Face-to-Face conferences
To meet face-to-face with staff member, students, and administrative superiors is a worthwhile expenditure of time. Obviously there should be something of importance to discuss to merit a conference.
The purpose of such meetings is to talk in an environment that is conducive to the sharing of intimate thoughts without the presence of other on lookers.
A personal conference should take place in a relaxed, friendly, and private atmosphere. It is a good situation for the discussion of unpleasant assignments, lack of success in assigned tasks, misunderstandings as to delegated duties, quarrels between individuals, poor facilities for certain activities, failure to receive promotions, and future salaries and working conditions.
Goals and objectives, the future of the department, personal evaluations, analysis of a staff member’s shortcomings, and changes in assignments are also topics worthy of face-to-face conferences.
If the conference is with a student, the topic may well be his/her future employment, the reasons for getting poor grades, failure to perform as expected, changes in living quarters, discontentment because of poor food, and similar subjects.
Regardless of the topic, the administrator should remain calm and should present an attitude of helpfulness and concern. Emphasis should be on the positive, and the effort should be to solve the problems.
It is often worthwhile to take notes on the meeting and, if necessary, to make an appointment for further discussion in an effort to reach a solution. Records of personal agreements arrived at in the conference are important.
In some cases, individuals involved may be misquoted on important subjects, and it is good to have documentation of what has been said.
In some instances, administrators consider one or two meetings per year with each individual staff member a necessary function of management. This is a good idea, but in a large department, it may not be practical.
Students are generally assigned to counsellors who help them with the registration process and then meet with them again if they are having problems or need help with their next step in the educational process.
It is important to have access to a computer programmed for each student. Computer-assisted systems provide the counsellor and the student with information such as courses taken, grades earned, test scores, and progress toward graduation.
The counsellor will usually stay with the student for more than the freshman year, and they will have many personal conferences.
This does depend to a degree on the level of their education. The higher students are on the educational totem pole, the more they will have conferences with faculty members concerning their progress and their future.
