商务英语口语对话:会议议程

M: Please let me see the draft of what you have put together for Monday's meeting.

F: I'm still working on the agenda, there will be a lot to go over on Monday. Here's what I've got so far.

M: Do you think we will spend more than twenty minutes in the opening? I think it should be pretty simple.

F: It shouldn't take too long, but there will be a lot of dignitaries at the meeting. In the opening exercises, it is protocol to spend a little time to recoginise them. I reckon it should take about half an hour before we can even get to the minutes.

M: Really? Well, at least the minutes shouldn't take too long to review. There shouldn't be a lot of active business left over from last meeting.

F: True. After review and acceptance of the minutes, we have several committee reports. Old business won't take up too much time, but sometimes the committee delegates can be a little verbose… Is there where we can limit their time?

M: We can set a five minute report time with a three minute question and answer afterwards.

F: That's not good. Q&A always stretch out the time, because people usually get stuck on some irrelevent point, we'll lose control of the meeting if we open it up to questions too early.

M: True. Well, imposing an eight minute limit on the committee reports then, we'll save Q&A until right before closed session.

F: Sounds good. Overall, we can probably keep the meeting under two hours.

M: Let's hope!