UNIT-8 [ Lesson-1: Some Internal Communication ]
After reading this lesson you will be able to:
- explain the importance of meeting as a tool of management
- write minutes of a meeting
- prepare ‘notices’ to give short announcement of events, decisions of interest to the staff
- write resolutions.
Some Internal Communication
Why do organisations have meetings?
Although time consuming, unpopular, and difficult to arrange, meetings serve as the most powerful means of managerial communication. One of the keys to a successful meeting is being clear about why it is happening at all.
If you are in the position of deciding whether to call a meeting, you should first ask yourself. “What do I hope to get out of it?” If your answer is just to get “some ideas”, you would probably do better to postpone any meeting and try to gather ideas in some other way—say, through one-to-one conversation. Usually most meetings fall into one or more of these categories:
- to consult by giving or receiving advice
- to brief or review-such as give a progress report on a project
- to make a decision
- to solve a problem
- to negotiate
- to generate creative ideas.
Although discussion is the essence of meetings, nevertheless committee meetings cannot function efficiently without the large amount of written work they involve. The main meeting documents are:
the notice of the meeting
the agenda
and the minutes
Notice
Committee meetings must be formally conveyed. This means that notice that a meeting is to be held must be sent by the secretary to all those who are entitled to receive it and who will be attending. Notices of this kind
do not have any set form but must comply with the principles of communication i.e., they must have accuracy, brevity, and clarity. These notices must also have completeness so as to leave no doubt in the mind of the readers.
Notices of other types such as short announcements of events or decisions of interests to the staff in an organisation also do not follow the structure of all communications i.e., having an introduction-body- conclusion structure but accuracy, brevity and completeness are important and the origin of the notice should also be indicated.
Notices for committee meetings must be signed by the receivers and if the agenda is not sent with the notice, brief details of the matters to be dealt with at the meeting can be given.
Notices serve the same functions as memorandums. There are certain differences between the notices and memorandums.
Number of receivers: There is no fixed number of receivers for a notice. Notices are means of mass communication. They are not sent through the internal post but put on bulletin boards or as in the case of one firm, chalked on the floor.
Direction of the communication – They are used by those at medium and higher levels to communicate to those at the lowest levels of the hierarchy.
Because notices are used exclusively for down ward communication, there may be indirect feedback from the receivers and that could also be a disruptive kind—sometimes. Notices are less capable of conveying complex messages effectively than memorandums. If you wish to make notices effective, avoid complicated language and use very short sentences and phrases.
Agenda
Even a short informal meeting can benefit by having an agenda. Agenda is a list of items proposed to be discussed at a meeting and sent to those attending well before the meeting.
Like the notice agenda is prepared by the secretary, sometimes with the help of the chairperson and distributed to committee members. It is also very important and useful to send a note with the agenda emphasising the main objectives for the meeting.
Brief agenda can be sent for frequent regular departmental meeting where the participants know each other and issues as well. To some extent the content of the agenda is determined by what has happened at the previous meeting. Certain items will always appear:
apologies for absence
minutes of the last meeting
any other business
date of next meeting
The following example illustrates the normal form which the agenda takes. Notice that the items are arranged so that they can easily be distinguished at a glance. It gives start and finish times by allowing people to prepare properly by showing them what the meeting is about.
This agenda is a valuable aid to secretary for preparing minutes because it lists the topics to be discussed.
Minutes
Minutes are the official records of meetings. Minutes serve two purposes; as a record, they provide a history of the transactions which is available for future reference; they also provide the concerned authorities with the basis for action. Copies of minutes are distributed to all members and interested superiors as a way of keeping track of proceedings.
The person appointed as secretary records the minutes. As accuracy is important, the minutes should be written as soon as possible after the meeting. The minutes must be precise, clear, highly informative, and free of the writer’s personal commentary (“As usual, Ms. Kanta disagreed with the committee”)’ or judgmental words (“good”, “poor”, “irrelevant”). When you record minutes answer these questions below:
- Which group held the meeting?
- When and where was it held?
- What was its purpose?
- Who chaired the meeting?
- Who else was present?
- Were the minutes of the last meeting approved (or disapproved)?
- Was anything resolved?
Answer to these above questions will help you write effectively the minutes of a meeting.
Guidelines for effective minutes writing
All the minutes of meetings have their strength and weaknesses. There are some guidelines which can make minutes more effective if followed properly.
All managers have to participate in meetings as well as chairing
them. If you are chairing the meeting, then ask someone else to keep
notes during the meeting. Take care to note who is present and who
sent apologies.
- Check their accuracy with someone else present if in doubt.
- Keep the language simple.
- Be brief.
- Name the person who makes the motion and the person who seconds it.
- Record the votes on each motion along with a description of the motion itself.
- Distinguish between facts and opinions.
- Use the same numbering system as you used for the agenda.
- Distribute within two days of the meeting.
- Ask for feedback from members on their views of the meeting record, do they want fuller, briefer, clearer notes?
- Highlight points of agreement as well as action points.
- Any other points that you feel important.
Here is an example showing how the record of the meeting whose agenda was given on page-5 might look.
Minutes are the written record of a meeting and they must be completely clear in order to serve their purpose. The notes should be written in the form of sentences.
Resolutions
Resolutions expressing sympathy, appreciation and congratulations may be a past of a business meeting. After the resolution is typed on a good quality paper and signed by the president and secretary, it is sent as a formal document to the appropriate person.
A copy of the resolution is included into the meetings. In writing resolutions the word “WHEREAS” begins the paragraph giving the reasons for the resolution and the word “RESOLVED” begins the paragraphs stating the action to be taken.
Example is as follow.
Question for Review
These questions are designed to help you assess how far you have understood and can apply the learning you have accomplished by answering (in written form) the following questions:
1. Write down the six categories of meeting that you have learnt from this Lesson-1.
2. Why do you have to write notices and for which level of communication you use the notices?
3. a. As a secretary of the Student’s Union prepare the notice and agenda for a Union Committee meeting
b. Write the minutes of the above meeting.
4. Write a resolution to the member secretary of an organisation expressing sympathy for the death of his wife.
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