Staff meetings are vital for effective management and communication. Properly run meetings save time, increase motivation, improve productivity, and solve problems. Meetings can create new ideas and achieve company ‘buy-in’. Well run staff meetings can diffuse conflict in a way that emails and written communications can’t.
Even if it is difficult to justify the time, hold regular meetings. Plan, run and follow up meetings properly and they will repay the cost many times over because there is still no substitute for physical face-to-face meetings. Run staff meetings to manage teams and situations, to achieve salon objectives quicker, easier and at less cost. Well run meetings make people happier and more productive. Badly run meetings waste time, money and resources and are worse than having no meetings at all.
Meetings which involve staff and encourage participation and responsibility are more constructive than meetings in which the manager tells, instructs and makes all the decisions, which is not a particularly productive style of leadership.
The structure of effective meetings:
- Use the agenda as a planning tool.
- Circulate the agenda in advance, allowing all team members to prepare.
- Run the meeting - keep control, agree outcomes, actions and responsibilities.
- Take notes, so that the team see you are recording agreed actions.
- Circulate the notes.
- Follow up on agreed actions and responsibilities.
The key to successful salon meetings is keeping control. You achieve this by sticking to the agenda, managing the relationships and personalities, and concentrating on outcomes. Meetings simply must have a purpose. Remind yourself and the team of the required outcomes and steer towards making progress.
Staff tend to be at their most sensitive at the beginning of meetings, so schedule anything controversial later in the agenda, giving people a chance to settle down and relax. Politely suppress the over-zealous and encourage the nervous staff. Never tolerate useless moaning, instead tell the moaning individual to research the topic and report back to you with recommendations.
Always watch how staff are behaving in meetings – look out for signs of tiredness, exasperation, confusion, boredom and take necessary action. As much as possible, stick to the agenda.
There are many reasons to have salon staff meetings on a regular basis, such as: training, giving information, generating new ideas, planning, getting clients’ feedback, solving problems, performance reporting, setting targets, making decisions, team building and motivation.
Basic rules for salon staff meetings:
The aim of a well run staff meeting is that whatever the agenda, afterwards all staff members feel it took care of their needs, as well as the agenda.
Your choice of structure and style in running an effective meeting is dependent on several factors, such as:
- The situation
- The implications and needs of the salon project
- The needs and interests of the team
- Your own role, confidence and personal experience
- Your salon position and relationship with the team
- The aim/agenda of the meeting
You have a responsibility to manage the meeting so that it is a positive and helpful experience for all attending. That way, staff will be happy to attend and will look forward to your meetings.
