How to prepare for meetings?

翻译:邱敦莲(英译中)

From: http://www.knowledgebase-script.com/demo/article-236.html

If there is one activity that unites professionals from different occupations all over the world, it is meetings. Executives, managers, or software developers, they all spend a large part of their working hours closeted in conference rooms discussing issues, significant and insignificant.

如果说有一种活动能够将全世界各个行业的专业人士联合起来，那就是会议。总裁、总经理、软件开发人员都会花费大量的工作时间关在会议室里讨论问题，不管是重要的还是不重要的。

But the truth about meetings is they are largely a waste of time if not organized well or not planned in advance. Here are some tips to help you get the best out of these congregations.

但是，事实是，如果会议组织不当或者没有预先好好计划，则会浪费大量的时间。这里，我给大家讲一讲组织会议的一些绝窍，有助于你们让这类聚会发挥其最大的作用。

Time and venue 时间和地点

The initiator of the meeting must take up the task of sending out meeting requests to all parties who are required to attend, specifying the date, time and venue. If the meeting is a teleconference or a videoconference with participants from multiple locations, it is essential that the meeting request contain the date and time of the various time zones. This is a common mistake, as a colleague in Tokyo found out when she forgot to specify the time zone in her e-mail, which meant that disparate groups of people were waiting for her to teleconference them at different times of the day!

会议的发起人必须负责将会议要求发到参加会议的有关各方，说明会议召开的日期、时间、地点。如果是电话会议或者视频会议，参会人员往往位于不同的地方，会议通知还必须标明各个时区的日期和时间。这是一个常犯的错误。日本东京的一位同事发现，她忘了在邮件中说明各个时区的开会时间，结果意味着不同时区的几组人员在当天的不同时间等待她召开电话会议。

The initiator must ensure a discussion room or conference room large enough to hold the requisite number of attendees is booked for the scheduled time.

发起人必须确保预定好能够容纳所有参会人员的讨论室或者会议室。

Material 资料

It is also up to the initiator to arrange for any materials such as a projector, computer, slides, handouts, or even just a whiteboard and markers. A manager at a telecommunications firm narrates how a meeting he was invited to was delayed by 45 minutes because the computer and projectors were not set up, leading to senior managers walking out and requesting a reschedule.

会议发起人应负责安排投影仪、电脑、幻灯机、讲义甚至白板、记号笔等物品和资料。一位电信公司的经理讲述了一次会议被推迟45分钟的经历：由于电脑和投影仪没有设置好，导致高级经理离开会场，并要求重新安排会议。

If you are invited to a meeting for which handouts are distributed, make sure you read those notes before attending. It will keep you in tune with the discussions once you are part of the meeting, and will demonstrate your preparedness with ideas and thoughts on the topic at hand.

如果邀请参加的会议需要向与会人员分发讲义，确保参会前仔细阅读了这些提示。讲义可以使你与会议讨论合拍，同时，你的一些思想和观点表明你对这个主题作了充分的准备。

Agenda 会议日程

Once the time and venue of the meeting is fixed, it is vital that the initiator of the meeting decide the points on the agenda. Each of these points must be covered in detail and decisions taken on them before the meeting wraps up.

一旦确定了会议时间和地点，会议发起人必须确定会议日程的要点。每个要点都必须详细地涵盖，并且在会议结束前作出决议。

Preferably, these points can even be enumerated in brief on the whiteboard in the room, allowing everyone to be aware of the agenda and helping the initiator keep an eye on it at all times.

较好的做法是，在会议室的白板上简明地列出会议日程的几个要点，让与会的每个人都知晓会议日程，并且有助于会议发起人能够随时看到。

Minutes of the meeting 会议备忘录

In the duration of the meeting, several points and ideas will be thrown up which, if not documented, will evaporate into thin air well before the end. It will be impossible for anyone to retain all the discussed points in memory. Therefore, it is best for the initiator or the meeting-in-charge to appoint one person to jot down notes during the meeting. It is better still if two or three people take notes just in case one misses out something important. At the culmination of the meeting, it is the duty of the person assigned to note down the minutes to create a document and circulate it amongst all attendees. Such a document typically contains the date and time of the meeting, number and names of attendees, the agenda and, against each of the points on the agenda, the action items.

开会期间，参与人员会抛出某些观点和思想，如果不进行记录，会议结束前这些观点和思想就会消失在空气之中。不可能每个人都能将所有讨论的观点全记在大脑之中。因此，会议发起方或者负责会议的一方最好安排一个人记录会议要点。当然，如果由两人或者三人进行记录会更好，这样可以避免遗漏掉重要的内容。会议进入高潮时，被安排人员要作会议记录，然后制作会议文件，并在所有与会人员之间传阅。这类会议文件一般包括会议的日期、时间、与会人数和与会人员的名单、会议的议事日程、针对会议日程上的每一点的具体内容，以及行动项。

The focus on agenda 重点是会议日程

Often, despite maintaining an agenda and adhering strictly to time and schedule on a few points, the discussion deteriorates into heated debates. At this point, it is the prerogative of the meeting-in-charge or the initiator to ensure an objective discussion. Also, if a member starts rambling for hours without any end in sight, he must be brought back on track. It should be made clear that although brainstorming is acceptable, digression into irrelevant territory is entirely unwelcome.

往往虽然有议事日程，并且会议严格地遵守了议事日程所规定的时间和时间安排，但是，会议讨论最终演变成了激烈的争辩。这时，负责会议的一方或者会议发起人要行使其权利，确保进行客观的讨论。同时，如果某个成员唠叨了数小时还不见有停的情形，必须想办法让他回到正题上来。尽管头脑风暴法是可取的，但是，必须明确，偏离正题进行不相干的讨论是完全不受欢迎的。

Conclusion 结论

When all points on the agenda have been discussed to the satisfaction of all parties, the person writing the minutes or even the initiator can wrap up by briefly reading out the salient points of all that has been discussed, including action to be taken once people return to their work. The minutes of the meeting is a good starting point to follow up with team members in the following days if necessary action has been taken, as discussed.

对议程规定的各项内容进行讨论后，参会各方均表示满意，这时，负责写备忘录的人或者发起人可以简要地宣读经过讨论后的要点，包括会议各方回到各自的工作岗位以后要采取的行动。如果以后按照讨论采取了必要的行动，那么，会议备忘录是团队成员今后遵循的良好开端（please tell me the better translation for this sentence）。

 

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