Dos and don'ts for leadership: Hold effective staff meetings

Every practice needs to create opportunities for departments to work together and exchange ideas. Morning meetings and monthly staff meetings serve this important purpose. Daily meetings are a chance to review the day's activities, while monthly team meetings should be reserved for discussing office policies and areas for improvement

Prepare for the meeting. Develop an agenda before each meeting, and post it to give the team time to prepare questions and comments. Staff members will appreciate seeing that the meeting is organized.

Don't get in the habit of canceling meetings. Many practices start off having staff meetings only to abandon them as time goes on, feeling they aren't necessary. These are generally the same practices where the staff members are stressed because they feel they don't know what is going on.