To call a meeting to order, the presiding officer confirms that notice was given and a quorum is present, then at the scheduled start time announces something like “The meeting will come to order.” The call to order in a meeting is the moment a room of people becomes an organized body capable of taking binding action, and getting the surrounding requirements wrong — no quorum, defective notice, the wrong person presiding — can invalidate every vote taken afterward.
Who Has Authority to Open the Meeting
Primary authority rests with the organization’s presiding officer, usually the president or chairperson. That person should arrive a few minutes early, verify conditions are met, and open the session on time.
Under Robert’s Rules of Order, which most organizations adopt as their parliamentary authority, there is a clear line of succession when the regular chair is unavailable. If the president is absent, the vice president takes over. If neither is present, the secretary calls the meeting to order and immediately conducts an election for a temporary presiding officer, called a chairman pro tem, who leads only that session.
This chain matters because actions taken by a body opened by someone without authority can be challenged later. Bylaws sometimes modify the default order, so check yours before assuming the standard applies.
Confirm a Quorum Before You Open
A quorum is the minimum number of voting members who must be present for the group to conduct business, and it has to exist before the chair calls the meeting to order. Most organizations set the number in their bylaws — a third, a majority, or a fixed count like 15 are common choices.
When bylaws are silent, Robert’s Rules defaults to a majority of the entire membership. For a 100-member organization, that means 51 people in the room. Larger groups often find this default unworkable, which is a signal the bylaws need their own quorum provision.
The chair confirms quorum by scanning the room, checking a sign-in sheet, or asking the secretary to conduct a roll call. Once satisfied, the chair announces “A quorum is present” either just before or right after the call to order. A visual headcount is fine for small groups; larger or more formal bodies may require a roll call recorded in the minutes. Either method works so long as the presence of a quorum is established before any substantive business begins.
Notice Requirements
A meeting cannot validly open if members were not properly notified. What counts as proper notice depends on the type of meeting and the type of body.
Regular Meetings
Regular meetings on a fixed schedule — for example, the first Tuesday of every month — generally do not require individual notice each time, because the schedule itself is set in the bylaws. Members are expected to know when regular meetings occur.
Special Meetings
Special meetings are stricter. Every member must receive advance notice with the date, time, location, and a specific description of the business to be considered. That last piece is critical: at a special meeting the group can only act on items listed in the notice. Anything else is out of order no matter how urgent it seems. Bylaws should specify a minimum notice period; 14 days is common where members need to arrange travel.
Public Bodies
City councils, school boards, and state commissions face additional obligations under open meetings laws. These statutes require notice to be posted a set period in advance — typically anywhere from 24 hours to 10 days depending on jurisdiction — with the time, date, location, and subject matter described specifically enough for the public to understand what will be discussed. Vague labels like “new business” are usually insufficient. When a public body opens without adequate notice, actions taken during the session are generally voidable, meaning a court can invalidate them if challenged.
Making the Call
Once the scheduled time has arrived and a quorum is confirmed, the call itself is simple. The chair stands, addresses the room, and says something like “The meeting will come to order” or “I call this meeting to order.” There is no required formula. The words just need to clearly signal that informal conversation is over and official proceedings have started.
Do not open early. Even if everyone appears to be present, members who planned to arrive at the posted start time have a right to be there from the opening moment. Starting before the scheduled time can create grounds for challenging any business conducted before latecomers arrived.
A gavel is optional. Robert’s Rules does not require one, and a clear voice works just as well. If a gavel is used, a single light tap is the standard; repeated pounding rarely improves attention and comes across as aggressive.
Immediately after the call, the chair moves into the first item on the agenda, which under Robert’s Rules typically begins with reading and approval of the previous meeting’s minutes, followed by officer and committee reports, unfinished business, and new business. Bylaws or an adopted agenda may rearrange this order.
What to Do When Quorum Is Missing
Sometimes the numbers simply are not there. Without a quorum, the assembly cannot conduct substantive business, and any action taken anyway is null and void under Robert’s Rules.
Those present can still do exactly four things:
- Fix the time to which to adjourn — schedule a continuation of the meeting for a specific date and time.
- Adjourn — end the meeting.
- Recess — pause to wait for more members.
- Take measures to obtain a quorum — contact absent members by phone, text, or email and ask them to come.
The practical move is usually to recess for 15 or 20 minutes while someone reaches out. If enough people arrive, the chair then calls the meeting to order with a valid quorum. If not, the group adjourns and tries again later.
Quorum can also disappear mid-meeting when members leave. For board meetings, quorum generally must be maintained throughout, and business stops when it drops below the threshold. Some state laws treat a quorum established at the start of a nonprofit or community association membership meeting as valid for the whole session regardless of later departures, so check the applicable state nonprofit corporation act and your own bylaws. Any member can raise the absence of a quorum at any time by addressing the chair, but not by interrupting a speaker.
Virtual and Hybrid Meetings
The same principles apply online, with a few added logistics. Under the 12th edition of Robert’s Rules, an organization can hold electronic meetings only if its bylaws specifically authorize them. If yours do not, the group needs to amend them before conducting binding business remotely.
Establishing quorum remotely requires a roll call at the start, since the chair cannot scan the room. The secretary calls each name, the member responds verbally or confirms presence on video, and the count is recorded. After that, the platform’s participant list serves as an ongoing quorum check, and members participating by video should keep their cameras on.
Notices for virtual meetings need to include the video or teleconference link, any access codes or passwords, joining instructions, and a phone bridge number if one is available as backup. Two weeks’ lead time gives members a chance to test their setup.
The chair opens a virtual meeting with the same verbal announcement used in person. Members who join late should announce themselves at the next natural pause rather than interrupting a speaker, and they seek recognition using the platform’s raise-hand feature or, on a phone call, by stating their name and waiting to be acknowledged.
Recording the Call in the Minutes
The secretary’s job at the opening is to capture the details that prove the meeting started properly: the exact time the meeting was called to order, the name and title of the presiding officer, the type of meeting (regular, special, or adjourned), and the fact that a quorum was present. These entries create a defensible record if the meeting’s validity is later questioned.
Robert’s Rules does not require recording the times individual members arrive late or leave early. Organizations that track this are doing so under their own policy. Noting arrivals and departures can still be useful for reconstructing quorum status later, especially in smaller boards where a single member’s departure could drop attendance below the threshold. For roll call meetings, the secretary records who was present at the opening and may note members who joined afterward.