Practicing what I teach

Chairing meetings is only for some individuals. This is what I used to think. I didn’t count myself among those who could lead or facilitate meetings for many years. That’s why I didn’t force myself to practice it. On the other hand, I enjoyed working behind the scenes on assignments given to me.

Five months ago, I was assigned to be a part of a team designing a course called “Chairing an Effective Meeting”. When I started working on it, I had no particular interest in the subject, but after a while, I saw how vital it is for many people, including myself, to learn how to chair meetings.

One day, for another project, our team had to organise a workshop with primary school teachers to review a course we made for them on ‘Learning through Play’. We were supposed to work in groups, and I was assigned to chair one of these groups. Even though it was a small group, I panicked since chairing was an unusual experience for me.

But, because of the course I was developing, I knew the tips and tricks for running a workshop. I felt that it was now time to put theory into practice. And that’s what I say to myself: “Now that you’ve been given a platform, it’s your turn to embrace the challenge and overcome your shyness.”

Next, I opened the course “Chairing an Effective Meeting” as a learner and went through it, page by page, as if I did not contribute anything to its development. I was delighted by what I was learning from this course! There were so many details that I used to ignore. I never cared much about the pre-preparation of the meeting; I used to think only of time, location, subject, and if there would be a yummy lunch.

However, the course deepens its content and forbids learners to jump into the execution of the meeting. It calls to invest in the preparation of a meeting by creating a great agenda, mastering the content, inviting the right participants, making seating arrangements, etc. It doesn’t end there. The course also advises the chair of the meetings to pay attention to the social aspect of the meeting, such as icebreakers or other activities to bond participants quickly.

Dear reader, I can’t merge the whole course on this page. However, I’ve seen the necessity of a well-trained and confident chair who can handle different personalities, stick to the agenda, and assign roles to other people like minute takers and timekeepers to create an enjoyable and productive meeting. On the contrary, badly managed meetings are boring and mostly result in chaos.

Now, back to the conclusion of my first facilitation workshop: honestly, I was nervous, but I tried to apply what I learned from the course, and it worked. I was well prepared and gave chance to the participants to contribute fully. It ended up being fun and productive. I still need to be exposed to chairing many meetings to master the skills fully, but now I don’t panic anymore as I used to.

The good news is the course will be available on our website soon, it is almost finished. We want external reviewers to examine if the content matches the needs of the end users.

Are you interested in joining us in the completion of this course?

Please send an email to info@threemountains.academy and we will send you a review link.

Gisele Iradukunda