We’ve all been in meetings where participants are unprepared, people veer off-track, and the topics discussed are a waste of the team’s time. These problems — and others like it — stem from poor agenda design. An effective agenda sets clear expectations for what needs to occur before and during a meeting. It helps team members prepare, allocates time wisely, quickly gets everyone on the same topic, and identifies when the discussion is complete. If problems still occur during the meeting, a well-designed agenda increases the team’s ability to effectively and quickly address them.
我们都参加过这样的会议，与会者没有准备充分、大家心不在焉、讨论的话题是对团队时间的浪费。这些问题——以及其他类似的问题——都源于糟糕的议程设计。一项有效的议程明确安排了会议前后的事件。这可以帮助团队成员充分准备、合理分配时间，快速地让每个人都参与讨论同一个主题，并确定了讨论时间。如果在会议期间仍然出现问题，一个精心设计的日程会增加团队有效并快速解决问题的能力。
 
Here are some tips for designing an effective agenda for your next meeting, with a sample agenda and template below. You can use these tips whether a meeting lasts an hour or three days and whether you’re meeting with a group of five or forty:
以下是为下次会议设计有效议程的一些建议、样本议程和模板。你可以以此来决定会议时长以及与会者数量。
 
Seek input from team members. If you want your team to be engaged in meetings, make sure the agenda includes items that reflect their needs. Ask team members to suggest agenda items along with a reason why each item needs to be addressed in a team setting. If you ultimately decide not to include an item, be accountable — explain your reasoning to the team member who suggested it.
寻求团队成员的意见。如果你希望你的团队参与会议，确保议程中包括了反映他们需求的项目。要求团队成员提出议程项目，同时询问成员提出此项目的原因。若最终决定去除某项目，你需要向提出建议的成员解释去除项目的原因。
 
Select topics that affect the entire team. Team meeting time is expensive and difficult to schedule. It should mainly be used to discuss and make decisions on issues that affect the whole team — and need the whole team to solve them. These are often ones in which individuals must coordinate their actions because their parts of the organization are interdependent. They are also likely to be issues for which people have different information and needs.
选择影响整个团队的主题。团队会议时间很昂贵，而且很难安排。它应该主要用于讨论和决定影响整个团队的问题，并且需要整个团队来解决它们，需要个人成员协调，因为大家是相互联系、相互依赖的，每个人掌握不同的信息，有不同的需求。
 
List agenda topics as questions the team needs to answer. Most agenda topics are simply several words strung together to form a phrase, for example: “office space reallocation.” This leaves meeting participants wondering, “What about office space reallocation?” When you list a topic as a question (or questions) to be answered, it instead reads like this: “Under what conditions, if any, should we reallocate office space?”
将议程主题列为团队需要回答的问题。大多数的议程主题仅仅是串在一起组成一个短语的几个单词，例如:“办公室空间重新分配”。这让与会者感到疑惑，“办公室空间再分配怎么样?”你应该把一个主题作为一个问题列出来:“，我们应该在什么条件下重新分配办公空间?”
 
A question enables team members to better prepare for the discussion and to monitor whether their own and others’ comments are on track. During the meeting, anyone who thinks a comment is off-track can say something like, “I’m not seeing how your comment relates to the question we’re trying to answer. Can you help me understand the connection?” Finally, the team knows that when the question has been answered, the discussion is complete.
一个问题能够使团队成员能够更好地为讨论做准备，并时刻检查他们自己和其他人的意见是否正确。在会议期间，认为别人的评论偏离轨道的人会说:“我没有看到你的评论和我们想要回答的问题有什么关系，你能解释下吗？”最后，当团队知道当问题得到解答时，讨论就完成了。
 
Note whether the purpose of the topic is to share information, seek input for a decision, or make a decision. It’s difficult for team members to participate effectively if they don’t know whether to simply listen, give their input, or be part of the decision making process. If people think they are involved in making a decision, but you simply want their input, everyone is likely to feel frustrated by the end of the conversation. Updates are better distributed — and read — prior to the meeting, using a brief part of the meeting to answer participants’ questions. If the purpose is to make a decision, state the decision-making rule. If you are the formal leader, at the beginning of the agenda item you might say, “If possible, I want us to make this decision by consensus. That means that everyone can support and implement the decision given their roles on the team. If we’re not able to reach consensus after an hour of discussion, I’ll reserve the right to make the decision based on the conversation we’ve had. I’ll tell you my decision and my reasoning for making it.”
请注意会议主题是共享信息、寻求意见以进行决策还是共同作出决定。对于团队成员来说，如果他们不知道参会的目的是简单地倾听、给出他们的意见还是参与决策过程的话，那么他们就很难有效地参与进来。如果人们认为他们参与了决策，但你只是想要他们提出意见，那么每个人都可能在谈话结束时感到沮丧。在会议之前，让大家阅读会议提要，会议开始时花几分钟回答与会者的问题都是非常有效的方法。如果目的是做一个决定，那么会上就要宣布决策规则。如果你是正式的领导人，在议程项目开始时，你需要说，“如果可能的话，我希望我们以协商一致的方式作出这个决定。这意味着每个人都可以支持并执行这个决定，因为他们在团队中扮演着重要的角色。如果在一个小时的讨论后我们无法达成共识，我将根据我们的对话做出决定。我会告诉你们我的决定和我的理由。”
 
Estimate a realistic amount of time for each topic. This serves two purposes. First, it requires you to do the math — to calculate how much time the team will need for introducing the topic, answering questions, resolving different points of view, generating potential solutions, and agreeing on the action items that follow from discussion and decisions.
估计每个主题的实际花费时间。这有两个好处。首先，这要求你做数学计算——计算出团队在介绍主题、回答问题、解决不同观点、生成潜在解决方案以及在讨论和决策之后的行动项目上达成一致所需的时间。领导者通常会低估所需要的时间。
 
Second, the estimated time enables team members to either adapt their comments to fit within the allotted timeframe or to suggest that more time may be needed. The purpose of listing the time is not to stop discussion when the time has elapsed; that simply contributes to poor decision making and frustration. The purpose is to get better at allocating enough time for the team to effectively and efficiently answer the questions before it.
第二，预估时间使团队成员可以根据时间调整他们的意见，或者建议需要更多时间讨论某项问题。列出时间的目的不是在时间范围内必须完成讨论，这只会导致糟糕的决策、达不到预期效果，真正的目的是为了更好地分配足够的时间，让团队能够有效、高效地回答问题。
 
Propose a process for addressing each agenda item. The process identifies the steps through which the team will move together to complete the discussion or make a decision. Agreeing on a process significantly increases meeting effectiveness, yet leaders rarely do it.
提出处理每个议程项目的程序。这个过程明确了团队一起完成讨论或作出决定的步骤。这样一来能够大大提高会议效率，但领导者却很少这样做。
 
The process for addressing an item should appear on the written agenda. When you reach that item during the meeting, explain the process and seek agreement: “I suggest we use the following process. First, let’s take about 10 minutes to get all the relevant information on the table. Second, let’s take another 10 minutes to identify and agree on any assumptions we need to make. Third, we’ll take another 10 minutes to identify and agree on the interests that should be met for any solution. Finally, we’ll use about 15 minutes to craft a solution that ideally takes into account all the interests, and is consistent with our relevant information and assumptions. Any suggestions for improving this process?”
处理问题的过程应该出现在书面议程上。当大家在会议中达成一致时，领导者需要向与会者解释实施过程并征求大家的意见：“我建议我们这样做：首先，让我们花10分钟的时间浏览所有相关的信息。第二，让我们再花10分钟来确定并表决我们需要做的决定。第三，我们将再花10分钟来确定解决方案涉及的利益，并举手表决。最后，我们将用大约15分钟的时间来制定一个理想的解决方案，这将考虑到所有的利益，并且符合我们的相关信息和决定。大家还有什么意见吗?” 
 
Specify how members should prepare for the meeting. Distribute the agenda with sufficient time before the meeting, so the team can read background materials and prepare their initial thoughts for each agenda item ahead of time.
明确规定成员应该如何准备会议。在会议开始前，把议程分发给与会成员，保证每个人充分阅读，这样团队就可以阅读背景材料，提前考虑每一个议程项目。
 
Identify who is responsible for leading each topic. Someone other than the formal meeting leader is often responsible for leading the discussion of a particular agenda item. This person may be providing context for the topic, explaining data, and so on. Identifying this person next to the agenda item ensures that anyone who is responsible for leading part of the agenda knows it — and prepares for it — before the meeting.
确定负责每个议题的领导人。除了正式的会议领导人之外，其他人通常负责领导讨论某个特定的议程项目。这个人可能为主题讨论提供背景知识、解释数据材料等等。在议程项目旁著名负责人可以确保在会议之前，负责领导部分议程的人知道其职责并为其做准备。
 
Make the first topic “review and modify agenda as needed.” Even if you and your team have jointly developed the agenda before the meeting, take a minute to see if anything needs to be changed due to late breaking events.
第一个主题是“根据需要审查和修改议程”。即使你和你的团队在会议之前共同制定了议程，也要花一分钟的时间来看看是否发生了什么突发事件需要改变会议议程。
 
End the meeting with a plus/delta. If your team meets regularly, two questions form a simple continuous improvement process: What did we do well? What do we want to do differently for the next meeting? Investing five or ten minutes will enable the team to improve performance, working relationships, and team member satisfaction. Here are some questions to consider when identifying what the team has done well and what it wants to do differently:
会议结束时讨论会议表现。如果你的团队定期开会，两个问题就可以制定一个长期改进计划了：我们哪些地方做的好？下次会议上我们想做哪些改变？花5到10分钟讨论下这些问题将使团队能够改善绩效、工作关系，提高团队成员的满意度。在确定团队哪些地方做得很好以及想要做些什么改变时，以下是一些需要考虑的问题:
 
1. Was the agenda distributed in time for everyone to prepare?
议程是否及时分发给每个与会者？
2. How well did team members prepare for the meeting?
与会者准备是否充分？
3. How well did we estimate the time needed for each agenda item?
我们对每项议程预估的时间正确吗？
4. How well did we allocate our time for decision making and discussion?
我们制定决策和讨论的时间是否充足？
5. How well did everyone stay on-topic? How well did team members speak up when they thought someone was off-topic?
每个人是不是都参与进来了？当团队成员认为某人离题时，他们的表现如何?
6. How effective was the process for each agenda item?
每个议程项目的进程是否有效?
 
If you develop agendas using these tips, and the sample agenda and template below, your team will have an easier time getting — and staying — focused in meetings.
如果您使用这些技巧制定议程，并参考下面的示例议程和模板，您的团队将在会议中更容易保持专注。