5 exercises on the natural English verb collocations for professional meetings — from "run a meeting" to "capture action items" to "take offline."
Key meeting vocabulary collocations
run / hold / chair / host a meeting → facilitate it
raise a concern / issue / question → bring it up formally
take offline → discuss separately after the meeting
capture action items → record them officially
run through the agenda → review it quickly
0 / 5 completed
1 / 5
The sprint planning starts in 10 minutes. A developer says: "Who is ___ today's meeting?"
Which verb completes the sentence most naturally?
Run a meeting — the dominant verb in tech teams:
In corporate and tech environments, run is the most natural verb for facilitating a meeting. It implies active control: setting the agenda, keeping time, managing discussion.
Meeting facilitation collocations:
run a meeting → the most common, informal + professional
facilitate a meeting → slightly more formal, often used for workshops
chair a meeting → formal British English, especially for board/committee meetings
host a meeting → neutral, often used for video calls: "I'll host the Zoom call"
lead a meeting → also acceptable, slightly more leadership-focused
Quick reference:
attend / join a meeting → be present
call / schedule / set up a meeting → create/arrange it
cancel / postpone / reschedule a meeting → change or remove it
kick off a meeting → start it informally: "Let's kick off"
"Doing" and "making" are incorrect collocations here — in English you run, hold, or chair a meeting, never "do" or "make" one.
2 / 5
A product manager has just introduced a complex technical proposal. A senior developer says: "This is important — can we ___ this offline and go deeper after the standup?"
Which phrase fits correctly?
"Take offline" — the fixed phrase in English meeting culture:
"Take this offline" is a fixed collocation meaning: let's discuss this separately, outside the main meeting. It's used when a topic is too complex, too specific to a subset of participants, or better handled in a dedicated conversation.
Why "take"? In English, you "take" an item to another venue or context. You take a conversation somewhere else. This is a near-fixed phrase — the verb is always take.
Meeting agenda and topic collocations:
take offline → discuss separately after the meeting
table a topic → (BE) postpone to a later meeting; (AE) bring it up for discussion — false friend!
park it → informal: defer until later ("Let's park that for now")
add to the agenda → include in the meeting plan
carry over a topic → move to the next meeting
⚠️ Warning: "Table" is a false friend: British English: "table a motion" = bring it forward for discussion American English: "table a topic" = postpone/defer it In global IT teams, "take offline" or "park it" avoids this ambiguity.
3 / 5
At the end of a design review, a tech lead says: "Before we close, let's make sure we've ___ all the action items — owner and deadline for each."
Which verb sounds most professional and natural?
"Capture" — the professional verb for recording meeting outcomes:
In meeting and documentation contexts, capture means to formally record something so it's not lost. "Capture the action items," "capture the decisions," "capture requirements" — all are standard in professional settings.
Meeting documentation collocations:
capture action items / decisions / requirements → record them formally
document the meeting → write formal minutes or notes
take / write / send meeting notes → informal recording
summarize the decisions → brief recap
assign action items → allocate to owners
Action item lifecycle:
raise / identify an action item → note during the meeting
assign an action item → give it an owner
track an action item → monitor progress
close / complete an action item → mark done
carry over an action item → move to next sprint/meeting if not done
In Jira / project tools: "capturing" action items means creating tickets. The vocabulary bridges spoken meetings and written systems.
4 / 5
A developer interrupts a meeting discussion: "Wait — I want to ___ a concern about the proposed rollout timeline. The database migration will take at least 3 hours."
Which verb is correct?
"Raise a concern" — the standard professional phrase:
Raise is the dominant verb when bringing up issues, blockers, objections, or concerns in a meeting or formal context. It signals that you're introducing something for group discussion.
What you "raise" in meetings:
raise a concern → flag a potential problem
raise an issue / a point → introduce it for discussion
raise a question → ask about something
raise an objection → formally disagree (more formal/legal)
raise a flag / red flag → informal: signal a warning
Related: what you "bring up": "Bring up" is also acceptable but slightly less formal than "raise." You'd more often hear "bring up" in casual conversation and "raise" in professional documentation or meeting language.
Full phrase examples:
"I'd like to raise a concern about the timeline."
"Can I raise something before we move on?"
"I want to raise a blocker — the dependencies aren't ready."
5 / 5
At the start of a weekly team meeting, the PM says: "Let's quickly ___ the agenda for today."
Which verb is the most natural and common in professional English?
"Run through the agenda" — the natural phrasal verb for a quick review:
Run through means to go over something quickly, in sequence. It's a phrasal verb extremely common in meeting culture: "run through the agenda," "run through the plan," "run through the checklist."
Agenda collocations:
run through / go through the agenda → review items quickly
set / build / prepare the agenda → create it before the meeting
share / send the agenda → distribute it to attendees
follow the agenda → stick to the planned items
add an item to the agenda → include something new
come off-agenda / go off-script → deviate from the plan
Meeting flow vocabulary:
kick off the meeting → start it informally
wrap up the meeting → finish/conclude it
table an item (BE: bring up; AE: postpone)
circle back to a topic → return to it later
move on to the next item → transition between topics