Unless you are planning to rob a bank, skip the meeting intros

I walked into the meeting and spotted an open seat. It was just about to begin. I didn’t recognize anyone, but that wasn’t a surprise. The subject line of the meeting read “Project Kickoff” and I hadn’t recognized the names in the invite. I nodded a polite hello to the person next to me. The meeting leader suggested we “go around the room and introduce ourselves,” adding “I’m not sure if everyone in the meeting knows each other, so…”.

I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. Intros always give me anxiety. Also, aside from the subject line in the meeting invite, I still wasn’t quite sure what this meeting was about. The first person to introduce himself didn’t seem sure either, so he went into just about every detail of his career and background. After that onslaught, the second person was less forthcoming with the personal details. She appeared frustrated at having to introduce herself and seemed to just want to get to work. The third person did seem to know what the meeting was for. As he talked I froze in fear. I’d somehow ended up in the wrong conference room and this was not my meeting. I furiously debated my next move. Judging by the pace of intros, I had about 3 minutes to make my move before my turn came along and all eyes would be on me.

There was Option A. I could just power through it, introduce myself in very general terms and sit through the rest of the meeting quietly. I’d commit to nothing, leave at the end and pray to never see these people again. But I worried I would see some of them again. I also had no idea how long this meeting was. What if it was all day? What if lunch was being delivered soon? How long could I continue to live this lie?

Option B was to use my intro to explain that I’d just figured out I was in the wrong meeting. I’d make a clever joke about how this one seems way better than the one I was supposed to be in and how I wished I could stay. I’d get a good laugh and strut out confidently. (2 minutes til my turn…) Option B terrified me. What if no one laughed?

I could go with Option C and just get up and leave before my turn. If I was ninja-like, maybe I could make it to the door before anyone noticed. (1 minute left…) I made my decision. I leaned over to the stranger next to me and whispered that I thought I was in the wrong meeting. They gave me a confused look that didn’t help my confidence. I quickly got up, avoided eye contact with everyone and sped to the door. As the door closed behind me I peeked back to see people looking at each other curiously with raised eyebrows and disapproving shrugs. Fortunately for me, they didn’t seem to know each other well enough to call out my awkward exit. I breathed a sigh of relief as I walked down the hallway in search of my actual meeting.

It’s possible that I was too traumatized by that moment so many years ago to ever feel good about intros, but I’ve questioned the value of meeting introductions for my entire career. I used to chalk it up to being anxious about public speaking or just being uncomfortable talking about myself. But over the years I’ve spoken on stage in front of thousands, often to tell them about myself. It wasn’t that.

I realized that this feeling was rooted in a belief that introductions at the start of a meeting were usually unnecessary, often counterproductive and sometimes hurtful to the meeting.

There are a few personas that tend to emerge during meeting introductions.

The Outspoken Expert (O.E.)

This persona has a lot of experience in the topic that was in the meeting subject line. “Social Media Marketing Planning — Kickoff” you say? Well you are in luck folks, because the Outspoken Expert has done it all, and done it well. And way more than you ever could. And you are about to hear all about it during intros.

The Quiet Expert (Q.E.)

This persona also has plenty of experience in the topic area, though they are less likely to brag about it in the intro. They may mention a couple of past jobs or projects they were a part of, but usually someone else jumps in to sing the praises of the Quiet Expert. “Oh, you are just being modest Karen! Folks, Karen pretty much wrote the book on supply chain management!”

The High Ranking Official (H.R.O.)

This persona likely leads with their title. “I’m the Vice President of Eastern Regional Regions” They make it clear that they outrank nearly everyone in the room. They may even point out that a few in the meeting work for them. “Some of my team is here as well…”

The Very Important Person (V.I.P.)

Slightly different from the H.R.O., this persona has shit to do. You should be honored they even showed up. He will introduce himself, but consider yourself lucky to hear that intro. He will look up from the phone, but continue to furiously type on that phone while sharing the introduction, because he’s a fucking beast at multitasking.

The Deferential One(s) (D.O.)

These people may work for the H.R.O. or with the O.E., Q.E. or V.I.P. and they know their place. They will introduce themselves and quickly make it known that they feel lucky to be basking in the glow of the rest of these impressive people.

The Life Story Teller (L.S.T.)

Bless their heart. They have good intentions and the 10 minute career recap really does come from a good place. They just don’t want to leave out a single detail just in case someone in the meeting needed that information about them.

I believe that introductions are the on ramp for all of these personas, and their establishment leads to a less productive meeting. There are many problems with doing introductions at the beginning.

1. If you are there to come up with ideas or try to figure out a problem, intros will quickly limit the input to just the H.R.O., O.E. or V.I.P. Surely they know the most and have the best ideas and why are the rest of you even here?
2. It derails the meeting at the beginning. Occasionally the meeting leader will attempt to place strict parameters around intros. “Share your name, what city you are from and what you had for breakfast”. That may go quickly for the first or second person, but by the 3rd person it becomes an all out share-off to see who had the most impressive breakfast.
3. It delays the start of the actual meeting. People probably have an idea why they are there, but if you start with intros, everyone has to sit patiently wondering if they even showed up to the right meeting.

Many times, a round of intros at the start of a meeting is an indicator that there was no plan in place for the meeting. It’s very common. Meeting organizers feel like a meeting needs to happen (or are told it needs to happen by someone else). They find a time on the calendar, invite people who probably should be there, add a subject line and check that task off their list. Then the meeting rolls around and the meeting leader quickly realizes that they don’t really have a plan.

There are different types of meetings with different inputs and objectives, and a one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t work. [more on meeting types here] Without a clear plan in place, meeting leaders tend to rely on intros, hoping that as people introduce themselves, ideas will get shared, dominance will be established, and a plan will somehow materialize. The personas show themselves, and a “meeting” happens.

Not all intros are bad. Take a bank robbery for example. If you were attending the kickoff meeting to rob a bank, it’s probably important to know the background of the others on the bank robbery team. You might start with intros because you probably want to know exactly how many years of safe cracking experience Sarah has. Or whether Carlos is from the area and knows the backroads he may need as the getaway driver. It’s rare, but occasionally intros can add value. In most business settings though, I think you can be more productive without them.

I realize this may be a controversial stance, so I propose an alternative.

Outros

Instead of doing introductions at the start, save them for the last five to ten minutes of the meeting. Start with the objectives and just get to work. It may be uncomfortable, but you’ll see some surprising benefits.

• You’ll give everyone a chance to start on a level playing field. “The Deferential Ones,” who may have valuable input, are more likely to share since they don’t know everyone else.
• The “Life Story Tellers” will have the time pressures of the end of the meeting to help them remain concise.
• People won’t know if there are any “Experts” in the room, so they may be more likely to offer up their perspective with less fear that it will be torched by someone else.
• It also just saves time overall. Looking at you, “Life Story Teller”.

Outros near the end of a meeting still give the meeting leader the option of asking everyone to go around and introduce, or “outroduce,” themselves. The difference now is that there’s context. People can decide what would be relevant to share. “I’m Bill and I recently worked on a similar project. We made some mistakes there so I’ll be sure to share what we learned as we go.” Excellent, Bill! That sounds great.

It is possible I’m still licking my wounds from that awkward meeting exit long ago. But I’m guessing if you’ve read this far, some of this article has resonated with you. Still, maybe this “no-intro” approach seems too extreme. Maybe you would prefer to ease in by limiting intros to just names and titles? Maybe. But that can quickly devolve into the same old share fest. If you are worried about taking a risk, think about this.

What if I’d started this article with a long paragraph about my background and every step of my career path, including detailed, randomized examples of some projects I’ve worked on? Would you have kept reading?

I know it’s scary, but I encourage you to take the leap. It can be so freeing and productive. And if it all goes wrong, just blame this stupid article!