IDOARRT: Meeting Design

Every organization holds a significant number of various meetings daily. It may be information exchange meetings, team building meetings, decision-making meetings, seminars, or meetings with clients. You have probably already attended such meetings, after which you felt like the time was wasted. In terms of time and money spent, it is a huge investment that is not always profitable.

So, what can be done to get the highest benefit from the meetings?

First, it is necessary to spend some time and effort planning the meeting. This can be assisted by the IDOARRT tool.

IDOARRT is a simple tool to help you run an effective meeting or group process. The abbreviation IDOARRT stands for:

• Intention
• Desired Outcome(s)
• Agenda
• Rules
• Roles
• Time

When organizing a meeting, it is essential to work out each component before it starts. Let’s take a look at how to do this.

Questions:

• What is the intention or goal of the meeting? Why do you need it?
• Why are you and the participants there?

The intention is to answer the question "Why?".

Question:

• What specific result should have been achieved by the end of the meeting?

Understanding the expected outcomes focuses the participants and explains how and why the outcomes of the meeting will be used.

Questions:

• What steps and in what order will the group take to move towards the desired result?
• What will be the structure of the discussion?

The structure of the meeting should be chosen depending on the goal. Understanding the stages will significantly simplify the facilitation of the discussion.

Question:

• What rules will be used at the meeting?

This could be related to agreed-upon behavior or way of thinking (e.g., we want to think freely and try not to be constrained by what is possible). On the other hand, it could also include practical rules related to the physical space.

It might be worthwhile to let participants add rules to fill ownership.

Questions:

• What roles and responsibilities should be present during the discussion to ensure a smooth meeting? 
• Who facilitates and who participates? 
• Who documents and who keeps track of time? 
• What do you expect from the participants?

The effectiveness of the meeting will depend on how roles are assigned.

Questions:

• How much time will the meeting take?
• When does it start and finish, and when will the breaks be?
• Are there any deadlines that need to be taken into account?

Planning the time intervals and pauses will allow distribution of the load and rest during the discussion.

STEP 1. To create an IDOART for your meeting, you can start filling in the elements you already know. The others will follow.

STEP 2. Clarify and record the intention and desired outcome before creating your agenda in detail.

STEP 3. Fill out the agenda, rules, roles, and times. Embed iterations in the meeting design process and refine it to improve the IDOART.

STEP 4. When you have your IDOART for your meeting, you can continue to create an even more concrete structure by creating an IDOART for each element of your agenda.

STEP 5. Revisit your intention and desired outcome to make sure the structure of your meeting still aligns with the goal.

STEP 6. Present your IDOART at the beginning of the meeting. Offer participants the chance to ask questions and make suggestions for changes so everyone can agree on the plan before starting.