The meeting took a sudden turn for the worse when Emil stood up, walked over in front of Sharon and slammed down the report. Up to then, things had been ambling along with the usual finger pointing, back biting and general nastiness. Now, there was real confrontation.

The GPS Project had been off track for several weeks and had been the whipping post of every department meeting in the past 14 days. As I listened, it occurred to me that, what had been said, was true. The problem was in the structure of the conversation, or the lack of it, that prevented the team from making progress.

I suggested a Gap Analysis. This is quick and easy. Take a flipchart piece of paper and make three columns. Column 3 is used to define what we expected. This could come from any list of goals, benchmarks or milestones. Column 1 is to document what we got, instead. This is what actually happened in relation to the expectation. The middle column is the gap, which can now be used to document what actions can be taken to close the gap.

This simple structure can be used to turn the whining, moaning and complaining into a useful conversation. -TF

The meeting had come to a standstill. Oh, Marion was still talking, but no one was listening. No one was thinking, no one was contributing.

“Marion, stop!” There was an immediate startled moment in the room. “In one sentence, Marion, what is the issue we are talking about?”

“Well, it’s not really an issue, it’s just an update on the Phoenix project, just the stuff that happened last week.”

“That’s not true, Marion. This is not just a report on what happened last week. The Phoenix project is four weeks behind schedule, the clients pissed off and we don’t have a clue what is driving it into the ground.”

Simple exercise. Pair off the team members and give them the following assignment: Create twelve questions designed to expose what needs to be corrected on the Phoenix project. Only questions are allowed. Time frame: Six minutes to create the questions.

Six minutes later, this meeting had a dramatic change in mood, tempo and attitude. Marion was no longer comfortable responding to the questions. It is possible we were finally talking about something real. -TF

The response in the room was silence. Everyone counted, one, two, three, waiting for Jeanine to nod her head indicating that the discussion over. Today would be different.

The team knew that the less they contributed, the less they could be held accountable for. Jeanine would describe an issue or a problem, and then ask for ideas. No one ever had any ideas. No ideas meant no accountability. The team was not doing this on purpose. Most counterproductive thinking is done unconsciously.

Productive thinking requires conscious thought. It most often happens by design, rarely happens by chance. Jeanine’s statement of the issue played right into the hands of chance. “The customer is complaining that their product is always late, even though they know it was manufactured by the deadline. Does anyone have any ideas?” Chance of an idea? Fat chance.

We changed Jeanine’s question by simply making it more specific. “In what ways can we move the customer’s product from our manufacturing floor to the staging area and onto the truck in less time?” Suddenly, there were seven ideas.

Productive thinking happens by design. Make your question more specific. You will get more ideas. -TF

Joan was beside herself. She had taken over the business when her husband died two years ago. While she had a vested interest in the success of the company, she depended on her management team to provide direction, initiate action and measure results. They had just decided that the monthly management team meeting was boring, lacking substance and should be suspended to every other month. Of the eight people in management, only three truly participated, everyone else just watched, trying not to get in the way.

Instinctively, Joan knew the market was changing fast and they had a fierce competitor that decided to relocate not two miles away. Something had to be done to re-energize the group. It’s as if they had all gone brain-dead. Waiting sixty days to review progress and make strategic adjustments was out of the question.

Joan’s company had all the substance necessary, and the market turmoil surrounding them was far from boring. It was the meeting. A specific dynamic in the meeting had to change.

A recent development in management technology was about to transform everything. It is called the 3×5 card, and I suggested Joan use them in the following way. At the beginning of the meeting, Joan distributed the cards and asked each person to write down their one goal for the meeting. No talking allowed, just think and write, 60 seconds.

One minute later, Joan went around the table and asked each person to share what they had written. Instantly, the team went from three ringleaders and five pacifists to eight people with agendas. This is not a subtle difference. Joan was not satisfied with the first round, so she repeated the exercise. Now there were sixteen initiatives on the table. This was only the beginning for Joan and her team. -TF

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