Creating Meetings

Creating and Managing Meetings

Effective meetings are crucial for team alignment and progress. Elairo provides robust tools to schedule, manage, and optimize your team's meetings, from quick stand-ups to strategic planning sessions. This guide will walk you through creating various types of meetings, setting up recurring series, and leveraging templates.

Scheduling a New Meeting

You can schedule a new meeting quickly and easily within Elairo.

1. Navigate to Meetings: From the main navigation, click on "Meetings." This will take you to your meeting overview.

2. Initiate New Meeting: Click the + New Meeting button, usually located in the top right corner of the Meetings page.

3. Enter Meeting Details:

   • Meeting Title: Provide a clear and concise title (e.g., "Weekly Sync - Marketing," "Q3 Planning Session").

   • Description/Purpose: Briefly explain the meeting's objective. This helps attendees prepare.

   • Date & Time: Select the start and end date/time. You can manually enter or use the calendar picker.

   • Time Zone: Ensure the correct time zone is selected, especially for distributed teams.

   • Attendees: Start typing the names of team members or teams. Elairo will suggest users from your User Management. Select all required participants.

   • Location/Conference Link: Specify a physical location or paste a link to your video conferencing tool (e.g., Zoom, Google Meet).

   • Add Agenda (Optional but Recommended): Click "Add Agenda" to start outlining discussion points. See Agendas & Action Items for more details.

4. Save Meeting: Click Schedule Meeting or Save to finalize the creation. All attendees will receive a notification and a calendar invite if you have Calendar Integration set up.

Tip: A well-defined purpose and agenda significantly increase meeting effectiveness.

Creating Recurring Meeting Series

For regular meetings like weekly stand-ups, monthly reviews, or quarterly planning, creating a recurring series saves time and ensures consistency.

1. Follow Steps 1-3 from "Scheduling a New Meeting."

2. Enable Recurrence: Locate the "Repeat" or "Recurrence" option, usually near the date and time selectors.

3. Configure Recurrence Pattern:

   • Frequency: Choose how often the meeting repeats (e.g., daily, weekly, monthly, yearly).

   • Interval: Specify the interval (e.g., "Every 1 week," "Every 2 weeks").

   • Day(s) of the Week: For weekly meetings, select the specific day(s).

   • End Date: Choose when the series should end:

     • Never: The meeting will recur indefinitely.

     • After X occurrences: The series will stop after a set number of meetings.

     • On date: The series will stop on a specific date.

4. Review and Save: Double-check all details, then click Schedule Meeting or Save.

Best Practice: Keep recurring meeting series consistent with their original purpose. If a meeting's objective changes significantly, consider creating a new series.

Designing Meeting Templates

Meeting templates streamline the creation of common meeting types by pre-filling standard details like titles, attendees, and agenda items. This is particularly useful for recurring or standardized meetings across different teams.

1. Navigate to Meeting Templates: From the Meetings section, look for a "Templates" tab or a Manage Templates option.

2. Create New Template: Click + New Template.

3. Define Template Details:

   • Template Name: Give your template a descriptive name (e.g., "Weekly Team Sync Template," "1-on-1 Review Template").

   • Default Title: Enter a placeholder title that will auto-fill (e.g., "Weekly Team Sync - [Team Name]").

   • Default Description: Add a standard description or purpose statement.

   • Default Attendees: Pre-select common attendees or roles.

   • Default Agenda Items: Outline standard agenda points. You can leave space for specific topics to be added later (e.g., "Team Updates," "Blockers," "Next Steps").

   • Location/Conference Link: Add a default link if applicable.

4. Save Template: Click Save Template.

Using a Meeting Template: When scheduling a new meeting, you'll now have an option to "Use a Template." Select your desired template, and its predefined details will populate the meeting form, which you can then customize for the specific instance.

One-on-One (1-on-1) Meetings

Elairo facilitates focused one-on-one meetings between managers and team members, crucial for performance and development.

1. Standard Creation: You can create 1-on-1s using the standard "Scheduling a New Meeting" process, inviting only the two participants.

2. Dedicated 1-on-1 Features (if available): Some Elairo configurations offer dedicated 1-on-1 sections with integrated features like:

   • Private notes only visible to the two participants.

   • Pre-populated discussion points related to Development Plans or Performance Reviews.

   • Automated prompts for feedback or goal progress updates.

3. Recurring 1-on-1s: It's highly recommended to set up 1-on-1s as a recurring series to ensure consistent check-ins.

Tip: For 1-on-1s, encourage both participants to add agenda items before the meeting. This promotes mutual ownership and ensures critical topics are covered. Refer to Agendas & Action Items for more on collaborative agenda setting.