Holding a Meeting

Before doing this activity you will have to read Complementary Text 3 and Comlementary Text 4. The first text draws up a set of guidelines as to "How to hold a successful meeting". It covers the following areas: the role of the chairman, participation and administrative considerations. The second text is on some useful language for participating in meetings

You are directors of the Benson Group. Each of you plays one (or if it is necessary two) of the roles listed below. Each participant will receive his/her role from the instructor. These roles are only indicators how to proceed. You are free and encouraged to expand and change. Prepare for the meeting by studying your role-card only. The meeting will be held in the Virtual Conference Centre.

The Chief Executive will chair the meeting. Divide into 2 teams and each team should work separately coming to an independent decision. The outcome should be a consensus decision on the future strategy of Benson Group. First, the Chairman will circulate a memo to all directors several days in advance. The memo will inform about the time and place of the meeting. It will also contain brief information about the present state of the company. Also about the purpose of the meeting:

a) how Benson can improve and increase its market share and
b) what its future strategy should be. It will specify what the individual contributions will be.  

At the end the secretary is expected to produce minutes of the meeting. 

The roles of the meeting are:

Chief Executive, Deputy Chief Executive, Company Secretary, Director - Corporate Strategy, Director - Public Relations, Director - Corporate Finance, Director - Marketing, Director - Personnel and Staff Development, Secretary of the meeting