The keys to a successful HOA board meeting is careful planning and efficient execution. Board members must be able to conduct a meeting in such a way that everyone feels they benefited from being there. Therefore, if you want to conduct a productive meeting, follow these tips below:
1. Pick the Best Time for Everyone to Meet
Consider changing the time of your board meeting from the typical weekday evening to the morning daylight hours or even on a Saturday. Evening hours are less conducive to effective decision making because everyone has had a long day at work. Scheduling your board meeting during the weekend may allow for higher attendance and more effective discussions, as well as more thoughtful decision making.
2. Have an Agenda
A detailed agenda will clearly organize your meeting and set expectations of what is to be discussed. Holding a meeting without an agenda may derail your objectives or cause you to stay longer than necessary to address an issue. It is important to remind board members that these meetings are meant to make decisions on various important topics and that getting off topic will hinder this accomplishment. An agenda keeps these moving while helping board members make important decisions.
3. Don’t Crowd the Meeting with Too Many Topics
There is only so much information your board or members can digest in one sitting. Therefore, pick your topics wisely and don’t crowd the meeting with too many ‘big decision’ topics. Not everything has to be addressed in a single meeting.
4. Demonstrate Strong Leadership
The board president must be able to guide everyone in the room and have the courage to make hard decisions while facilitating healthy discussions. All board members must be able to demonstrate strong leadership when conflicts arise or when there are differences in opinion about certain issues. Board members are elected because of these leadership qualities.
5. Take Notes & Keep Meeting Minutes
Assign one individual to keep detailed meeting minutes so when questions arise, they can easily be referenced at a later time or quickly answered near the end of the meeting without launching into another discussion about the topic. You can also share these notes with your property management company whenever they include your PM’s responsibilities.
Taking prior meeting minutes to precede board meetings is also helpful, as these can be provided to other board members or owners as a reference as opposed to having a second discussion at a second meeting about the same topic. This is often a requirement of HOA meetings, so it is helpful to have clear roles established and not spend time during the meeting deciding on this task.
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Gassen can help you manage your HOA. We offer comprehensive reserve studies, local property management, and accounting for all property owners and organizations. We can help you protect your HOA with the right tools.
To schedule an initial consultation, call us at 952-922-5575, or you can message us on our contact page.