Developing the web » Work

10 tips to work from home successfully

Noémie Lemaitre — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 15:56:37 +0000

During my career I’ve been working as an employee, going to work every day, and also as a free-lancer, working from home. It’s time to share a few insights on the topic.

1. Give it a try
First of all, you’ll never know if working from home could be an option for you if you don’t try it out. Talk to your boss. What about beginning with one day per week during a “test month”?

2. Prepare the space
Depending on the nature of your work, you’ll like to set up a defined space, and consider the following.

Dedicated place with appropriate infrastructure (this is probably not your bathroom)
Noise management: Do you like it silent? Avoid the street side of the appartment.
Organisation of supplies: Have you got all the materials you need at hand?

3. Eliminate diversions
Find out what’s happening at your house when you’re not there. Is the phone constantly ringing? Could you spend the whole day reordering a messy household? Are your cat’s friends visiting around the clock?
You’ll have to find solutions to prevent the distractions from invading your work day. Some may be easy to get rid of (like muting the phone), some may require you to elaborate more (like convincing the cat to poker only on weekends).

4. Stay focused
Once you’ve taken care of the surroundings, you’ll be confronted with your worst enemy: yourself.
Your own pet peeves can get in the way, from procrastination to hyper-activity. This is the rule: Your private mails may have to wait in your inbox until the end of your work day, and you won’t be able to repair the television until Saturday.

5. Follow work habits
The difference between “work” and “work from home” should basically remain the location. If you usually begin your work day with reading (work) eMails at your workplace, then simply do the same at home. Keep your work habits if they’re empowering you; drop them if they’re not.

6. Structure your work/time
Plan ahead, organize your schedule, manage your tasks. Nothing new. At home, it’s more likely that nobody will remind you to get specific things done; make sure you’ll still do them.

7. Keep track
Know what you’ve achieved at the end of the work-at-home day. A short list of completed tasks and topics worked on should be a good investment. You can use this information to verify how you’re doing and compare it to your feelings if unsure, and to show your boss how much more efficient you are.

8. Don’t think about it too much
Don’t obsess over the topic. Theoretically, you won’t experience anything else than you always do on a normal work day. Only the weighting differs.

9. Don’t give up
Working from home may not turn out the way you expected at first. Persevere! Practice and generation of habits will help you consolidating the building.

10. Be productive
Keep the productivity techniques you’re already using when at your company; they probably fit also at home, since you’re doing the same work.
Important: Working from home should have more advantages than going to work elsewhere. Thus it’s supposed to enable you to be more efficient. (Otherwise you may be better off at your workplace.)

Suggestions?

Would you like to work from home?
Are you already? Have you got tips to share?

The mutation – Part 2: Being a pain is part of the job

Noémie Lemaitre — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 11:43:22 +0000

This is the second part of a serie dedicated to one of my biggest career moves. I started at my current company as a web developer and, after a few years, I was given the opportunity to become a UX designer. I’ll turn the spotlight on some major differences I noticed during the progress of my mutation.

I recently had a meeting with our Testing department, and the thought came up again: within a company producing software, User Experience and Testing persons are both strongly dedicated to a product’s quality. Of course, developers are, in the best case, too. Still, as my friend Liz, our former UX analyst, often reminded me when I was a web developer:

You are not the user!

Fighting my brothers

Representing the user within a company means getting into lots of work-related battles.
My first ones were against fellow developers. My programming colleagues weren’t “us” anymore, facing challenges together under the banner of the code. It was “the users and me” against “them”.

In my developer role, I had to evaluate the feasibility and the cost-time factor of features; my response to the “strange requests and utopian feature designs” of our UX person was often “No”. Depending on the technology, I was able to provide one or more alternatives that would also work.
As a UX designer, I was suddenly in the position to ask my former crew for these strange features. That’s when I faced the infinite – and worth being admired – willpower of developers (resembling that usually attributed to dwarves in fantasy stories). That’s when I had to make use of my own programmer strength against them. Not yet painful, but highly interesting: I was confronted with replicas of myself, knowing maybe more than I should about the technical background (“Did you create a class for that? You did, right?”).

Knowing that friction breeds greatness, I carried on with convincing and winning my developer colleagues for my new cause, the user’s experience. It surely was a positive aspect that we’ve all been working closely together for years.

Fighting authority

When I dealt with our principal stakeholders (mostly from Management) as the user’s advocate, I had to

admit that I was being even more a pain,
cope with the fact that I probably always would, in this position.

I had to accept it as an important part of my job.

I told my bosses “I have to disagree once again” and “I don’t think we should do it like that” many times.
Was I going too far? Should I just have shut up instead?

Time gave me the answer: Hell, no!

Pointing out at dust piles under the carpet is the first part of what I’m paid for.

The second part is to elaborate the best way to clean them.
I learned that the messenger delivering bad news wasn’t likely to be shot at if she stuck to reality and objectivity.

The path

While continuing being a pain, I pushed my coworkers into thinking harder, developing great ideas to overcome the issues I revealed on their way. I see myself as a sort of trainer, helping people generate great usable software and shaping our path to success.

What about you?

Do you believe you are a pain in your job? Why?
How do you manage to keep a healthy balance between being a pain and still go on well with your colleagues?

The mutation – Part 1: Busted myth: The paperless office

Noémie Lemaitre — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 20:05:53 +0000

This is the first part of a serie dedicated to one of my biggest career moves. I started at my current company as a web developer and, after a few years, I was given the opportunity to become a UX designer. I’ll turn the spotlight on some major differences I noticed during the progress of my mutation.

Paper blessings
I discovered the benefits of sketching long ago. Sketching complex ideas has always helped me understanding and communicating them. A sketch is also a good way to make sure you’re on the same page with your interlocutor when discussing rather theoretical subjects. When it comes to remember a concept’s unwritten details, I haven’t found a better help than a sketch yet.
I’ve seen accurate memories swept away by nicely formatted digital meeting minutes. I’ve also seen the very same piece of – in the meantime worn-out – paper with a drawing on it travel through a whole company, from the employee who generated the sketch to the boss making a decision based on it. On the other hand, I’ve witnessed inefficiency due to the disappearance of paperwork, and great confusion due to its ambiguous relation with time.

Developer A – “Is this the new one or the old one?”
Developer B – “I don’t know exactly… I thought this was the new design, but there’’s no date on it.”

Developer – “I’ve implemented it according to this spec” (waiving with spec in the air)
Designer – “Oh… I see you’ve got the old one.”

In my daily work as a web developer, I used sketching to simulate the interaction between flexible and fixed GUI components, to visualize hidden amounts of padding and to identify others’ CSS classes (before Firebug was born). I remember those “” and “” written on top of boxes while I was learning HTML tables; later I drew the same sketches to explain how to build those tables. I’ve been strongly reminded of school while defining a container’s coordinates relatively to a button’s edge on the x and y axes of the stage.

So it was obvious to me that I’d never even want to reach the paperless state at my desk some of my developer colleagues seemed so eager to achieve and preserve. Still, I sometimes wondered why Liz, our User Experience Analyst at the time, was surrounded by all sorts of sheets. She was carrying a bunch of them at any time, she took a few of them to every meeting and basically never left her desk without a pen and a piece of paper. (The latter being an advisable habit.) The possible explanations I had in mind went from a little almost-messy tendency (sorry Liz!) to the widely spread desire to keep useless stuff instead of throwing it in the bin. I imagined a better system could have helped her managing her growing piles of paper, and I thought that 2 months of good ol’ GTD would probably have gotten rid of both the cause and the consequences of the “paper problem”.

That was until I got her job.

Holy sheets
When Liz left the company, I inherited a big shelf full of heavy-packed folders, additionally to the digital files. Survey questionnaires and results, annotated screen captures, ideas, user research protocols, paper prototypes, user flows in big format… were things I could call mine. (Nobody else had a claim on them anyway.)
I was focused on interaction and technology, principally working towards Development, rather than towards customers and stakeholders. Thus there was still hope that I wouldn’t succumb to the paper flood Liz had had to fight.
I placed the first paused interaction design ideas for the first 3 features in a folder. My “To do” pile grew exponentially, almost none of its parts ever becoming a “Done”. I had to divide it, so that every feature would be isolated. I discovered I had better keep my files ready to grab and to present at any time, due to the spontaneity of the internal meeting schedule.
I had to answer the question “What is the current concept state of feature XYZ?” precisely and shortly, without fiddling with unsorted sketches. Oops.

Suddenly I saw myself doing exactly what Liz had sometimes done: rummaging through the depths of a single concept’s printed history, desperately seeking an answer. When asked a question, I had no more time to build and trigger a search statement in my brain or to foster the code later.
So additionally to providing the latest document containing the (agile) design decisions on demand, I had to know them, together with the pros and cons enunciated during the last meeting.

Taking notes, until the paper catches fire
Fortunately, I never lost the habit of taking notes while attending work-related gatherings. I see taking notes closely related to sketching, helping connect memories to tasks and concepts.
In the past, I wrote important things down, like

info (“Boss will be on holiday from 12 to 20.08″),
own tasks (“Find a way to reduce the framework-generated row heights before Friday”),
or to immediately capture my thoughts about a specific topic (“Create a component inheriting from WindowInfo including a new button ‘Save’ → WindowEdit“)

Although I’m not keen on writing down meeting minutes (who is?) and make sure they’re coherent, I can do that too. I can extract everybody’s next tasks and communicate them adequately.
The new challenge was now to simultaneously

present design concepts
moderate ensuing discussions
document decisions and steps in-between; make them fit into a time plan (“Place a single dispatch status at once in Release 1″, “Place multiple dispatch statuses at once in Release 2″)
keep track of generated ideas, ranking from small improvements for currently discussed functionality to unrelated killer features
provide solutions and ideas on the fly
record references and resources related to one topic (“Talk to Mara about the archive, then organize a meeting with Michael to discuss the technical possibilities”, “Look at the file ABC.pdf at part 3 for requirements for new tracking functionality”)
identify my own to-dos, which are not necessarily dictated by the discussion’s outcome (“Redefine the interaction and generate a high-fi prototype to convince boss next time, but first get real data from the database from Oliver”)

I no longer could talk confidently about the code that I knew every part of, like you know the rooms of your house and their contents. Instead, I had to struggle to keep people focused, to advocate the user’s rights and to deal with the what-ifs in real-time.

Expanding
When I was a web developer, I usually came out of a meeting with a few next actions. Now, I fill 5 or 6 pages with all kinds of subjects of different nature. Afterwards, I can’t just program and commit the solution to mark the task as “done”. (By the way, I had to drastically reduce my expectations concerning a job being “done”, since an information architect’s job is never really “done” or “finished”.)

As time went by and my field of activity grew, the little and bigger features had to find their place within different encompassing so-called “projects”. I added colored labels to my first suspension file folder and got a second one for support. I’ve banned the paper monsters – like these printed sheets resulting from the testing of some print functionality – into separate folders on the new shelf I had to find. I keep the really big features (the ones that wouldn’t fit in the suspension files) in their own folders. I can’t get rid of many layout trials on paper, since we may need the wisdom they showed us later. Of course, I could digitalize them if I had lots of spare time at work.

Conclusion
What I’ve learned: cope with the fact that the User Experience Designer’s position includes paperwork. If I don’t sort the papers on my desk on time and meticulously, I’ll be submerged by waves of sheets within a short time, losing tracks, tasks, and time (and thus money). I need solid methods, an established and reliable system and the appropriate infrastructure to manage my job efficiently.
…So basically, it’s a bit like programming within many projects, in different languages and with lots of commented code

Got laid off? Part 1

Noémie Lemaitre — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 18:53:07 +0000

I have made a habit of coaching friends who just got laid off to help them get a job. So let’s see what you can do to recover quickly in a similar situation.

Get legal
If you’re a german resident, for example, you’ll have to contact your local employment agency to inform them about your new status. Be quick! You may be penalized if you miss the date (e.g. diminution of unemployment pay).

Get up
You’re at the beginning of a new career: it’s called job-seeking and it’s full time. Getting up every weekday at 8 o’clock seems fair.
Convince yourself you won’t be able to think smart while talking on the phone when you just got up. Imagine your boss-to-be on the line, begging for an interview, and you just sound sleepy, desperately trying to wake up your dreamy brain. That’s not how you want to be perceived.
Apart from that, you’ve got plenty of things to do. Start early enough.

Get dressed
I mean it. Every weekday. Get out of your night/slacking clothes and choose day clothes without holes, loose threads, or stains. You won’t show up for an interview in your favorite worn-out sweatsuit. And this interview could take place sooner than you think. Maybe today, maybe even in 2 hours!
I assume I also don’t have to go over the benefits of an established washing routine, right?

Get pretty
During the last months or years, you may have selected pieces from your wardrobe while thinking “Come on, it’s only for the workplace, it’ll do”. Well, now it’s time to dare using “the good ones”. And while we’re at it: Do “the good ones” still fit? (Hint: Probably not. Second hint: If they fit, they’re out of fashion.)
Nice clothes for interviews are a very good investment. You will also need them for your new profile picture.

Be a model
You need one or more resume pictures of yourself, and they should be younger than a year. Depending on the field where you’d like to work, you can select an option from the professional photo taken by a photographer, to a good shot with an acceptable digital camera. Notice that the result is usually worth it and the professional pictures really look more… professional.

Now we’ve got some basics covered. We’ll look at the paperwork in the second part of the serie. Stay tuned!

The advantages of being a team of one

Noémie Lemaitre — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 19:31:06 +0000

For many UX professionals, it’s a nightmare to work alone. They feel isolated and are desperately seeking company and exchange. While lots of benefits usually come in mind when thinking about team work, I’d like to take a look at the positive effects of being one team in one physical person.

Less meetings
I tend to reduce meetings to a minimum since I believe most of them are wasting my time. I have nothing against a good brainstorming session or a longer project kick-off gathering. (Preparation, moderation, and documentation are keys to a productive meeting and should be provided.)
Sitting numbly in a poorly aired room with 9 other people, everyone knowing the others are bored except for the two who are vividly fighting over the choice of a button instead of a link, is definitely not efficient.
The reflection process occurs quicker when you’re arguing with yourself – hopefully. In most cases you will be able to make a decision at the end, enabling you to go on with the next step.

Less communication
Since you are both the sender and the receiver of the information you communicate, the loss of information on the way from your brain to your colleague’s brain is minimized. Explaining complex ideas occurs rather seamlessly inside your own head. Although you may need to write down things for yourself to understand them better, you’re still lucky you don’t have to make them fit into your co-workers vision of the world.

More standards
No-one messes up your files!
It also means you can establish standards, templates and whatsoever you need for your daily work, without having to share, discuss or justify every change.
You manage your team’s image in the broadest sense. You’re in control of your efforts towards your goals. (Already been caugh singing “I did it my way…”?)

No personnel management
You don’t have to decide about your subordinates; you won’t curse your team leader twice a day. You have responsibility for only one person, and fortunately, it’s you! You will gain time while not bothering about organizing personnel meetings, and you’ll be able to reduce friction between your team member(s).

More ownership
Everything that comes out of your team is produced by you. You are the one who’s responsible for what you deliver – good or bad. I believe that in this case empowerment helps building a notion of responsibility, thus strengthening the will to become better. Endorsing responsibility leads you to improve yourself; embrace it!

Further readings

Would you like to become a team of one? Why, or why not?

The right media

Noémie Lemaitre — Thu, 25 Nov 2010 18:44:08 +0000

As I stood in front of the meeting room, being told that the reunion had been postponed to half an hour later, I was slightly disappointed. As a colleague added “But I’ve sent you an eMail”, I was tempted to talk about the foolishness and inefficiency of such an action.
So let’s see which medium is best for what topic at work. (Note that the adequate medium for a specific topic might be totally different at home.)

Personal contact
Meet the other part in person if the topic

is very important
will probably generate a longer discussion
is top secret
involves talking about money
involves many people (organize a meeting in this case)

Phone call
Dial the other part’s number if the topic

is time-critical
is an idea or concept that’s better explained personally (rather than written)
doens’t need deep thinking from the other part
is a question which can be answered by “yes” or “no”

Direct messaging / Instant messaging
Depends on your organization’s guidelines.

eMail
Send an eMail to the other part if the topic

is not time-critical
can be written and understood shortly
is precise, defined
is a question which can be answered by “yes” or “no”, if the recipient is not available on the phone
can be structured into smaller chunks if it’s longer

Sticky note
Paste a sticky note if the topic

contains no sensitive information
is not time-critical
is not important

Make your workplace more environment-friendly

Noémie Lemaitre — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 19:58:11 +0000

Being green is a trendy topic. Let’s see how we can do good to our planet by tweaking little things at work.

Current control
Do you switch off the lights when leaving your room for lunch? Shut down your PC before the week-end? Less obviously, could you use more daylight by moving your desk – thus avoiding to turn on the lamp?
And what about heating, or opening and closing windows at defined times, when your roommates agree, during the winter?…

Waste separation
Depending on where you live, you may be aware of the local waste separation guidelines. The workplace is an ideal location to apply them, since you might have more container space available there than at home, and habits are easier to form due to the amount of time spent there.

The appropriate medium
Choose your method of communication according to the desired outcome: personal contact or eMail can sometimes replace lengthy printed letters and phone calls. A waste of time, for example by trying to write down a complicated concept rather than explaining it to your colleague face-to-face, may lead to higher energy consumption (i.e. doing overtime in the evening with the light on).

Use paper wisely
For my part, I use a lot of paper to sketch and to brainstorm in my work. I’ve made a habit of collecting the misprinted sheets that are always laying near the printer. They mostly are still usable, at least on one side, which I draw on.
I also think twice before sending a job to the printer. Sometimes it’s enough to quickly scan the document on screen to know if its contents are worth printing.

Nourish the green flame
Ask your colleagues at the IT department what’s the best way to save energy with the hardware they provide you with. Keep your ears and eyes open for new possibilities in the domain of environment-friendliness. Be a positive example and more people will follow you.

Here are few keywords to inspire you on your green journey in the workplace:

Rechargeable batteries
Bikes, public transports, car sharing, working from home
Fair-trade coffee
Recycled furniture
Shared office supplies

How do you “green up” your workplace? Let us know!

5 tips to get your work done

Noémie Lemaitre — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 17:30:53 +0000

There are lots of ways to increase your productivity at work. Although, before you can become even more productive, you will have to get your own stuff done first. I’d like to consider a few elementary tips to begin with.

Learn to say “no”
It may sound egoistic, but you probably won’t hurt anybody by simply refusing to do other people’s work from time to time. “No” doesn’t necessarily mean work denial tentative or pure procrastination. You are the only one who knows if you’ll be able to type this report due on Monday when your boss asks you to begin at 17 o’clock on Friday. Don’t let the pressure force you to agree on every request. You may find other diplomatic ways to better schedule or modify what has to be done, still satisfiying all the involved parties. Practice saying “no” regularly to get better at it.
Delegate
Feeling irreplaceable? Try delegating some of your tasks to someone else. You may find out that:
- you’re winning time to get other stuff done,
- you’re gaining influence in relevant topics because of your ability to focus on the important things,
- you’re not really missing the task you’ve gotten rid of,
- your colleague is doing pretty well at it, and maybe even enjoying it,
- all of the above.
Schedule
To get work done, you’ll have to know how to manage your time. Plan your deadlines, keep buffers, batch tasks, etc. You can use any system that works for you.
Secure the zone
Allow yourself to work in surroundings that help you being productive. Get a separate room if your colleagues are too noisy at the moment, get headphones if music makes you work faster. Know what is good for you and try to apply it as often as possible.
Take a break
Don’t fool yourself! You may work great under pressure… but how long? You are more likely to get your stuff done when you’re well rested. Enough sleep, some breaks during the work day, and weekends without torturing your brain with work-related topics are ingredients you’ll need.

Now, what are your tips to get your own work done?

UX training for new employees

Noémie Lemaitre — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 17:53:17 +0000

At the beginning of September we got a few new colleagues, and I took the opportunity to organize a UX training for them. Some coworkers work remotely or in different countries and I don’t get to meet them often after their training at the company’s head quarters. That’s why it’s important for me to raise UX awareness as soon as possible.

Paper prototypes, low-fi and high-fi samples were pasted on the walls. Books, personas, surveys and other deliverables laid on the table.

Lengthy vocabulary explanations are usually the part to begin with, especially when talking about mostly unknown concepts, but let’s face it: it’s boring to listen at. So I began the training with an exercise.

My trainees got some time to figure out on their own what to do in case of a web application crash. Did they want to restart the app? To provide an error message?
They presented their concepts to the audience afterwards, explaining why they choose a specific solution. They came up with nice ideas, e.g. “It’s not an error, we’re just currently updating”!

According to their professional background, they focused on providing technical details about the crash and steps to check the browser’s health (developers), or on the Support team’s reachability and the system feedback’s wording (consultants). Some formulated their ideas with words, others drew the interactions. We discussed the pros and cons, and met a lot of aspects that also play a role in the design process (technology knowledge, expert users, multilanguage support, etc.)

At the end of the exercise the brains were ready to convert the information – about UX in general and UX within the company, visualized with a presentation – into their own way of thinking and with the colors of their own experiences. And “experience” is what it’s all about, right?

Best practices for the regular meeting with your boss

Noémie Lemaitre — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 10:26:51 +0000

As a UX team on my own I’m having a “department meeting” with my boss every 2 weeks to update him about my work and get input from him.
Even if the meeting itself only lasts from 30 minutes to one hour, I’ve developed some best practices to save time and improve the overall efficiency of my meeting culture.
So I’ll be writing about a few tips to consistently improve your career during a regular 1:1 meeting with your boss.

The surroundings
Your boss’ head is full with other stuff, too, so he’ll appreciate if you actively take care of the logistics. This includes:

Making sure you and your boss both know exactly when and where your meeting takes place.
Reserving a meeting room, a beamer, and whatever tools you may need during the meeting.
Providing an agenda accessible to your boss before the meeting, for the case he’d like to take a look at it, let’s say, on the evening before, when he has some time left. (Talk to your boss about this topic. Maybe he really doesn’t want to get informed earlier, or just has absolutely no time for that. It’s OK. In this case, skip this step.) The agenda could be contained in an internal Wiki page or in some file you both can access and possibly edit.
Keeping it private. People who are not involved directly need no access to your agenda. You’re not exposing your topics to the whole company and you’re not making publicity with it, e.g. “Point 3 – Ask for a day off because I’ve worked so hard during the past weeks and I need to go to the [insert embarassing doctor's name here]“.

Plan ahead
Keep track of your tasks to know at any time what you did and what you’ll do in a defined time range. For this, your preparation for the SCRUM daily meeting can be a great help. I’ll probably write about it in another post.

Be prepared!

Use a template. You can download my meeting template here.
Block time for your preparation depending on how your input will look like. I need about 10 minutes go through older tasks and to review new ones, and 10 minutes to write things down. I reserve a 30 minutes block of time, including a 10 minutes buffer. Those 30 minutes are a good investment.
Have thought about what you want to communicate, and how – regardless of the topic. E.g. “I want to say that I like the interaction with the remote developer team and I want it to sound positive.” will have a different output result from “I want to say that I don’t think the new process should stay in place and I want it to sound conviced and ‘ready to change’”.
Focus on the topics corresponding to the meeting’s nature. For example, asking for a raise isn’t a part of it, it requires a meeting on its own.
If you’re the verbose and/or fuzzy type of person, knowing how to get your message across in a concise way will improve your image incredibly. Since this is not as easy as it sounds, you may exercise with a friend or go to a presentation training to get better at that.
Have all the materials you’ll need at hand and organized. Order your printed screenshots, sort the files in your folder by date, etc. You may have to generate some more material especially for this meeting, e.g. overviews, combined images with annotations. It’s worth it: your boss wants to get to the point quickly, not to be taken on a trip to the meanders of your design process.
Depending on the type of the files required for your meeting (multimedia, print, else), you’ll have to make sure you can play sound, display movies or get a colored print. As many of us already experienced, a change in the media type always takes more time to handle. (The printed will strike at 13:58, you know it!)
Do you need the summary of your last meeting? If so, grab it and have a look at it.
Free your head enough to focus on the meeting’s contents. You need to really “be there”.

The paperwork

Print out your agenda. It’s usually easier for two people to manipulate a pen and a piece of paper together and interact with it than to agree first on a topic and then dictate and type the outcome into a document on the computer.
Bring at least a working pen and some spare paper to draw schemes or share ideas.
Have a dedicated paper/note book/Moleskine (or whatever fits you) to take notes and write down to-dos for yourself. Enter information in a way that you’ll be able to understand it later, the more the better.

The meeting itself

Be on time. Not “your” time, not the “I estimated you’d come a bit late” time. At least 5 minutes earlier. Period.
As a guideline, be serious, friendly and open-minded. The rest depends on your relation with your boss.
If needed, review the last meeting minutes together. Have you done what you intended to back then? Has he thought about providing you the information you needed? This works in both ways and it’s possible that one of you missed to to his work, for some reason. Stay professional.
Take notes. Write down your next actions.
Better ask twice if you don’t understand what your boss says. Don’t let yourself go out of the meeting unsure.
Be aware of time passing by. In a time-boxed meeting, one of you may point out that you’ve got to hurry a bit to get through all the topics. You may want to arrange another (bigger) meeting for a specific topic.
Schedule the next meeting with your boss.

Afterwards

Are you still writing down next actions while your boss rushes out of the room? Finish that task.
Now your meeting is over. Take a deep breath.
You’ll need a variable amount of time for the follow up process, ideally beginning shortly after the meeting. Transform your notes into to-dos, set reminders, modify documents, organize appointements, plan time for the tasks, prepare how to delegate work, etc.
Write down a meeting summary for the next time. Make it accessible to your boss.

Conclusion
So you see, the meeting with your boss is not only you sitting together and discussing. It requires preparation and has consequences. Once you’ve gone through those steps a few times, you’ll have made a habit out of the procedure and your skills will improve.

What are YOUR tips for such a meeting?