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Agendas
and Minutes | Letters to the Editor | Newsletter Articles | Notices and
Posters | News Releases | Petitions
| People work in groups to
accomplish what they cannot achieve individually. Parents band together to
run a softball league. Service club members raise money to fund a
multicultural festival. Citizens join a riding association to try to get a
candidate elected to the House of Commons. No individual could accomplish
these tasks single-handedly. It usually takes many
meetings to turn the group's goals into achievements. In political campaigns,
for example, meetings will certainly be held weekly; some of the key people
will meet daily. Over a five- or six-week campaign, that's a lot of meetings.
More commonly, volunteer groups will meet monthly, although there will
probably be committee meetings for smaller teams to work on projects such as
fund-raising or membership drives. Volunteer groups are democratic organizations. Most groups will have
a constitution and a set of bylaws. The constitution spells out the rules the
group will follow and the roles of the executive members (usually a minimum
of a president, vice-president, secretary, and treasurer). The proceedings of the meetings are usually based on parliamentary
procedure, often variations of Robert's Rules of Order, published by Henry M.
Robert in 1876. These meetings function most efficiently when everyone
understands the basic procedures. The use of agendas, parliamentary rules for
meetings, and the keeping of written minutes help democratic groups
accomplish their goals. Imagine you've just agreed to serve on the Board of Directors for
the Niagara Youth Concert Band (NYCB). What can you expect? Before you attend
your first meeting, the secretary of the NYCB will probably send you a copy
of the constitution and bylaws. If you don't receive these materials, ask for
them and read them through. You are legally responsible for adhering to them.
The secretary will also send you a copy of the agenda for the
upcoming meeting. The agenda serves more than one function for the group. Its
principal use is to indicate the business the organization wants to
accomplish at the next meeting. But it also serves as a reminder to
individual group members of work they must do before the meeting, if the
group is to make progress toward its goals. As is true of so much of the writing in our lives, there are no
absolute rules for agendas, or how they are created. The chair of a committee
or the president of an organization usually sets the agenda, although the
group's secretary often does the typing and mailing of the agenda. The
agenda's main use is to help the group conduct its business in a timely,
effective, and democratic way by delineating the tasks under discussion and
thus, by implication, what is off topic for the meeting. But most groups will also make the agenda a permanent record in the
minutes book, a record that the group keeps as a kind of memory more reliable
than the recollections of participants. Records can save time for groups by
allowing them to follow prior successful procedures rather than constantly
inventing new ones. Groups vary, too, in when they give their members a copy of the
agenda. When agendas are distributed depends at least partly on when and how
the agenda is set. Some of the agenda will represent tasks that were not
completed before or at the last meeting. New topics for discussion or actions
to be taken, though, may come from group members as well as the president,
and members may think them up after the last meeting. This has led some
groups to follow a procedure of asking members to phone, fax or e-mail agenda
items to the president or secretary a week or two weeks before the next
scheduled meeting. Even so, some groups will distribute the agenda at the
next meeting, while-more commonly-other groups will mail the agenda to group
members a week before the next meeting. In this way, the agenda is another
reminder of the date of the next meeting and of any work members still need
to do. Look at the agenda that came in the mail (figure 1). As you glance
over the agenda, you may see language that is unfamiliar. To gain familiarity
with the content of an agenda, examine some of what happened at that meeting
on the fourteenth. When you arrived at the library, a sign directed you to
the LaMarsh meeting room. Inside the room, you saw a long table. In each
place, there was a small plastic name-holder, including one with your name on
it. You were enjoying a chat with the person sitting next to you, Nick Bunch,
when John Luck—whose name card identified him as president—called the meeting
to order: "It's exactly 7:30, and I call this meeting to order." You noticed that the secretary, Linda Rogers, who was seated to the
left of the president, was looking at each person around the table and seemed
to be recording the names of those attending the meeting. Then she asked if anyone
needed a copy of the minutes of the meeting of November 28. You asked for a
copy, and then joined the other directors in reading the minutes of the
previous meeting. After a few minutes, President Luck asked, "Would someone move
the approval of the minutes?" "Just before we do that," said Keith Durkell, "I want
to suggest that we correct the figure for our sales at the Book Sale. We sold
$34,000, not $3400." "Right. Are there any other corrections?" asked President
Luck. "I second that," said Nick Bunch. "All in favour?" said John Luck. All the directors raised
their hands. "Carried. Let's move on to the reports. Could you make the
Treasurer's Report for us, Keith?" You glance at your agenda and notice
Keith's name in parentheses beside the "Treasurer's Report" item on
the agenda. "Certainly," said Keith Durkell, distributing a
spreadsheet showing this year's financial transactions. "Most of the
players have paid their fees. We've paid for the new music and the annual
rent for our rehearsal space. There are no unpaid bills. You can read the
details on the spreadsheet. Our balance is $10,322.35." "I move that we approve the treasurer's report," said
Alleyene Quarter. "Seconded," said Kathy Ganapathy. "All in favour?" asked John Luck, looking around at the
raised hands. "Carried. Thank you, Keith, for looking after the finances
for us. We're in good shape this year." The procedure was much the same for the next two reports. You
noticed that the secretary seemed to be the hardest working person at the
meeting. She took notes constantly as the other directors spoke. "Is there any correspondence to report?" asked John Luck. "We have a letter from the Niagara Parks Commission," said
Linda Rogers, "I don't think I need to take the time to read it aloud.
They just say that they will not be scheduling summer concerts at the
Queenston Heights Bandshell until January." "That's plenty early," said John Luck. "All right,
we're making good time tonight. Let's go on to matters arising from the
previous minutes. The first item on this part of the agenda is the exorbitant
rent we are paying to the school board. It would be great to find a less
expensive practice venue. What can we do?" "I don't think this is something we can solve here
tonight," said Irene Silken, "but I would certainly like to find a
cheaper practice space. Perhaps we could strike a committee to investigate
different places, such as church halls or the Optimist Club's building."
"I think we should stick to public buildings. If we rent a hall
from any particular denomination, some of our players might feel odd about
playing in someone else's place of worship," said Linda Rogers. "Nobody's going to care about that," someone called out. "I can see that this is not going to be anything we can resolve
quickly," said John Luck. "How would members feel about striking a
committee to gather information and report on this at our next meeting?"
"I move that a rehearsal space committee be established,"
said Kathy Ganapathy. "I second that," said Nick Bunch. "That's
fine by me," said Kathy Ganapathy. " I withdraw my motion and
second Irene's." The amended motion was carried and it was agreed that those
interested would stay a few minutes after the board meeting to apportion the
work and set a time to meet. You've seen enough of this meeting to get a feeling for how a chair
moves along a meeting that follows parliamentary procedure and the role the
agenda plays in helping group members conduct their business in a, well,
businesslike fashion. After all of the business on the agenda had been
concluded, Nick Bunch moved, and Kathy Ganapathy seconded, a motion to
adjourn. You decided to try to help find a less expensive practice hall, so
you went over to where the new committee members were sitting down. Take a look at the minutes that secretary Linda Rogers wrote for
this meeting (figure 2). Every group
records minutes uniquely, but underneath the surface differences, there is a
common core: Good minutes aim to allow members to learn from past successes
and failures and to plan to fulfil commitments made for the next meeting. To
create effective content, then, for minutes, the minute-taker tries to
accurately set down the most important points of discussion and the action
decisions made by the group. Group members need this information to do their
jobs. There is no one way to organize minutes of meetings, but there are
some widely observed conventions. It's important to identify the nature of
the document right at the top where it can be spotted immediately by a
reader. It's logical to include the title Minutes, the name of the group, and
when the meeting took place. Most groups also record in the minutes who
attended the meeting, and who was absent. If you know you must miss a
meeting, call the minute taker and express your regrets. It's important
information: Those absent will need to catch up on what occurred, and many
groups will remove a board member who misses some designated number of
meetings, especially if the absences are unexcused. Usually before considering the business scheduled for the meeting,
members will check to determine that the record of the last meeting is
accurate. After this, the order of events of the agenda may vary and, thus,
the order of the minutes. It is common to deal first with reports because
that can often be done quickly so members are still fresh when they reach the
most important items of the meeting. New business tends to be scheduled
later; often, it will be referred to the agenda of the next meeting because
members have neither the time nor the preparation to deal with it adequately
when it is first raised. There
is one other convention that some groups follow. Some recorders format the
minutes so that there is a column at the right margin. In that column, the
record shows the name of the person(s) charged with taking the action
indicated in the motion. This method of organizing minutes makes it easier
for members to quickly remind themselves of the work to be done. There are even fewer conventions about the appearance of the minutes
documents. The keyboarder of the sample minutes uses block capitals, bolding,
and sub-points to make it easy for readers to tell at a glance the information
in each part of the minutes. A minute taker who creates documents with
consistent use of these embellishments creates minutes that will be
increasingly easy for members to use. Examining the relationship between the simulated meeting and the
minutes for it will help you learn the principles of agenda creation and
minute keeping. When you join a group, you will want to see how they create
agendas and keep their minutes, but you will find it easy to follow if you've
studied this example. Later in this section, there is an activity to further
familiarize you with the conventions of minute keeping. Some Final Tips for Participating in Meetings The
rules for making, amending, and voting on motions or resolutions are the
heart of parliamentary procedure. Those motions are the action plans of the
organization. You'll participate in groups more capably and confidently when
you understand just a few more of the conventions, conventions that are
derived from Robert's Rules of Order.
If you say, "I move that we table the motion," and someone
seconds your motion, the chair will call for an immediate vote. If the
majority of the group votes to table the amendment, it cannot be addressed
again at that meeting. If you say, "I call for the previous question," the chair
will immediately call for a vote. In most groups, the discussion ends if
two-thirds of those present vote to end the debate.
If you know this much about
parliamentary procedure, you'll be well on your way to being an effective
member of democratic decision-making groups, from minor hockey associations
to municipal government committees for the arts. Minute-taker or recording
secretary-you can really help a group by taking this role. To consolidate
your ability to take the role of minute-keeper, try this activity. Activity 1: Analyzing Minutes of Meetings Content:
Organization:
Appearance:
Answers to Activity 1: Analyzing Minutes of Meetings
Activity 2: Comparison of Agendas Ask a
friend who belongs to a community group to give you a copy of an agenda for a
meeting. Bring this to class on the day scheduled. Form a group of five
people. Have each member briefly show an agenda. Discuss the differences.
Record the features that you feel comprise the most effective agenda. Present
your findings to a meeting of the whole class. Activity 3:
Comparison of Minutes Follow the same procedure as for
"Comparison of Agendas," but find and compare copies of minutes
taken at meetings of community groups.
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