If you could control meeting participants’ behavior, commitment, and motivation, it would be an easy world. But, those are out of your control. In fact, the only thing you can control during a meeting is its structure and your own behavior, says Marvin Weisbord and Sandra Janoff in their book, Don’t Just Do Something, Stand There! Ten Principles for Leading Meetings That Matter (Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc, July 2007).

“Exercise maximal control before the meeting (e.g., your role, participants, agenda, and time),” say the authors. “During the meeting, control only those few things needed to keep people working on task.” They offer these guidelines to follow before and during the meeting:

Know your role: Process only: your role is simply to observe and comment. Process and meeting management: your responsibility is centered on structure rather than content. Process and content: you have influence over goals, time frames, and agendas, but another person runs the meeting. Process, content, and meeting management: you assume a great deal of responsibility for process, content, and outcomes.

Once you determine your role in the meeting, the authors suggest that you let other participants know before or at the beginning of the meeting.

Clarify your meeting purpose – for yourself. Make sure that the purpose makes sense to you, what the output will be, and if it is achievable in the time frame you have available. “Whether you plan for 10 people or 1,000, the first question to ask is, “Why? What is required here? Information, decisions, solutions, action plans – any or all?’” recommend the authors.

Assure participants are equal to the task. Make sure all key people are part of the meeting or you won’t succeed.

Use subgroups to differentiate and integrate views. Don’t just ask people to form small groups, advise the authors. “In our framework, we differentiate to integrate,” they say. “Integration requires that people interact across boundaries of differences made explicit, seeking to build on all their resources and needs. You can differentiate groups by function, geography, experience, and a host of other criteria.”

Plan to have each group report to the whole. Plan to have each small group not only report to the large group, but also discuss questions or respond to what they hear from other groups.

Allow enough time. The authors advise to allocate time so that people can collect their thoughts, differentiate their stakes, integrate their ideas, and make action commitments.

Choose healthy working conditions. “Make it easy for people to hear, see, interact, and move around,” say the authors. Consider environment, lighting (outdoor light is the best), acoustics, snacks, accessibility, and sustainability.