Meeting fatigue is a thing in the cohousing business. This is why in The Reef we have the following guidelines for plenary meetings:
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Plenary meetings are mostly for information sharing (very important, complex topics) and for decision-making. They are not meant to be used as a talk shop, e.g. for just a consultation (we use Edgeryders for this).
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Following a recommendation from our coach, proposals that are put on the agenda need to be pre-cooked and ideally ready to be consented to in a fairly short amount of time.
To facilitate the latter, people who are preparing a proposal can do the following:
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To make your life easier: if you need input about what people think about a certain issue, create a post and ask people to react.
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To shorten the “questions for clarification round”: ask for a review, ideally including by somebody who is not on your team, to make sure that the proposal is clear and complete.
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To shorten the “thoughts and concerns” round: post the proposal well in advance ahead of a plenary and ask for reactions. Where necessary set up a bilateral conversation or an online meeting so as to better understand the concerns. Address the concerns before the bringing the proposal to a plenary.