How to plan quarterly company meetings

As a manager, your role is to guide the company through its long-term aspirations, monitoring the progress at regular intervals.

How often the meetings take place is down to personal choice. They can be daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly or annually. The important thing is to have a systematic approach for maximum efficiency.

Why do businesses have quarterly meetings?

Conducting quarterly meetings is a popular practice that helps managers with their short and long-term planning strategies.

Compared with weekly or monthly meetings, a quarterly meeting gives leaders a better opportunity to see the bigger picture, understanding the current state of the company and markets, while taking into account short-term fluctuations.

It provides an opportunity to identify and prioritise the best initiatives and goals for the following quarter, keeping your company moving forward at the fastest pace. Quarterly meetings also give employers the chance to complete performance reviews for the company and for individual teams.

Reviews are at the heart of integrating your company’s strategy with day-to-day operations to monitor how you’re faring. They also enable you to provide key shareholders with a means of examining the state of the business, the opportunities and ways of moving forward in the next quarter.

How do you plan a quarterly meeting?

Arrange the meeting dates as far in advance as you can, so everyone can book them in their diary and attend. The longer you wait to book, the more difficult it can become to organise everyone’s diaries. Many companies organise their latest meeting for a couple of weeks before the start of each quarter, so there’s time to communicate the outcome to the rest of the company in advance of the new quarter.

Ideally, find an offsite meeting room, as it’s often more productive than meeting in your own conference room. Studies show there’s more chance of losing focus when meeting in your workplace, as there can be interruptions when general operational issues arise.

The company’s growth is important enough to deserve your full attention, without day-to-day distractions. When you take your team to an offsite venue, they can focus 100% on developing a winning quarterly plan.

What preparations should you make?

Prepare your agenda long before the session, giving yourself time to think through what you aim to accomplish and create a suitable agenda that clearly lays out the topics for discussion. Send the attendees the details a couple of weeks before the meeting to give them time to digest and plan.

Determine what tools you will need for the meeting and then check with your venue what equipment they will be providing. High quality meeting and events rooms will often provide the latest audio-visual and presentation equipment, so make sure you’re on the same page and know what to expect.

With proper planning, quarterly meetings can meet your company’s objectives, enabling managers to successfully assess results and realign strategies and goals. The process will keep the executive team better informed of the various departments’ activities and progress, ensuring everyone is aligned towards the company’s long-term success strategy.