How to get the best out of meetings

1. Recognise that most meetings will be chaotic and unproductive without a good chairman or woman and an agenda.

If your aim is to be productive, skip most such meetings. If you work in a large organisation where productivity is unimportant, you may prefer this way of whiling away the time to sitting at your desk.

"Research has shown that groups rarely make better decisions than the best or second-best person in that group," says Professor Larry Phillips, decision-making expert at the London School of Economics.

2. Bring your own informal agenda if the meetings you attend are badly run but you want results.

In poorly organised environments, few people think far enough ahead to turn up with papers to hand out.

If you are the only person who has a handout, you will usually find that discussion will centre on the points you make on these sheets.

3. Watch for operators in political organisations; you need to match their tactics. Do some lobbying beforehand so you can count your allies. Be prepared for all outcomes.

Keep a new strategy or idea up your sleeve for the meeting so you can announce it there, keeping your opposition on the back foot.

4. Understand, however, that well-run meetings can produce better results than would come from the smartest people in the group.

Three things are needed for good collective decision-making, says Phillips -an impartial facilitator or chairman or woman; a clear structure for the discussions; and the necessary IT to model possible alternatives there and then.

Information will be treated as a neutral commodity. And everybody will have their say.

5. Try to avoid major confrontations in meetings. Explore serious disagreements outside the meeting room.

6. Follow up all decisions. You will look a fool if you spend time in discussions but then neglect implementation. You can put your own twist on agreements reached if you are taking the initiative.