I guess you've experienced that panic when you were in a meeting, then suddenly put in the spotlight and asked to provide your input without any prior heads-up? And for sure, everyone has been pulled into a meeting called simply 'Sync' with 10 other people who talked about a matter you had no remote idea about, right?
Photo by fauxels from Pexels
I confess: I very much dislike poorly managed meetings. Those who know me know that I'll avoid being in such meetings at all costs.
When I teach BAs, I always stress the importance of meeting facilitation. Because more often than not, It's so easy to schedule and facilitate meetings that are productive, outcome-focused, engaging, and fun! This skill alone will elevate you in your organization and make you stand out among your peers.
Here are the top 5 habits every BA should develop.
Habit #1: Clearly Define the Purpose of the Meeting
This may seem obvious, but it's crucial to understand the purpose of a meeting and your role in it. Sure, you know this for those meetings that you schedule yourself, but what about those meetings that you're invited to? Are those always clear to you?
Let me puzzle you for a second:
'Project Sync'
'Escalation'
'Question'
These are actual meetings I attended and it took me a while to figure out what they were about.
Here's why it's so important to get to the purpose of the meeting. You don't want to waste time on useless meetings that offer no value, nor do you add value yourself. If there's no involvement for you, just ask for a summary of that meeting to be shared with you later, and don't go there!
Some folks falsely believe that attending countless meetings boosts their image, productivity, or status. No way - that's a road to stress, overtime, and burnout.
Don't fall for it - clean up your calendar and attend only essential meetings where your role and purpose are clear.
Habit #2: Have a Structured and Timeboxed Agenda in Business Analyst Meetings
Always have a meeting agenda defined and communicated in advance of the meeting. Creating the agenda sets you on the right path to clearly understand the specific topics and how you want to approach them.
The sooner you communicate your agenda, the better. This will allow the participants to come prepared and ensure the meeting is productive. Where possible, I recommend timeboxing the agenda items so that we can manage time effectively and ensure we cover all the topics on the agenda. Additionally, tag people on specific agenda items so that they know for sure that they must attend, especially when their participation is required.
Here's a sample agenda that, as a business analyst, I would use for a backlog refinement session with the client and the technical leads:
As you can see, I have clearly tagged the people who need to be present, and I time-boxed each of the topics to ensure focus and staying on track.
Now, let's discuss how we can ensure that during the meeting, we remain productive and engage the team in a healthy conversation.
Habit #3: Engage in Active Listening and Facilitation
Actively listening to others and encouraging open dialogue helps build trust with your colleagues and business stakeholders. However, it doesn't mean that you must be the star of the show and seek all the attention. Your job is to ensure that all topics are covered and engage others in meaningful conversation.
Never assume that the stakeholders will communicate everything right away. Always ask clarifying questions to ensure you understand everything correctly. Here are a few tips for healthy and productive business conversations:
Maintain eye contact and nod occasionally to demonstrate engagement in the conversation.
Avoid interrupting and allow others to communicate their thoughts completely.
Paraphrase and summarize valuable points to show understanding.
Ask open-ended questions to encourage further discussion and clarification.
Another crucial aspect is time management. As mentioned earlier, setting specific time slots for each agenda item and redirecting discussions that go off-track helps maintain focus on the objectives and requirements at hand. If this doesn't happen, you may end up running over time, which can result in the need for a follow-up meeting or require staying late.
Don't forget to allow a few minutes to summarize key decisions, action items, and next steps at the end of the meeting.
Habit #4: Keep Meeting Notes
As a business analyst, your job isn't just about attending meetings. It's pretty much about requirements elicitation and making sure you capture meaningful outcomes of the meetings you attend and then communicate these outcomes with your team.
One habit that will help you do it is keeping meeting notes. And don't wait for someone to ask for the notes – keep them to yourself, because it's easy to forget what was covered and what decisions were made.
For all my projects I typically have a section in OneNote dedicated specifically to Meeting Notes, and here’s how it looks:
When asked to capture formal meeting notes, don't go too far with structuring and formatting. Hopefully, your organization has a template that you may reuse for formal meeting notes. If not, use the following as an example of how you may structure your meeting notes for a client-facing meeting:
Habit #5: Focus on Outcomes and Action Items
When talking with your team or the client, try to focus on the specific outcomes you want to get from the conversation. Are these new or clarified requirements? Are there any specific decisions to be made? Any follow-up action items with due dates and assignees? The more concrete the conversation is, the better.
Remember, you don't want to waste your time, your teammates' time, or the client's time by just talking without achieving productive results from the meetings.
A special note for discovery projects: during requirements discovery, it is crucial to be formal in tracking your action items and following up on them with your stakeholders. To the point that you may actually use a tracker such as Jira, Azure DevOps, or at least a spreadsheet to capture and track the action items that need to be resolved during the discovery process.
Conclusion
I really hope that the meetings you attend or conduct are truly productive, engaging, inclusive, and results-oriented. Please ensure that you continue to exhibit the 5 good habits for BAs to conduct business meetings:
Learn More
Interested in learning more? Download the Discovery Checklist – your all-in-one, practical blueprint for successful requirements elicitation, packed with actionable steps to guide you through every stage of the discovery process.
Comments