Too many meetings end up being time-consuming and unproductive. How can you hold effective meetings that produce good results? The answer is in better meeting management.

Meredith Schneider, writing on the Hive.com blog, provides several suggestions to help you manage your meetings more effectively.  Here are her top five tips:

• Determine whether to have the meeting. The simplest way to reduce meeting time is to determine whether a meeting is even necessary. Before scheduling a meeting, ask yourself if it’s the best way to handle the issue, or whether it can be dealt with one-on-one or via email.
• Limit the number of attendees. Not every team member needs to attend every meeting. By curating the attendance list, you are ensuring meeting participants benefit from it.
• Be guided by an agenda. Writing an agenda to guide your meeting ensures you stick to the specific issues you want to discuss while also keeping everyone to a set schedule.
• Have a designated note-taker. A productive meeting should result in a written record of what was discussed and decided. Designate a note-taker who can compile an overview of what is said.
• Give every attendee a platform. Since you have curated your attendee list, those who are participating in your meeting have something valuable to offer. Allow each participant the time to add their thoughts and questions to your discussion.

Read more at 7 Tips for Effective Meeting Management.