How to Run a Successful Project Kickoff Meeting

For every project launched, there are countless meetings for updates, progress, and alignment. But the project kickoff meeting is probably the most crucial of them all.

The project kickoff meeting is the first meeting with everyone involved in the project, including the core project team, clients, stakeholders, and sponsors. It’s the initial meeting to put everyone on the same page—same goals, same measures of success, same timeline, and same plan.

Without this, the project is set to fail. Why? Because a well-executed project kickoff meeting brings clarity to all aspects of the project. It:

• Sets the roles and responsibilities of the people involved
• Prepares solutions to foreseeable problems
• Answers everyone’s questions

Most importantly, the project kickoff meeting jumpstarts the momentum for the weeks or months ahead.

There are two different types of project kickoff meetings, each of which has a different purpose and objective.

The first type is the internal project kickoff meeting. Here, project managers meet the internal team to explain the project, its goals, expectations from the team, and their roles. Most of the time, the internal team does a lot of brainstorming to gather the members’ ideas.

This type of meeting always happens before the executive sponsor and the client kickoff (or external kickoff). It builds the foundation of the project, so the team will avoid wasting the precious time of the client or sponsor.

In cases where there are no clients or external stakeholders, this could be a simple company-, management-or team-wide project rollout.

Second type is the external project kickoff meeting, where the internal team meets the client or sponsor. This is the time to build clarity on the project operations, processes, goals, limitations, timeline, and overarching strategies. The internal team also manages the client’s expectations and explains the next steps. Most importantly, this is a good opportunity for the internal team to build rapport with the client or sponsor.

A tip: When confused, don’t hesitate to ask questions during a project kickoff meeting. The goal is for everyone to be on the same page, so use this time to clarify things with key stakeholders, project managers, or sponsors. That meeting is meant for that.

Now, for the project kickoff meeting to become effective, you need to prepare a handful of things. Seamless kickoffs require time and planning, but the effort is worth it.

So, we’re going to tackle the best practices—how to conduct a project kickoff meeting, what to discuss, what project topics should be covered in the kickoff meeting, and more.

This is the starting point of your preparation. The first questions you must answer are: What is the purpose of this project kickoff meeting? What are its objectives and goals?

Knowing the answer to these questions helps you build a strong foundation for the project. It’s essential info for the internal team, stakeholders, sponsors, or clients.

In addition, these guide questions can also help you:

• How did the project originate?
• What business value is the project trying to achieve?
• Are the project goals aligned with the business goals?
• What approach does the project require?
• What methods will you use to accomplish the objectives?
• How can you evaluate if the project is successful or not?

Since this is a pre-kickoff task, you can set individual meetings with people who can best answer the questions. Once done, you’ll have a complete context, which you can discuss at the meeting.

It’s vital for the whole team to understand everyone’s roles and responsibilities. This way, they can perform their assigned duties efficiently and seek help from the right person. Also, a solid grasp of one’s role helps improve productivity, morale, and momentum—the ingredients to success.

Confusion will be avoided, and every member will feel a sense of ownership. Sounds ideal, right?

A sound agenda makes the most of a project kickoff meeting. It maximizes time and ensures you won’t miss anything.

Here’s a sample agenda for project kickoff meetings.

• Introduce the people in the meeting to set everyone at ease
• Define the project
• Show and discuss the project plan
• Walk through the scope and deliverables
• Reiterate the roles and responsibilities of the attendees
• Set the central source of truth and point of contact
• Give the details of the communication channels
• Decide on the following meeting plans
• Open the floor for questions and feedback

This is flexible; you can revise it based on your team’s needs. Moreover, you can assign talking points to different team members. For example:

• Introduce the people in the meeting (Kyle; 5 minutes)
• Define the project (Marielle; 10 minutes)
• Show and discuss the project plan (RJ; 10 minutes)
• Walkthrough the scope and deliverables (Jen; 15 minutes)
  

Visual aids, like graphs and presentations, help attendees understand the meeting points better. They highlight crucial information and leave a more powerful impact on the team. Plus, they keep everyone’s attention.

Leading a project kickoff meeting means creating decks and presentations that are clear and engaging.

Don’t worry, creating presentations is easy peasy on Canva. Team members can make beautiful kickoff meeting slides, even if they’re new to project management, even if they’re pressed for time. Browse thousands of templates for agenda decks, visual charts, and roadmap presentations.

Try your hand at making kickoff decks with these templates:

If your kickoff involves a lot of data, try this chart-rich template:

After weeks of preparation, the day has finally arrived. Here are some practical tips to ensure the meeting is smooth and productive.

Apart from the introduction, an ice breaker at the beginning of the project kickoff sets a positive meeting atmosphere. Just keep your ice breaker short and sweet, and give everyone a chance to join.

During the presentation, avoid bombarding everyone with too much information. It’s just the initial meeting, after all, so the details can follow. It’s also important to discern which details should be prioritizes and included in the deck.

Leverage visuals. Use charts, tables, images, videos, and other elements to minimize text-heavy decks (that nobodly likes). The Canva presentation you created will help the presenter make the flow coherent and seamless.

Even if project kickoff meetings have polished details, there might still be some project items that require brainstorming. And you can brainstorm even if you don’t have a whiteboard and marker at hand.

Mindmap? Doodle? With Canva Online Whiteboards, you can make this brainstorming fun, exciting, and visually appealing. What’s great about this technique is that every team member can leave a comment, share their ideas, and provide rough details. Brainstorming via virtual whiteboards enables team collaboration.

Give it a try:

Last, during the kickoff meeting, open the floor for questions and feedback. This will help the team settle things as soon as possible.

As a presenter, prepare yourself for possible questions. It’s also good to politely raise questions if there are unclear things on your team’s end.

The first-ever project kickoff meeting has ended. What’s next?

After the kickoff, what are the next steps for you, the internal team, and the clients or sponsors? Create a clear list of the succeeding tasks expected from all sides. This will help you keep track of the project’s progress.

Do this as soon as you have the next steps and the summary of the meeting. The best time to send a follow-up email is the day of the kickoff itself. Best practice: Attach all the decks you used, from agenda to visual charts to brainstorming presentations.

Right after the project kickoff meeting, you have the option to set another meeting with your team to get their thoughts. You can use this as well to process the discussion.

An effective project kickoff meeting is the foundation of project success. With the help of these tips, tools, and templates, you’ll surely launch a kickoff meeting worthy of everyone’s time and presence!