Your company boardroom can be the ideal location for meetings and business pitches alike. Within the walls of these structured rooms your team can come together to reach objective and achieve goals. Similarly to most businesses you are likely to find that they are often the birth place of productive discussions, heated debates, and smart decisions.

However, great ideas and successful pitches will generally emerge only from careful planning and considerations, even when creativity is key. Therefore we thought we’d give you a helping hand to ensure your boardroom is the source of prosperous business ideas.

What Happens in The Boardroom, Doesn’t Stay in The Boardroom

As mentioned previously, from boardrooms great ideas and healthy debates can emerge. Not only are your employees able to get involved in important decisions and reach necessary goals and objectives but potential sales and bigger business opportunities can occur. So whether it is a casual meeting, brainstorming session, formal conference or sales pitch ensuring that your boardroom runs accordingly is key.

However, time spent together is not always time spent getting work done. Whilst conducive, boardroom meetings can often lead to profit loss, decreased productivity, and wasted hours for employees. According to Atlassian up to 62 meetings are attended monthly by employees where half of these are considered a waste of time. In fact they found that 73% of people did other work in their meetings whilst a staggering 92% of individuals simply daydreamed. In fact it has been found that UK workers waste a year of their lives in unproductive boardroom meetings and whether due to time spent away from client work or resulting travel costs companies are losing out on money too. Therefore it is critical that any time spent in the boardroom is well planned.

Ensure a Productive Meeting

No one enjoys a meeting that lasts hours; attendees either end up daydreaming, fiddling with their smartphones, or simple wondering, “why am I even here?”. Instead ensure you get to the point, learn from, and implement the meeting objectives.

Define Objectives

Begin by defining the upcoming meeting objectives in order to drive the direction of conversation. Whether these are broad goals which help with creativity or defined objectives aimed to keep everyone focused it is imperative to making your meeting a success.

Start On Time

Starting on time sets the precedence for the forthcoming meeting. Don’t arrive late and ensure that you start on time even if people re absent. It is surprising how much this will affect people’s ability to concentrate and effectively contribute. Equally make sure that you don’t run over the scheduled end time.

Comfy Furniture Goes Along Way

Provide your team with cold hard seats in a less than inspiring room with old wobbly tables is asking for a lack of concentration and involvement. Guarantee attendees a comfy seat and we’re positive their productivity and performance will enhance. And what better time to consider new boardroom furniture as we’re offering a fantastic Boardroom Tables from just £163.00 and Boardroom Chairs from as little as £176.00

Agenda, Minutes, and Action plan

An agenda lays everything on the table for all attendees. Providing structure you will also drive action with these plans acting as a measuring stick for timings and discussions. In the following days you are then able to send out an action plan based on your minutes which remind people of important points and ensure they haven’t been misinterpreted. This will also allow you to ensure everyone is clear about what has been achieved and who is responsible for each action.

Inspire Trust

Creating a safe environment for participants, trust is a non-negotiable when it comes to board meetings. With trust in place employees are more likely to get involved in discussions and know that a little debate can lead to great ideas. Leaders should also employ positive thinking to encourage team members to continue working hard towards goals and vision even if their suggestion is brushed off the table.

Consider Banning Technology

Unless absolutely necessary smartphones and tablets are often more of a hindrance in terms of productivity and concentration. If possible ban the use of technology including phone calls, emails, texts, and surfing the web throughout any meeting.

Impress With A Killer Pitch 

Think of a businessman delivering a great sales pitch and you likely conjure up a fantastic movie scene with one guy quaking in his boots and the other coming to his rescue with a compelling thought provoking, inspirational speech which is instantly followed by over the top applaud and a mass order. However, Hollywood lied to us and the likelihood is that you’ll be left trying to command the attention of elders whilst trying to deal with palm-sweating and lack of sleep.

However, it doesn’t have to be that way.

Preparation

Preparation is key and a clear strategy is needed when pitching to potential investors. If you don’t know what you are talking about, neglect any sort of structure to your speech, or don’t know the subject inside out then why would anyone invest in you? You should also ensure that you prep the boardroom accordingly; arrive early to set up your visuals or presentation and you’ll avoid the potential for any last minute hitches.

During preparation you should find out as much as you can about your audience and their company; although we’d hope that was obvious. Try to understand their positions in the organisation, what they do and what decision making processes they may follow. In doing so you’ll be able to steer your pitch in the right direction.

Keep it Simple

A succinct elevator pitch is a great boardroom opener, not to mention handy just in case you run into a CEO in a lift one day. Getting straight to the point without too much technical jargon is a great way to begin and implement throughout your presentation; if your audience don’t understand within the first 3 you’re in trouble. Keep in mind this insightful quote from Albert Einstein; “If you can’t explain it simply then you don’t know it well enough”.

Don’t Try to be the Smartest Person in The Room

It is important to get across your own personal experiences and expertise. However, don’t make out that you know everything; a successful entrepreneur/businessman builds a team of credible experts and surrounds themselves with smart people. You’re investors aren’t simply investing in your idea or concept but you and your team.

Be Prepared to Answer Questions

The way you respond to directed questions is key. You may find it surprising that it’s not necessary that you have the right answer which will impress. Answering on the spot demonstrates how you deal with situations that may involve uncertainty and pressure.

More Help From The Team

If you’re looking to update your boardroom in a bid to create a space your team can thrive in then Office Supermarket stock a range of office furniture including our great Boardroom furniture. For more information simply give the team a call on 0344 755 3018 or browse our website.