear the word meeting in there? Those are all kinds of meetings. Isn’t that already more fun? 

If you’re picturing balloons and a pin the tail on the donkey party, that’s not the kind of party I’m talking about. Maybe you’re not a party person. All of a sudden you’re like, “Oh, a party, no way.” 
I want you to think about this. Think about a simple dinner party. Just getting together with friends. Do we ever call that a meeting? Why not? Because meetings are boring and parties are enjoyable and you’re with people you actually want to be with.

How do you have fun and still get things done? 

There are three things all parties have in common: food, atmosphere, and fun. And fun isn’t really about the activity, it’s just about enjoying being with friends. 

These are the three things to turn your meetings into parties. 

First, have food, snacks, drinks, something like Hershey kisses. Just something that breaks the ice that feels welcoming. Honestly, a lot of people are racing to meetings in their busy lives; having a snack for them can really help. 

Second, atmosphere. I want you to think about where you like to hang out that is comfortable. 
Usually, there aren’t tons of distractions. It’s kind of like going to a restaurant. Would you rather sit by the kitchen and the bathrooms or be somewhere where you can actually hear the people you’re talking with? 

If you have meetings at church and you need to have them there, just throw a tablecloth on the table. Put a tiny little flower in the middle, or again, chocolate. I’m always into chocolate. 

Or, could your meeting actually happen at somebody’s house? Can you make sure the temperature is okay? That there’s not some crazy stuff going on in the room next door with all sorts of noise. Be sure to consider your atmosphere. 

And the third common thing that parties have is just friends. Any party is filled with people who actually want to be there. 

Parties are not required, they’re optional. They’re not filled with people who have to be there under duress. So make it happy. Make sure to facilitate people getting to know each other. And if they’re not friends, to actually facilitate becoming friends. Greet people with warmth, with a smile, and sensitivity, and not rush around because you’re late to the meeting.

That’s the total difference between a meeting and a party. 

If you can turn your meetings into parties, it is so much nicer. 

How does that sound, did I give you enough for today? 

In the future, we’re going to have episodes on how to plan meeting agendas that matter, overcoming objections that happen in meetings, leading through change, dealing with difficult people and naysayers at meetings, team trainings, program evaluations, parent meetings, and tons more. 

Even how to help adults get their wiggles out because just like kiddos, we need a little downshift. We need a transition from work to a meeting or a party at church. 

But for today, would you commit to just never leading a boring meeting again? 

If you would, I want you to raise your right hand and just repeat after me. (I know I’m not there to know you’re doing it but do it anyway.)

To the best of my intentions. Go ahead and repeat that. 

“To the best of my intentions.” 

I will never again, 
“I will never, again,”

Lead a meeting that should happen in an email.
“Lead a meeting that should happen in an email.” 

If you’re going to ask for people’s time, please make it worth their investment. And please quit blaming people for not wanting to attend meetings. Many have had years, and even decades of people wasting their time. Don’t be that person. 

It’ll take some consistency to change a culture, but you can totally do it. 

Have a purpose, stay positive, lead with principles that value and include people, show that you care not just about your agenda, but about them.

Is there someone in your church who would be encouraged by this episode? Or a friend far away who could use some support in their small church? 

There are so many people in small churches feeling alone, discouraged, and even defeated. The Creative Little Church is committed to changing all that. 

Help us spread the word of hope and share this podcast with somebody you know, it’ll totally make a difference.

Go be a light in the world and we’ll talk to you next week.