Tips On Making Your Meetings More Productive

Have you ever been in those meetings where people were supposed to have read a document before joining a meeting but few did? As a result instead of making a decision, most of the meeting time is spent on going over the document.

Connect Pro can help you create effective meetings by ensuring all meeting invitees have reviewed documents ahead of the meeting.

Follow these simple steps.

1. Create a meeting. Do not add any attendee to it. In my example, this meeting will be called "Strategic Decision".
2. Click on the content tab, and click on the "New Content" button.
3. Select the document you want people to read before the meeting (it needs to be a powerpoint, PDF or SWF file)
4. Give it a name and click "Save". In my example, this document will be called "Strategic Options".
5. Click on the Training tab and click on the "new curriculum" button
6. Give it a name and click "Next". In my example it will be called "Strategic Decision Making".
7. In the "Add Items" step in the curriculum wizard, click the "Add Content" button and select the content you just created (ie "Strategic Options").
8. If you are uploading a pdf, you will receive a warning that the content will now be tracked. Click "Add"
9. Back on the "Add Items" step in the curriculum wizard, click the "Add Meeting" button and slect the meeting you just created (ie "Strategic Decision")
10. Click "Next" then click "Finish"
11. In the Curriculum view, click on the meeting item (ie "Strategic Decision")
12. Click the "Edit" button in the "Prerequisites" section
13. Next to the content name, you will see a drop-down menu. Select the "Required" or "Hidden" option. Click "Save"
14. Click on "Manage Enrollees" and add all the required invitees to the list.
15. Click on "Notifications". Select the radio option "Send notification now"
16. Edit the message. Change the "Subject". Change the "Body" and uncheck the "Attach MS Outlook calendar event" unless you specified actual dates when creating the curriculum

Note: Alternatively, after adding the invitees, you could click on "curriculum information", copy the URL and use your standard email client to broadcast that link.

What happens next? Each invitee will receive a link to the curriculum viewer prompting them to first look at the document. Only once they viewed all the pages of the document will they be able to join the meeting