The executive chair and former CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt, has just published a book entitled How Google Works. Together with former Google vice-president of products Jonathan Rosenberg, he describes his experience during a decade of building the leading Internet company.
The authors conclude that the key to success in today's turbulent business world is to create exceptional products and attract and educate versatile employees, whom Google refers to as "smart creatives". They focus on issues of corporate culture, strategy, talent, innovation, communication, etc., as well as organising meetings in such a way as to avoid unnecessary loss of time. The meeting rules developed by Eric Schmidt and his team were summed up on the Business Insider website. They appear below.
1. Every meeting must have a leader
Without a clearly designated leader, meetings end in compromise because no one wants to make difficult decisions. All participants should know who will have the last word. This also applies to meetings aimed at sharing information and brainstorming.
2. Every meeting must have a clear purpose and structure
The preselected leader is responsible for convening meetings as well as organising their content, objectives and participants. The agenda should be distributed at least 24 hours in advance. The leader is also responsible for summarising meetings and distributing tasks the participants agreed on within 48 hours.
3. Hold meetings only when necessary
Any meeting without a clearly defined purpose and goal is unnecessary. If you go to regular meetings only out of habit, this is wrong.
4. Do not invite more than eight people
All participants should actively participate in meetings. If you should only sit and listen (and look important) at a meeting, you can find more useful work to do. The meeting's leader will send you relevant information covered at the meeting later.
5. Follow a schedule
Always start and end meetings on time according to a predetermined schedule. Plan for breaks during longer meetings. If you are done before the scheduled end, it makes no sense to prolong the meeting unnecessarily .
6. Pay full attention
When following the above-mentioned rules, you will attend only meetings where your participation is essential. Then you should pay full attention to the meeting and, for example, stop playing with your computer or phone. Here, however, Eric Schmidt admits he had to give up continuously asking his staff to close their notebooks. "This is the hardest rule to follow, but it is still a good rule," he writes in the book.
Book:
SCHMIDT, Eric - ROSENBERG, Jonathan: How Google Works. New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2014. 304 p.
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