From the Ask Tom mailbag:
Question:
I find myself sometimes in meetings where things are often decided in advance, by politics. And the meeting seems just organized to the appearance of democracy. There is no control in these meetings. They just happen and sometimes it is better to just let it go and walk away. Nevertheless, I step out of those meetings with a bad feeling.
Response:
First, your stomach is an excellent guidepost to the effectiveness of a meeting. When your stomach feels bad, something was not discussed that is actually preventing the organization from making progress.
This often happens counter the intentions of the manager.
Susan was concerned about her team not being creative enough. She called a meeting to come up with some creative ideas to solve a customer problem. When the meeting started, Susan passed around copies of her list of ideas. Then she asked the group to come up with their ideas. She was disappointed that no one else had any. NONE. So she called to complain that her team isn’t creative. She feels so overworked because she has to come up with all the ideas.
Worse, her team comes out of that meeting feeling bad that they had not contributed. It was all they could do to properly support the ideas that Susan came up with.
It was all pretense, all the appearance of participation. So, what is the issue? What is NOT being discussed, that must be discussed for Susan’s team to make progress going forward? -TF
The final product must have forethought. The key players should all discuss and envision exactly what their goals or products are. The leader should convey a clear description of exactly what they are trying to produce on time or ahead of schedule. They should all be made aware of exactly how important the budget constraints are. Once the leading team members all agree on their plan and goal, each one is then empowered with a strong ability to be creative in making it happen.
Susan had good intentions when she put together her list of ideas as a reference for her team to get creative, but it may have been better to have asked her team to write down their lists individually at the beginning of the meeting followed by group discussion of each of those ideas. This would have fostered the team feeding off of each other’s ideas in a brain-storming session instead of everyone starting by looking over one person’s ideas alone.
I agree with Henry. Good intentions on Susan’s part, but she unwittingly removed the brainstorm process when she walked in with a full sheet of ideas (I’ve done it, and my team has pointed out this fact). It would have been better to walk in with a blank sheet, or a sheet with only the final outcome(s) on them. In a way, who cares how we get there?
Bringing a concept to think about and bringing an idea to be worked on are 2 different things. Susan, as Henry said, should have gathered information from each of them, used the ideas of each, and then integrated her ideas as an addition. Its like the post I am making here. After reading Henry’s response, that’s really all that sticks in my mind unless I walked away to formulate my own opinion and thoughts on the issue. As far as what is not being discussed. What the customer issue was, how it happened, why it happened, to open the table on creative ideas on how to prevent it.
Hi,
I am agreeing with Larry as the meeting agenda to be distributed well in advance with all the constraints. Adding to more this is simple a Yes Boss/Boss is always right management problem. See, at the moment what Sushan is doing, she just imposing his/her thought/ideas upon the subordinates or peers when conducting the meeting. Then will those poor guys do–nothing but to accept Boss ideas. This is the simplest approach of being an eye of apple for them. Now if Sushan do the same things differently by communicating — Guy tomorrow we will have meeting on the subject (Fully described with all the constraints) and would seek their participation to come prepare with all the great ideas they have in their mind and ask for their active contribution rather than just accepting yes node from them. This way not only she will be able to manage his/her good time but also allow others to take participation on ideas generation. And I am sure they all will enjoy doing. Hope Shushan will make good use of it.
B’Bye