5 exercises on the language of running structured meetings: opening the floor, taking minutes, chairing, wrapping up, and more.
Key patterns
open the floor to someone → invite them to speak
take the minutes → record the official meeting notes
chair a meeting → facilitate formally
circle back to a topic → return to it later
wrap up → conclude the meeting
0 / 5 completed
1 / 5
A junior developer is attending their first board-level meeting. The chairperson says: "I'd now like to ___ to our engineering team."
Which is the correct collocation for a chairperson inviting a group to speak?
Open the floor to — the standard chair phrase for inviting contributions:
"Open the floor to" means to invite a person or group to speak or contribute to the discussion. It is the fixed phrase used by meeting chairs when transitioning to a new speaker or inviting audience participation.
Related facilitation collocations:
open the floor to someone → invite them to speak (chair phrase)
give the floor to → also acceptable, but more common when passing a turn mid-discussion
hand over to → informal transfer: "I'll hand over to the engineering team"
invite questions from → solicit Q&A: "I'd like to invite questions from the team"
Why not "give the floor to"? "Give the floor to" is grammatically correct and used in parliamentary procedure, but in modern IT and corporate meeting culture, open the floor to is the dominant phrase when inviting a whole group rather than a single named speaker.
2 / 5
Before the meeting starts, the PM asks a volunteer: "Would you mind ___ today? We need an official record of decisions and action items."
Which phrase is correct?
Take the minutes — the fixed collocation for official meeting notes:
"Take the minutes" is the standard phrase for formally recording what happens in a meeting. "Minutes" in this context are the official written record, not a unit of time. The verb is always take — you cannot "do," "write," or "record" the minutes in formal usage.
Meeting minutes collocations:
take the minutes → record them during the meeting
write up the minutes → produce the final clean document afterwards
circulate / distribute the minutes → send them to attendees
approve the minutes → formally confirm they are accurate (often at the next meeting)
minute something → record it officially: "Please minute that decision"
Who takes the minutes? The role is often called the minute-taker or secretary. In tech teams it is frequently a rotating role or assigned to a junior team member.
3 / 5
The engineering manager is facilitating the design review. A junior developer asks: "Who is ___ this meeting?" The manager replies: "I am."
Which verb is most formal and correct for a structured, committee-style meeting?
Chair a meeting — the most formal term for meeting facilitation:
Chair is the most formal verb for the role of facilitating a structured meeting, especially in British English and corporate or committee contexts. The person who chairs is called the chairperson or chair.
Meeting facilitation verbs — register comparison:
chair a meeting → most formal; standard for board/committee/design reviews
run a meeting → most common in everyday tech team language
facilitate a meeting → formal, often used for workshops or cross-team sessions
lead a meeting → focus on leadership rather than process
host a meeting → neutral; common for video calls ("I'll host the Zoom")
Real-world usage: In UK corporate environments you will often see: "The CTO will chair the quarterly review." In a fast-paced startup standup you would more likely hear: "Who's running standup today?"
4 / 5
The discussion on database schema has been going on for 20 minutes. The PM says: "Let's ___ and come back to this in AOB."
Which phrase means to return to the topic at a later point?
Circle back — the standard phrase for returning to a deferred topic:
"Circle back to this" means to return to a topic later in the same meeting or in a future meeting. It is a fixed phrasal verb widely used in corporate and tech meeting culture.
Deferral and return collocations:
circle back to → return to a topic: "Let's circle back to this in AOB"
come back to → same meaning, slightly more neutral
park it / table it → informal: defer without committing to a return time
add it to the parking lot → formal facilitation term for deferred items
carry it over → move to the next meeting: "We'll carry this over to Thursday"
What is AOB? AOB stands for Any Other Business — a standing agenda item at the end of British-style meetings for topics not on the original agenda. It is standard in UK corporate culture.
5 / 5
At 4:55 PM the team lead says: "We're almost out of time, let's ___ — any final questions?"
Which phrase most naturally means to finish or conclude the meeting?
Wrap up — the most natural phrase for concluding a meeting:
"Wrap up" is the dominant phrasal verb for finishing a meeting in a natural, professional way. It signals that the meeting is coming to an end and any remaining items should be addressed quickly.
Meeting conclusion collocations — and when to use each:
wrap up → most natural for meetings and calls: "Let's wrap up"
round up → more common for rounding up numbers or people, less so for meetings
sum up → means to summarise: "Let me sum up the decisions we made"
close out → formal, often used for closing a project or ticket: "Let's close out this sprint"
Full meeting-end sequence:
"Let's wrap up" → signal the end
"To summarise / recap" → review decisions
"Any final questions before we close?" → last chance
"Thanks everyone — I'll circulate the minutes by end of day" → follow-up