Win In Meetings Before They Begin

Early in my career I was deathly afraid of getting shut down live and in person in a meeting. I worked for a company that managed people Up, or Out. I had to develop strategies to be seen as a “up-and-comer”.

I quickly decided on one tool that was immensely valuable.

And I had two things going for me:

1)     The understanding that meetings are absolutely the worst place in the world to ask someone for their opinion. Sometimes what you’re asking needs a day or two of thought. If another person gets singled out for their thoughts, they don’t want to be embarrassed either. Who knows how they’ll react?!

2)     Decent people skills.

To begin, I made sure that I was always ready for the meeting several days in advance and I’d speak face-to-face with each person who was stakeholder on that line item for the meeting.

I found that giving people a private viewing of the topic gave them time to think about it. In that private conversation we could brainstorm and I could hear the other person’s concerns without either of us being tied to one idea.

Secondarily I gained their insight on how to navigate the room. Whereas one stakeholder might not have a significant opinion the topic they could offer insight into why others might care quite a bit.

There were huge benefits in this...

Very often the people I was meeting with outranked me on the org chart. Hearing their concerns ahead of time gave me the opportunity to resolve them, or at least account for them in some way when I spoke at the meeting. I never surprised anyone in a meeting.

Because I kept the private one-on-ones private I began to be seen as someone who could be trusted. People came to me to bounce ideas off of, and they never broadsided me in a meeting. Everyone benefited from this professional courtesy.

The private one-on-ones made the meetings go faster while we covered my agenda item.

Looking back on it, the approach of pollinating my ideas was incredibly beneficial when it came to executing on my goal package every year. When the meeting required a consensus, we could get there with confidence and without delay which meant that I could take action as soon as we walked out of the room.