Do These Look The Same To You?

When it comes to meetings, you may think that a meeting is a meeting is a meeting. And that's where things go horribly wrong.

Have you ever been in one of those meetings where someone drones on and on, standing on their soapbox, sharing their opinion, and chafing everyone's patience by insisting that they're the only one with an answer? Me, too. Or maybe you've been in a meeting where a critical, time-sensitive decision needs to be made, but the room is full of people whose whole role is to research, explore, and create?

You Need A Purpose In Life...and In Your Next Meeting.

There are three kinds of meeting - and each one serves a different purpose. Mix them together at your peril.

The first is the information or status meeting. This meeting is meant only to deliver information. Questions are acceptable, but it isn't meant for decision-making, debates, or generation of new ideas. The people in the room are everyone who needs to be informed. The other types of meetings may require that attendees have special information or skills or responsibilities.

The second type is the innovation, ideation, or creation meeting. At these, you need a problem to solve, so it will require answers in advance to questions such as, "who are we solving this for?" and "what resources do we have at our disposal?" Attendees may need specialized skills to inform all or part of the process. Not everyone needs to be there for the whole meeting, but just-in-time access is really helpful.

And the third? That's the decision-making meeting. If you've ever been part of a design sprint, you'll know that they have access to people, information, and resources to make decisions easier. They also use a decider, a person who ultimately has, or takes, responsibility, if there are problems getting to a decision. This not only keeps the process flowing, but it means that you can avoid compromise, which can be deadly in this sort of meeting.

Once you know which kind of meeting you are having, make sure you have the right people, the right space, and the right resources, and you won't have to worry about any messy explosions around the boardroom table. (At least not that have been caused by you).

I'm Megann Willson and I'm one of the Partners at PANOPTIKA. We work together with our clients to help them find, understand and keep customers. If you're looking for help making better decisions that put your customer at the centre of your thinking, we'd love to hear from you. For more ideas and news, you can follow us here on LinkedIn, on Twitter, or on Facebook.