Welcome to “Meeting Hell,” and Ten Ways To Climb Out of It

Ask anyone who has ever done time in the perpetual prison of corporate meetings. 

Ask anyone with a hard deadline what it’s like to be trapped by the sound of someone else’s pontification.

Ask anyone who didn’t need to be on the call what it’s like to try to get real work done while listening to others take off on meaningless, irrelevant tangents. 

Welcome to Meeting Hell.

This morning a fellow contributor on Medium.com wrote a piece on better meetings for Data Driven Investor (https://medium.com/datadriveninvestor/inefficient-meetings-7-secrets-to-better-meetings-69b686d538f8). While I agree with many of his ideas, I might add a few which could tighten up the travesty even more. 

Some of what I write here will echo a bit of Mr. Minute’s points, but stay with me here. 

From Meeting Failure to Meeting Your Goals

1. Never ever have a meeting without first setting a crisp, clear agenda. 
2. Never ever set a meeting without a crisp, clear end point. This meeting is one hour. A half hour. PERIOD.
3. Set your meeting rules. Here they are: 
4. If the material doesn’t directly impact you, you’re not invited. That doesn’t mean you don’t matter (get over yourself, please) but your presence isn’t required. If you think it does, you owe the organizer a valid reason, plus the benefit to the attendees for your presence. 
5. Each participant who has material to cover is required to cover it within a specific time frame. No excuses. PERIOD.
6. Set a Timekeeper. This is one of the most important roles at the meeting. If Jason has five minutes to cover X, the Timekeeper gives him a head’s up at two, then one minute. Then JASON HAS TO WRAP IT. Period. No arguments. The benefit to Jason is that over time, he learns to be more to the point. Succinct. 
7. You can use a Talking Stick. This is an ancient tradition which adds a bit of fun. The person holding the stick talks. Nobody else, unless they get the stick. This honors the right of the speaker, but when that speaker’s time is up, they have to put the stick down or hand it to the next speaker. This stops interruptions. 
8. Want a secret weapon? Assign a Relevancy Challenger. Want to keep your meetings on track? Tired unto death of people who take off on meaningless, irrelevant topics which eat hours and cause delays, resentment and lost time? Every meeting, one person has the responsibility to challenge anyone who brings up a topic that’s not on the agenda. That’s their job. Granted, initially it will annoy folks who want to grind an axe, but secretly everyone will love you for it. This allows meeting participants to protect the limited time assigned, the shared responsibility to stay on track, give value to those who’re attending, and ensure you meet your stated goals. One of the benefits is that eventually, the RC role is part of your meeting culture, along with the Timekeeper. Between them, because they are different folks each time, meeting quality becomes a shared responsibility. When folks start and end on time, people learn to be crisp and they don’t want to be called out publicly for being off-topic, you end up with well-run, on-time meetings that get to the point. An important part of the Rule of the Relevancy Challenger: They can challenge anyone, including the meeting organizer. If not, then what’s the point?
9. Both the Relevancy Challenger and Timekeeper cannot be the meeting organizer. Those roles change at every meeting and they are always held by attendees, not the manager. This ensures that the meeting’s quality is owned by the attendees. 
10. Solicit feedback in your followup. Keep asking how you did. How you could improve. Ask for input on what worked and why. Publish that to the attendees and then make appropriate changes if they are warranted. 

I agree with Martijn’s point that virtually no one is trained on how to run a meeting. However I might add this: the structures offered above tend to train us all how to be vastly more efficient in a variety of ways.

How We Show Up At Meetings Depends on our Style

Let’s consider: there are four basic Jungian archetypes, and two of them yammer a great deal. Those are the folks who will, if given the chance, take up the bulk of your time. Those concerned with team happiness, and those who love applause or who simply hate to relinquish the floor are your repeat offenders. Nothing wrong with that, it’s just that these behaviors in meetings are a good part of why they are so often unsuccessful. 

In and of themselves these qualities aren’t bad. In their own places, in fact, they are extremely valuable. It’s up to all of us to learn how to better self-manage.

But not in meetings. So where you’ve got folks who love to tell a story, set the ground rules right up front. If it’s not relevant, they will get cut off. No offense is intended. It’s about effectiveness. A great skill for these two types is learning how to deliver an executive summary of their main points as opposed to an endless litany of how they got there. Relevancy Challenge: that has nothing to do with the facts themselves. If people want that background, they’ll ask you for it. Have it ready. 

For the other two types, one likes to take over completely and run the show themselves. That can run roughshod over other contributors and dishonor their input. Your RC can take care of that, as do fair ground rules. By establishing who’s in ultimate charge (the one who called the meeting) and by using a talking stick, you can control those who have difficulty with boundaries. 

Finally, your last type doesn’t speak up at all. A talking stick, and a clear understanding of what that requires of the holder, goes a long way towards helping this person speak up. 

I’ve found that using RCs, Timekeepers and Talking Sticks not only works but they become fun. And funny. That kind of friendly laughter makes all the difference in the world, and it changes the meeting culture. The Relevancy Challenger of the day only needs to lift a finger before the speaker stops in mid-sentence and everyone laughs. That’s a gift. Impromptu joking scuffles over who has possession of the Talking Stick, same thing. Groveling for an extra thirty seconds in the face of the implacable Timekeeper? Hilarious. 

Those fundamental shifts make meetings fun. Now there’s a change of pace.

Finally, require people to practice. Why? Because it works.

I have an awful habit of talking vastly more than I need to. I’m well aware of it. That means that if I’m going to be a potent and valuable participant in a meeting I need to get CRISP.

My favorite model is this:

1. What’s my purpose (why am I/we here? What’s my point?
2. What’s my process? (how are we going to get there? Here’s our -brief-journey. What I’ll cover. 
3. What’s the payoff for you/us? (how do you benefit from this material)

This should take about 10-15 seconds MAX. 

Assuming I have buy-in from that, I follow my process to the letter. Say, 3–5 minutes of bulleted material. I practice this when I drive, over and over and over to make sure I only hit the salient points. I can hear myself wander and self-correct. For me, this is hard. That’s why I do it. That makes me welcome at meetings, especially for those who know how verbal I am. They know I’m committed to the larger good. 

The P-P-P Model is also a great meeting opener. 

Not only will those people learn to be better in meetings, they will learn to be better, period. Those skills spill over when they have to present to a CEO, COO or anyone else with a seven-second attention span. Not a bad byproduct. 

And boy, does that build confidence. And competence. Also, not bad byproducts.

Bad meetings are a bacteria in most corporations. Learning to manage crisp, powerful, valuable meetings makes you very effective, well-respected, well-liked. People will want to show up. 

And that, is indeed how you might define success.