The Most Valuable Part of a Meeting: What Happens Next. In Blackboard Fridays Episode 128, Jacob talks about Productivity. Need this implemented into your business? Talk to the international business advisor who can do exactly that – Contact Jacob, Learn More, or Subscribe for Updates.
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“The smart and quirky advisor who gets sh!t done in business.”
Since April 2006, I’ve been an international business advisor providing bespoke solutions for privately-owned businesses with 12-96 employees.
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Transcript
We dive in once again to the most in-demand topic of Blackboard Fridays: How to Make the Most of Meetings in Your Business.
For all the conversations we’ve had, we’ve never really explored what I consider to be the most valuable part of your meeting.
- It’s not setting the agenda at the start of a meeting
- It’s not the importance of the Chair to manage the energy, to create and maintain momentum
- It’s not even the regular scheduling of the meetings.
The most important part of a meeting in business is What. Happens. After. Because it’s only if that meeting impacts change, a change in understanding or a change in behaviour, that the meeting can be said to have value.
If you find yourself in your business with your team having the same old meetings and the same conversations going around and around, then you’re not making decisions, you’re not making change. You may be making recommendations, you may be having great ideas, but after the meeting nothing’s getting done, nobody’s being held accountable, and as a result those meetings are wasting everybody’s time.
Meeting Planning Flowchart
Today, I’m going to walk through a simple flowchart. Fans of mine (or maybe you saw Harmony explain this on the Como Legal Coaching Instagram channel) will recognise the link to Episode 71 where we talked about 5 Different Types of Communication in businesses. These happen in meetings as well and meetings often get held for the wrong reason, the wrong type of communication.
So let’s have a look at where we start.
Question #1: Is This Going to be One-Way Communication?
The very first question you need to ask yourself (as the meeting organiser or a leader with responsibility): “Is this going to be one-way communication?“. Basically, “Is this just me as the business owner or the team leader getting up and just talking at people?”
This one-way communication, not looking for input or discussion, is almost always either an “FYI” conversation or it means you just want to have a “Rant”, get something off of your spleen.
If that’s the case, you don’t want a meeting.
That one-way communication is something that can be done:
- Much better by email if it’s brief, if it’s something that can be communicated clearly without ambiguity and in only a few paragraphs, or
- Face-to-Face with only the key individuals that are involved, or cascading through the business where you share that with team leaders who then share that face-to-face, one-on-one with their teams.
The time of your team is far too valuable to turn one-way communication into a meeting that goes on and on and on to justify the half hour or the full hour time slot that you’ve scheduled.
Question #2: Who Needs to Be There?
So okay it’s not one-way communication, it is actually two-way conversation then the next question is: “Is the purpose of this mostly for me to gather data, to gather information?”
In other words “Is this the “Ask” type of communication?” where you have a lot of questions that you want answered.
If this is the case, then a meeting may still be the most effective way to achieve your outcome.
You have to ask yourself “Who needs to be there?”. If you’re going around different department heads for example, and asking them for their input their updates, do they all need to be there? Is that the best use of the time you / your business is paying for?
A great liberating decision that I brought to a lot of my clients over the years, is that somebody may be involved in a meeting but that doesn’t mean they have to be involved in the whole meeting. They might be able to come in for 15 minutes or for half the meeting, for the part that they’re required to be there, and suddenly their time while present is more effective, and their time in the day is a put to better use than sitting through a meeting where they don’t need to be there for part of the conversation while you’re asking a lot of questions of somebody else that isn’t relevant to them.
Question 3: Who is Documenting our Actions and Agreements?
Okay so it’s not one-way communication, you’re not gathering data, that means that you’re either looking to have a “Discussion”, or you’re looking to make a “Decision” about something in your business.
If it’s a discussion – this is where being a Chair capable of managing the energy, making sure that everybody’s heard, that we stick to tasks, is very very important.
You also need to be very very clear: If you’re having a discussion about something that you want to change, make sure everybody in that discussion knows who will ultimately make a decision to change.
- Are you having this discussion because you’re going to recommend or enforce a change,
- OR are you having a discussion so this group can come back at a later point and actually make a decision on that topic?
Get that clear and the discussion will be more effective, and you won’t keep having that discussion going around in circles.
Lastly the most valuable meeting type is one where you’re making clear decisions of about that change that is going to come after. If you’re having these meetings, and hopefully you’re having them on a regular basis, not discussing things that can be done in an email, but actually diving deep on things that can change and making recommendations, then you need to walk out of that meeting with a clear and documented to-do list or action list: Who is going to do What by When.
This must be documented, both agreed decisions and actions, so nobody says later “I didn’t understand,” “I didn’t realize,” or “I forgot.”
This is this accountability perspective for these meetings. Get the to-do lists and those agreements documented, get them communicated and shared through the business as soon as possible, and then hold people accountable.
Documentation Means Responsibility and Accountability
For too many businesses there is no culture of accountability. It feels like a difficult conversation, and then they wonder why their team don’t take responsibility and why things don’t change, or change as fast as they want.
There’s a connection here with the broader “5 Dysfunctions of a Team” model by Patrick Lancioni.
You can build a culture of accountability, where your team or at least the right members of your team, will step up and enjoy it. But how do you do that?
- Praise success in public. When somebody follows through, when somebody lives your culture, your vision, praise them in front of their peers.
- If somebody’s letting you down, call them on it but call them on it in private. Bring them in and if you’re having regular one-on-one meetings on a weekly or monthly basis, that’s the perfect way to do it in a non-confrontational way but make sure they know that you’ve seen them not pulling their weight.
- Make practicing what we preach, doing what we say we’re going to do, holding our promises, make that a documented and agreed behaviour as part of the culture in your business.
- Get everybody aligned to the fact that a Culture of responsibility is right at the pinnacle of the Layers of Context. This gives meaning to, sets the context for, everything else in your business. Responsibility is something that you as an organisation see as non-negotiable.
And it’s that non-negotiable which is the final point I will leave you with.
Accountability won’t work if you don’t hold people accountable. The behaviours and beliefs in your business will always sink to the lowest level that you tolerate – the levels you walk past are the standards that you set.
So if people don’t do what they say their going to do, if they don’t implement agreements, you have to hold them to account, because if you let it slide then they will consciously or subconsciously begin to realize that they don’t need to be accountable, that they don’t need to take responsibility.
Again, if nobody’s taking responsibility for taking your meetings back into the business to make change, then the meetings will be a waste of time and your business won’t achieve the outcomes that you desire.
Next Steps
Want to learn more about how this can apply to your business? It costs nothing to chat:
- Email me jacob@jacobaldridge.com (I read them all)
- Call, Text, or WhatsApp me +61 427 151 181
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