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Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.

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Speaker 1: Good Morning. This is Laura, Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.

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Speaker 1: Today's tip is that following up after a meeting is

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Speaker 1: a distinct task from attending the meeting. You need to

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Speaker 1: schedule time for following up if it's going to get done.

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Speaker 1: From studying time logs, I know that so many knowledge

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Speaker 1: workers spend the bulk of their days in meetings. It

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Speaker 1: is easy to wind up going from meeting to meeting,

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Speaker 1: like middle schoolers changing classes. You go to your two o'clock,

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Speaker 1: your three o'clock, you're four o'clock without thinking through the

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Speaker 1: implications and next steps from any of it. This is

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Speaker 1: problematic because for a meeting to be worthwhile, it needs

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Speaker 1: to have an impact on the world outside the meeting.

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Speaker 1: That means that most participants will need to do something

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Speaker 1: afterwards to make sure the meeting has achieved its purpose.

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Speaker 1: The only way to make sure this happens is to

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Speaker 1: schedule time for it. Otherwise you won't follow up in

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Speaker 1: a timely fashion, or you might forget until the next meeting.

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Speaker 1: There are two general ways to do this following up.

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Speaker 1: One option is to schedule fifteen minutes or so after

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Speaker 1: each meeting as a follow up block. Increase or decrease

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Speaker 1: the length of the follow up block, depending on what

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Speaker 1: seems necessary for different types of meetings. If you get

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Speaker 1: to the end of your allocated time but haven't finished

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Speaker 1: all of your follow up tasks, add the specific tasks

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Speaker 1: you haven't done yet to your to do list for

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Speaker 1: the day or the week. I personally like this idea

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Speaker 1: because following up immediately afterwards means you've got momentum. You

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Speaker 1: also won't forget what you agreed to do, your to

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Speaker 1: do list won't keep growing during the day. Plus, this

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Speaker 1: rule has the side effect of meaning you can't fill

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Speaker 1: a whole day with meetings, so you will have to

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Speaker 1: be more judicious about which meetings happen. That sounds like

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Speaker 1: a pretty good idea to me. However, I know that

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Speaker 1: a lot of people view a meeting as an hour

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Speaker 1: and the next hour is fair game for something else.

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Speaker 1: If there is no convincing you otherwise, or there's no

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Speaker 1: way to avoid it, then you need to do something

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Speaker 1: else to make sure you don't forget or lose urgency.

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Speaker 1: Probably the best way to solve this problem is to

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Speaker 1: add things to your task list during the meeting itself.

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Speaker 1: You still need to schedule another time later for follow up,

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Speaker 1: but at least you won't be danger of forgetting anything

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Speaker 1: as you race off to your next meeting. But and

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Speaker 1: I am serious here, the meeting follow up time still

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Speaker 1: needs to happen. If you have more than one meeting

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Speaker 1: every work day, then meeting follow up should probably be

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Speaker 1: a recurring task on each day's to do list schedule.

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Speaker 1: Sometime maybe an hour that you have opened later in

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Speaker 1: the day or forty five minutes after the last meeting

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Speaker 1: has ended. To go back through your meeting notes, either

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Speaker 1: do the tasks you have written down or schedule a

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Speaker 1: future time for any major tasks. You can review the

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Speaker 1: notes as a whole and think through any additional follow

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Speaker 1: up activities that might be valuable. Whichever approach you take,

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Speaker 1: the point is that you need to treat following up

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Speaker 1: from a meeting as a distinct task from going to

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Speaker 1: the meeting, because it is simply having attended the meeting

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Speaker 1: probably doesn't mean you are done with that meeting, So

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Speaker 1: have a plan for what you need to do and

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Speaker 1: when you will get it done. And now a related tip,

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Speaker 1: if you are leading a meeting, you can help ensure

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Speaker 1: the team follows up by walking through the expected next steps.

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Speaker 1: You can invite people to reflect back what needs to

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Speaker 1: happen between now and our next meeting or something like that. Then,

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Speaker 1: as attendees reflect on what they need to do, you

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Speaker 1: can make sure their lists tie in with yours. Calling

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Speaker 1: attention to the fact that there are follow ups might

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Speaker 1: nudge your attendees to make time to deal with these matters,

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Speaker 1: or at least one can hope. In any case, during

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Speaker 1: the week ahead, make a plan for handling meeting follow

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Speaker 1: up tasks. When we follow up on meetings, we ensure

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Speaker 1: that all the plans and ideas generated during the meetings

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Speaker 1: do what they are supposed to do. Otherwise we are

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Speaker 1: just wasting time and we will never get that time back.

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Speaker 1: In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and

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Speaker 1: here's to making the moose of our time. Hey everybody,

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Speaker 1: I'd love to hear from you. You can send me

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Speaker 1: your tips, your questions, or anything else. Just connect with

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Speaker 1: me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at Before Breakfast Pod

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Speaker 1: that's b E the number four then Breakfast p o D.

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Speaker 1: You can also shoot me an email at Before Breakfast

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Speaker 1: Podcast at I Heeart media dot Com that before Breakfast

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Speaker 1: is spelled out with all the letters. Thanks so much,

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Speaker 1: should I look forward to staying in touch. Before Breakfast

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Speaker 1: is a production of I heart Radio. For more podcasts

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Speaker 1: from I heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app,

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Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Yea.