Stop Scheduling Meetings Without an Agenda

I took a meeting last week with a guy who’d waited for weeks to see me. Nice guy who wanted to talk about a particular media project – at least that’s what I thought. But once he came into my office, he had nothing to say. He hadn’t done his homework, didn’t have questions prepared, and didn’t know how I could help. We just sat there, doing small talk, and I finally had to ask, “How can I help you?”  “Why are we having this meeting?”

If you schedule a meeting with another professional to pitch a project, ask for advice, or whatever – come prepared.  Write up some questions, have an agenda, and know what you want the meeting to accomplish.

Better yet – email them ahead of time so the other person can prepare for the meeting.  It will be far more productive than just sitting around looking clueless.