5 Questions to Ask During Your Next Team Meeting

Communication is key within any business, but especially for a close-working team. For a team to stay on target, it is important to establish a consistent frequency of meetings on the same day, same time, with an expected flow to the meeting to keep everyone on the same page. Some teams meet daily, some don’t meet at all.

But a monthly meeting should be held – at the very least – to keep a pulse on the activities and mindset of your team. You can decide on the frequency necessary for your team meetings to keep your team oriented around the goals & priorities of tasks needed to push the business forward.

Question 1: Can we identify & eliminate any waste in a process that doesn’t add value?

The goal here is to simplify the standardized process for running the machine & improve those processes to make them easier and more streamlined for everyone.

You want to make sure that important activities aren’t delayed or output with a poor quality due to a faulty system or procedure. What makes the machine break down? Identify poor quality when it occurs, investigate the root cause and solve the problem immediately so that production can continue. Any process can be improved and it should be your goal to improve them. If there are several unnecessary (or unclear!) steps to completing a task, it could be decreasing efficiency and increasing risk for your team.

Is everyone on the team/ business following the core processes and if not, what can you do to improve them or address the issue? You’ll want to make sure your team members focus on quality and are not backtracking or bottlenecking in their work. The first step in tackling this issue is to make sure all systems are documented, job responsibilities are clear, then assess if those systems and responsibilities need to be further simplified into bite size pieces.

You’ll want to ensure that for more complex tasks, that your team is only doing 1 step of the task at a time…the more complex, the higher the margin for error. Eliminating any waste in a process that doesn’t add value can declutter & simplify the process, and ultimately help minimize mistakes.

Question 2: Are our priorities matching up to our goals?

Does every member of your team know your/the business’s priorities and goals? It is important that your staff is clear on the tasks, documents, systems, and clients (if applicable) that take precedence to better align the team to its goals. If your team isn’t familiar with the goals of the business, drill them! Post the goals on the wall. Review them daily with your team. Goals move the business forward – and if your team isn’t familiar with them, they have no direction for their work.

Once everyone is familiar with these goals and can sort their priorities accordingly, analyze if it is working well for everyone to hold fast to these goals. You might also ask your team, if they have any goals that they believe the business should set for next week/month.

Question 3: What weaknesses and strengths did we discover this last week (or month) that we can improve for next week (or month)?

This will get your team thinking – let them think on this one for a few minutes if they need to. You’ll want to make sure that your team members are placed in positions on the team that allow their strengths to shine… so are they? This will help you gauge how everyone is doing as a whole unit and individually. The strengths are always wins for the team, and the weaknesses can also be wins for the team if everyone learns from them for the future.

When you allow everyone to be a part of the solution, the no longer feel like the “problem.” Allowing the whole team to share weaknesses they’ve encountered helps everyone think of a solution together, and mastermind on how to improve the whole team in the future.

Question 4: What obstacles and opportunities did we experience this last week (or month)?

When considering the obstacles, you’ll want to follow up with your team to see if they may need any guidance from you to avoid similar obstacles in the future. For any obstacle that your team brings up, ask them how the team can respond in a positive way in the future to risk or that objection – this will continue to keep them a part of the solution process. (Role playing objection handling can also be a valuable tool for your staff to use in their day to day activities!)

When considering the opportunities, consider if there are any resources you may need to replace or add to the budget to increase efficiency (computers, technology, resources, etc.) to provide better opportunities for your staff. Is there anything more that you can do for your team to provide them with the training and networking opportunities they need to complete a process or hit a goal?

Question 5: From the feedback that we have received, are we satisfying customers and is there anything we can do to improve their experience and increase our 5-star reviews?

Reviews, reviews, reviews! Visibility and reviews on social platforms can be high income producing venues. Learn from the bad reviews and boost the good reviews. You may also need to revisit your Operations Manual & adjust it accordingly if a system needs to be improved upon to satisfy customers. Satisfying customers should be the entire scope of your business, since customers keep the business in business – treat their feedback like gold!

Does your team lack good reviews and what can be done to increase that review count across your platforms? Maybe you can hold a team contest to try to obtain more reviews or visibility online, or have your team brainstorm some new ideas on increasing the 5-star reviews. Are daily social proofs being completed on your platforms with various testimonials, market tips, value offerings to clients to show that your team is the expert if the field? This can be a great way for you to share the good reviews from the satisfied customers.

Asking these questions in your next team meeting will orient your staff to stay on track to the goals of your business and help launch your business to the next level!

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