Deciding where to have your meeting

The room and it’s layout can speak volumes about how much you value the meeting and the ideas of those assembled. 

Nancy Kline says ‘The room should say you matter’. I’m a big fan of the drama the ‘West Wing’ in one episode a new staff member at the White House is shown her new office. She is based in the ‘Steam Pipe Trunk Distribution Venue’. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkaNWkgrfxQ) It’s a cupboard, with pipes in. She’s been given the office because her views are the political opposite to those she is working with, the awful office space is a symbol of the lack of respect held for her. She is shown to her office by the White House Chief of staff. He is escorting her to her new office somewhere in the basement and well away from the Oval Office and the other characters in the show. His actions in escorting her, and his kind words leave Ainsley with a very different first impression. That she is valued, despite what the physical surroundings suggest. Through out subsequent episodes the location of her office is the butt of many jokes. It’s because the room says she doesn’t matter. It takes a lot to overcome that. 

Think about the spaces you have available for meetings. Some might be nice plush meeting rooms with comfy seats, breakout areas with sofa’s, or specially designed rooms with whiteboard walls and bean bags. Other spaces might be less sophisticated, but you can still communicate to people that they matter. That can be through providing refreshments, setting up the room before hand, or being welcoming to people as they arrive. 

Before your next meeting, think about what you can do to communicate to people that they matter. When have you felt valued and what has the space you have been in done to contribute to this?

There might be times when meeting off site can be a great advantage. A client wrote on an evaluation recently, that they would have found it easier to concentrate on learning and to think more clearly if they had not been learning in their regular office space. Sometimes taking people away from their regular space can help them think in a different way. 

Think about where you meet, and how you lay out the space to be able to allow the room to say ‘you matter’.