Page 14 - Leadership Basics 10

The Agenda

Put an agenda together and give as much thought to the order as you do to the content. There are
some things which must be discussed before others, so they must be aired first. The temptation is to
think of everything and put it all down on the agenda. If it is thirty‐seven items, we doubt whether
there has been any prioritisation. It is best to include as few items as is realistically possible: treat it as
a virtue to have short agendas. Sometimes you may have only one issue to discuss. It is still worth
calling a meeting if it genuinely needs discussion.

Ensure you have adequate time to discuss the important things and give less time to those items of
little significance. What about the urgent things which inevitably crop up at the last minute? It is a
good idea to get those out of the way so that you can focus on the important issues. Give urgent items
only a short amount of time and reach a decision quickly.

The agenda shown in Figure Two is an example of failing to plan adequately. It had been circulated in
advance.
At least the agenda was reasonably short (but not the meeting). The key item was number 4 which was
central to the department's future. An explanation of each item would have shown that some were of
little importance, whereas the item relating to department direction and the impact this might have
was critical to success.
The item should never have been put so far down the agenda. Secondly, it needed to be supported
with a statement and appropriate documents. Thirdly, teachers should have been given some
preparation to do for such an important issue.
At the start of the meeting, the chair said she had a lunch engagement at ESF centre at 12.00 and
would have to leave at 11.30 sharp. The make‐up of the staff social committee seemed to be close to
everyone's heart because of last year’s boring Christmas party with the ‘Famous England Cricketers’
there. If the leader had made it clear on the agenda, the issue was actually about just adding an extra
person to the committee, not what it did. As it was, the discussion digressed into quality of food
served at the last get‐together, to the problem of drunk colleagues spoiling the family atmosphere. At
11.00, the leader moved on to the second item and reached the key item at 11.25, saying that, since it
was so important, it could be deferred to the next meeting.

Figure Two : An Unplanned Agenda

1. Staff social committee.
2. Hire of new CAs.

3. Visit of teachers from Beijing.
4. Revision of department development strategies for next year.

5. AOB.

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