Daily Standup Meetings: 7 Best Practices

A daily standup meeting is a simple and effective way of getting your team on the same page and firing on all cylinders.

But your teammates aren’t going to appreciate having a meeting on their calendar every day unless it adds real value.

Read on to discover the do’s and don’ts of running a daily standup meeting to make sure you’re getting the most from this powerful productivity tool.

What is a team standup?

A team standup – also known as a daily scrum meeting – is a meeting where teammates take turns to share a quick status update.

How long is a standup meeting?

Standups are usually short and sweet. The point of them is to make sure each member of a team knows what their colleagues are working on, not get into long discussions. That’s where the name “standup” comes from – they should be over so fast you can hold them standing up without needing to take a seat.

What do you say in a standup meeting?

Everyone involved in a standup meeting should share:

• What they’ve done since the last meeting.
• What they’re going to be doing until the next meeting.
• Any blockers holding them back from being able to complete their current tasks.
• Anything that could impact their teammates’ ability to complete their tasks.
• What they’ll be moving on to when they’ve finished their current project.

Try Assembly today to make async and in-person standups as streamlined as possible.

How do you run a team standup?

Get the most from your daily standup meetings by sticking to these tried and tested do’s and don’ts: 

Keep it small

Standups work best when they’re short and sweet. And that’s never going to happen if half your company is on the invite list. 

As a rule of thumb, a standup should only ever last 15 minutes. If it’s taking longer than that for everyone involved to share a quick update on what they’ve done, what they’re going to do, and what’s blocking them, then it’s time to start thinking about ways you can split them into smaller groups. 

Pick the right cadence

It makes sense for some teams to meet daily, for some to meet weekly, and for some to meet fortnightly. It all depends on the type of project you’re working on and how many hours a week you're working on the project you’re meeting about.

Meet too often and you’ll waste your teammates’ time. Don’t meet often enough and your project is liable to go off the rails. Experiment with the right cadence for your standups for the best results.

Set it in stone

It’s crucial that you set your huddles in stone in each attendees’ calendar once you’ve settled on the right cadence for them. Standups don’t work if your teammates only turn up to them when they feel like it or think they can spare the time. So, make it clear that your team needs to consider your standups a must-attend meeting. Otherwise things are bound to unravel. 

Book a demo of Assembly to make it easy for your team to set up daily standup meetings. 

Ask people to come prepared

Your standup meetings aren’t going to be particularly helpful to anyone involved if your teammates don’t come prepared to share a quick status update. So, be sure to ask each attendee to spend a few minutes before each standup gathering information around the three main things they need to cover: what they’ve done since the last meeting, what they’re working on now, and what blockers are holding them back. 

Your standups will be a lot more effective if everyone involved spends just a few minutes preparing. Create a daily standup workflow with Assembly to make preparing for standups as easy as possible for your team.

Don’t get into the weeds

The purpose of a daily standup is to get everyone attending up to speed on what’s going on across a whole project and make sure any potential blockers are removed. It’s not the time or place to dive into details. Things should stay high-level, and in-depth discussions should be saved for a separate meeting outside this update.

Try Assembly to make arranging and running standups as easy as possible.

Follow the leader

Standups can easily get derailed. So, it’s crucial that someone is always in charge of keeping things on track and making sure everyone shares a clear and concise status update. While the team leader might default to being in charge of a standup, rotating who takes the reins can be a good way to boost engagement during the meetings and give employees looking for more responsibility a chance to step up.

Don’t drift off when it’s someone else’s turn to speak

The whole point of a standup is to get to grips with what’s going on across the project you’re working on. If you zone out when your teammates are sharing their status updates or spend that time thinking about what you’re going to say during yours, you're going to miss important details. That’s why properly preparing for each huddle is so important – it frees you up to actually engage with what your teammates are saying.

Hit all these marks during your standup meetings with your team to go beyond just standing up with additional employee incentive programs. Get started today by setting up and answering a daily standup with Assembly.