15 Standup Meeting Best Practices + Template

If your team wants to hold regular, clear, concise meetings that get right to the point, look no further than a standup meeting. Unsure what a standup meeting is and how to ensure they’re as productive as possible? Check out our guide on best practices.

• What is a standup meeting?
• What are the benefits of standup meetings? 
• 15 standup meeting best practices
• Free daily standup meeting template
• Revolutionize your standup meetings with Fellow

What is a standup meeting? 

A standup meeting is a short and sweet meeting that helps align teams and quickly resolve issues. Typically, this type of team meeting lasts between 10 and 30 minutes, depending on the team size and the topics on the meeting agenda.

These meetings are kept short because they aim to keep everyone focused on immediate goals and discussion points. Essentially, a stand-up meeting should help your team stay up to date, get focused, remain engaged with one another, and be motivated to help one another.

What are the benefits of standup meetings? 

When done correctly, standup meetings can provide a team with many benefits. Some of these advantages include:

• Improved collaboration and team-building
• Reduced energy drops from long meetings (like an all-hands or monthly meeting)
• Increased problem-solving roadblocks and challenges
• A better understanding of what your team is working on
• Reinforced group identity by working towards a common goal with everyone coming together and regularly discussing
• Boosted accountability across the team by checking in and providing updates

15 standup meeting best practices

As your team conducts a standup meeting, there are best practices to follow for them to be as effective and productive as possible. Check to make sure your team is following these 15 best practices and if not, check to see which ones you can implement. 

• Stick to a schedule
• Have a structure
• Watch for energy levels
• Incorporate a meeting software
• Get to the point
• Address your team
• Keep it short
• Make it fun 
• Save the solutions for later
• Include everyone in the discussion
• Try standing
• Change it up
• Have a scrum master
• Give everyone equal talking time
• Create psychological safety

1 Stick to a schedule

If the standup meeting is scheduled to begin at 10:00 am, make sure to stick to a schedule and start on time. Stress to the meeting attendees the importance of being on time for standups because they tend to be so short. Even if some people are missing, starting and ending the meeting on time is crucial. 

2 Have a structure

Your team should know what they’re walking into with every standup meeting, and they’ll know what to expect if you have a structure in place outlining what everyone will be asked to share or discuss. For instance, ask attendees to be ready to answer:

1. What did I accomplish yesterday?
2. What’s on my to-do list for today?
3. What obstacles am I facing that are holding me back from accomplishing my goals?

3 Watch for energy levels

If you’re about to start the standup meeting and you can sense a lack of motivation or willingness to be present from the team, consider beginning with a warm-up, icebreakers, or a fun exercise. Doing so will get everyone focused and alert, especially if the team is working remotely. 

4 Incorporate a meeting software 

Whether you’re a daily standup meeting expert or not, you could benefit from some assistance from a meeting software for your daily standups.

Implementing an all-in-one AI meeting transcription and management software like Fellow can help ensure the effectiveness and efficiency of your standup meetings or even automate parts of them. With Fellow, all your meeting details are organized, agendas are well-prepared, and notes are all in one place.

Plus, Fellow has the advantage of powerful AI features that automatically record, transcribe, and summarize your meetings, capturing every discussion and decision for your team to refer back to in one place. Since standup meetings happen so often, there may be a chance one of your team members can’t make it. With AI recordings, searchable transcripts, and clear summaries linked to your meeting notes and calendar events, a team member on OOO can skip the meeting without missing any context or next steps.

5 Get to the point

There’s a time and a place for a lengthy discussion or conversation; a standup isn’t one of them. Remember that you need the time for everyone to speak and to brainstorm solutions to bottlenecks if they arise. If any in-depth discussions need to be had, save that for later and keep the daily standup focused and on track.

6 Address your team

As the meeting attendees communicate, discuss, and share updates, remember that these updates are for the team, not the manager, scrum master, or agile coach. If the manager or scrum team lead wants updates about something specific, those can be saved until a one-on-one meeting. The point of a standup is to update the team with what’s on your plate and where you may need some help.

7 Keep it short

For it to be effective, a standup meeting should be kept short—no longer than 30 minutes. If your standup meetings are weekly, but start to run closer to the 45-minute mark, change the cadence to daily or every other day and reinforce the meeting agenda. When the team knows the meeting structure and what is on them to share, they can determine what’s worth sharing and what may not be as important.

8 Make it fun 

Your team shouldn’t dread the standup meeting, especially if it occurs daily. While it’s essential to stick to the structure and cover all necessary points, you should make sure the meeting isn’t boring. Start things off with a song, get people talking about their hobbies or interests, or even ask the team a fun trivia question—experiment with different ideas to make the meeting engaging.

9 Save the solutions for later

While problem-solving can quickly become the center of the discussion, a standup meeting isn’t necessarily meant to be the place where all bottlenecks get solved. Instead, these meetings are meant to be the place where problems are brought up to the team. If the solution can be discussed relatively quickly, that’s great! But if not, take the problem-solving conversation to another meeting so you don’t go over the meeting’s end or waste anyone’s time.

10 Include everyone in the discussion

Especially if your standup is a hybrid meeting, remember to include the attendees who joined in-office or remotely. Everyone should get as much time to speak as everyone else and a fair chance to contribute. And don’t forget to include them in conversations by encouraging them to share their insights or add talking points to the agenda beforehand.

11 Try standing

There’s a reason they’re called standup meetings, so if you aren’t already, try standing and get everyone off their feet. You can even consider making it a walking meeting. And yes, you can implement the standing rule for remote or hybrid workplaces, too. This tactic can be especially useful for blood flowing if the standup is early in the morning.

12 Change it up

If your standup cadence is daily and attendees frequently say they don’t have any new updates, questions, or concerns to share, consider changing the cadence to every other day or even once a week. That way, when the group does come together, there are actually action items to discuss. 

13 Have a scrum master

All good daily standups or daily scrum meetings have a leader or facilitator, so be sure to appoint a scrum master for an effective standup. This individual should help to facilitate the meeting and ensure the standup framework is followed. It’s up to them to ensure that the standup doesn’t go off the rails and that the discussion stays on track and remains productive.

14 Give everyone equal talking time

One person should not monopolize the standup meeting. The goal here is for all meeting attendees to get the chance to share what they’ve been working on and ask for help if they need it. If the meeting is running long and not everyone has enough time to speak, ask yourself if everyone in the standup meeting needs to attend. It’s impossible to run a productive standup meeting with dozens of people, so it could be time to re-adjust the invite list. 

15 Create psychological safety

Meeting attendees should feel comfortable coming into the standup and be ready to share new ideas, speak up about concerns, and offer new ideas to other members. Make sure to cultivate an environment of psychological safety so everyone feels like they can be authentic during these meetings. Remember to never make fun of or laugh at someone for sharing or bringing up specific discussion points.

Free daily standup meeting template

Confused about how to conduct your daily standup meeting? Let Fellow do the heavy lifting for you and your team with our free daily standup meeting agenda template, which provides a streamlined framework for your team to share updates and challenges.

Revolutionize your standup meetings with Fellow

Implementing these 15 best practices for standup meetings can truly transform your team’s communication and collaboration. To take your standup meetings to the next level, elevate efficiency and collaboration with Fellow.

With Fellow, you can seamlessly capture, organize, and share meeting notes and action items, ensuring everyone stays informed and engaged. No more scattered information and disconnected discussions—Fellow has native integrations with your favorite project management, productivity, calendar, and communication tools, keeping every meeting detail aligned across your organization’s workflow.

Plus, with a library of over 500+ expert-approved meeting templates, you and your team can ensure every standup meeting stays productive and on track. By using Fellow, you can experience smoother standups and enhance team productivity.