We’ve all attended those meeting that seem to go off on tangents and cover everything under the sun — other than the meeting agenda. So why do some meetings go off without a hitch and others don’t? It all comes down to proper planning before the meeting, and having the right tactics during the meeting.

So prepare your next meeting properly, and follow these guidelines:

Before you plan the meeting, figure out the answers to the following questions:

1. What is the goal of this meeting?
2. Who is invited?
3. Should we serve refreshments, and if so, what kind?

Once you have the basics, you can start planning.

Send out your invitations far enough in advance to give everyone a chance to plan and to make changes to their schedules if necessary.

• The day before the meeting, prepare a brief agenda and send it to the meeting participants with the goal of the meeting. The meeting participants will then know what to expect and the agenda will help them to stay focused.
• If you are serving refreshments, plan for time that you will need to pick them up or have them delivered and set aside time to set them up.

To stay on track during your meeting, consider the following:

• Start and end the meeting promptly at the times you specified in your meeting invitation.
• If you’re serving refreshments, make the food portion of the meeting streamlined and simplistic so the attendees can spend their time on the agenda and not on waiting for food.
• Designate one person to be in charge of keeping everyone on track. He can ring a bell or simply raise his hand each time the conversation goes off topic.
• Let everyone know you have set aside 10 or 15 minutes at the end of the meeting to answer any questions. Instruct meeting attendees to write down their questions as you speak, and save them for that discussion time at the end of the meeting.

Filed under: Management Minute | No Comments »

It’s a good question, and everyone has probably been guilty of lame last slides. For example, it’s easy to simply put “Thanks!” on the last slide. But this kind of slide doesn’t add anything to your presentation.

There’s no one right answer of course, but our recommendation is that your last slide should contain your key takeaway and also give your audience an uplifting and motivating finish.

If you have a Question and Answer period, you may use a Questions slide. Many presenters just put a big question mark on the slide. But you shouldn’t end your presentation with a question mark. We recommend always summarizing your talk after the Question and Answer period to focus the audience again on your message. This strategy will help them remember what you said and let you end on an up note.

It’s fine to put your logo on the last slide, especially if you’re selling something. But you still want that takeaway message. Perhaps you could end a sales presentation with something like, “We’re here to help you achieve great customer service.”

So, we would suggest the follow order for your final slides:

1. Last content slide
2. Question and Answer slide
3. Special offers, if any, or other necessary details
4. Uplifting takeaway

Filed under: Microsoft Office Tutor | No Comments »

Angry or frustrated customers often resort to a strategy known as “baiting,” in which they try to elicit a strong emotional response from you. For example, an impatient customer might march up to your counter and fume, “I’ve been waiting for 30 minutes! What’s the hold-up? You all are so lazy!” This customer is not only trying to let off steam, he’s also hoping to get your attention and force you to see things his way.

You might be tempted to respond to such a customer, “Can’t you see we’re understaffed? Sit down and wait your turn!” But, if you do so, you’ve taken his bait. You’ve shown him that he can get to you. And, chances are, he’ll get even angrier until you either give in and let him skip the line or ask him to leave the building.

A more efficient way of dealing with such a customer would be to acknowledge his frustration without taking the bait. Ignoring his insulting comment about your “laziness,” you might say, “Sir, you seem annoyed that you have to wait.” He’ll likely respond in the affirmative, at which point you can ask for his number. Asking him for information will force him to stop and think for a moment, putting you in control of the conversation and giving him a moment to reconsider his words.

The next step is to give the customer information. In the above situation, for example, you would tell the customer about how much longer he’d have to wait and suggest something he can do in the meantime. By ignoring his “bait,” you continue the conversation on your terms, not his, making it far more likely that the interaction will go well.

Filed under: Customer Service Corner | No Comments »

Continuing-education classes and seminars are great ways to encourage employee growth. Unfortunately, with budgetary restraints, these are not always feasible options. Another less expensive way you can help your employees gain more knowledge in their specialized fields is to establish a resource library someplace in your workplace.

A resource library can be as big as a large room with a table and chairs or as small as a bookshelf in your office. It really depends on the space you have to allot to it. But the most important elements of a resource library are the resource materials. Consider stocking your resource library shelves with the following resources:

• Trade books
• Magazines, journals and periodicals
• How-to newsletters

You don’t have to spend a fortune on a resource library. See if your company will sponsor a subscription to a few publications and keep those on display. Then, encourage employees to donate materials they don’t reference anymore. Other employees will no doubt find the materials useful. Also, keep your eye out for library book sales and garage sales where you can find plenty of books at a low rate. Just check the publishing date to make sure they are current.

Filed under: Management Minute | No Comments »

If your mouse has a wheel, you probably use it to scroll up and down through lengthy worksheets. You may not realize that you can also use it to change the zoom percentage for your view of the worksheet.

To do so, hold down the [Ctrl] key and move the scroll wheel. Rolling the wheel down decreases the zoom percentage and rolling it up increases the zoom percentage. Note that if you’re using Excel 2000, the zoom will only go up to 100 percent.

If you’d rather have your mouse wheel zoom by default, choose Tools | Options from the menu bar, switch to the General tab, and then select the Zoom On Roll With IntelliMouse check box. After you click OK, rolling the wheel zooms and rolling the wheel while holding the [Ctrl] key scrolls up and down the worksheet.

Adapt for Excel 2007

While this shortcut also works in Excel 2007, there’s an additional way to zoom in and out in 2007. You can use the Zoom slider in the bottom-right corner of the application. You can drag the slider up or down to adjust your zoom, or you can click on the plus and minus icons on either side of the slider to adjust the zoom by 10-percent increments.

Filed under: Microsoft Office Tutor | No Comments »