Meeting Effectiveness – Dan Greer

When Do We Actually Need To Meet In Person

Dan Greer — Mon, 02 Aug 2021 14:35:28 +0000

In my last post I talked about the importance of alignment with your communication platforms and the activities you are trying to resolve. The days of all the team members meeting to share information updates and to take the time to hear from everyone are over.

Meetings will need to be smaller with hybrid temporary working groups and the use of project management software is essential for keeping everyone up to date. This post by Rae Ringle is excellent and should be a must read and share for all team leaders:

“Three days in the office, two working from home? Or two weeks in the office, then two at home (or some other, more alluring remote locale)? Everyone in all the time, like in 2019?

These are some of the options leaders are considering as they grapple with what going back to work should look like. Some of these new arrangements are landing uneasily. At Apple, for example, employees are pushing back against a policy requiring them to be in the office three days a week, describing a “disconnect between how the executive team thinks about remote/location-flexible work and the lived experiences of many of Apple’s employees.”

7 Strategies To Break Down Silos In Big Meetings

Dan Greer — Mon, 26 Jul 2021 14:54:57 +0000

For far too long, teamwork was dominated by the idea of collaboration. Initially, that meant everyone needed to know everything and be involved to give input. This led to too many meetings wasting time with F.Y.I type information and it takes time to make sure everyone has contributed.

Today that thinking has been reduced significantly and the new challenge is how to get critical path work done without needing everyone in the room. The leadership strategy of building hybrid teams across multiple divisions and reporting lines is critical. This HBR post is excellent:

“When members of multidisciplinary teams are asked to describe their colleagues, many will say their peers are collegial, professional, and accomplished. While we would all love to be on a team that’s not dysfunctional, behind this insipid description lurks a peril that is far from bland: the lack of collaboration between siloes.”

How To Create The Perfect Meeting Agenda

Dan Greer — Thu, 05 Mar 2020 16:15:41 +0000

One of the most significant factors that leads to both loss of productivity and incredible frustration is ineffective meetings. Too many meetings that accomplish nothing more than information updates can destroy team collaboration and personal leadership development. Great meetings ask questions, solve problems and build trust. This HBR post is a must read for leaders:

“Read any book on running effective meetings and, chances are, one of the first recommendations is going to be to set an agenda. Managers are often led to believe that having a written plan is the key for an engaging and successful meeting. Sadly, it’s not that easy. Research has actually found little to no relationship between the presence of an agenda and attendees’ evaluation of meeting quality. What matters is not the agenda itself but the relevance and importance of what’s on it, and how the leader facilitates discussion of the agenda items.”

Protect Your Time At Work By Setting Better Boundaries

Dan Greer — Fri, 13 Dec 2019 15:35:28 +0000

Some of us have to be available all the time based on our roles and responsibilities. For most of us however, we are not disciplined enough to set the necessary boundaries to make sure we get the important work done. This requires blocking time for deep work and not wasting time in unproductive meetings. This HBR post will help:

“Your late afternoon meeting scheduled for an hour has crept over the 75-minute mark with no clear end in sight. You know you still have a time-sensitive email to send off, and now you’re going to have to make the choice between leaving late or pulling out your laptop after dinner. On the outside, you’re polite, participating in discussion and responding thoughtfully to your coworker who is running the meeting. But on the inside, you’re annoyed. This person just took a giant step over your time boundaries.”

How Leaders Can Communicate So Everyone Understands

Dan Greer — Sun, 03 Nov 2019 14:50:39 +0000

I have always been shocked to find out later that what I intended to say was not at all what was heard. Especially, when I have worked on a project for months and others are hearing it for the first time. One of the most important points in this post is to ask people what they are hearing before we move on to execution. Forbes does great work:

“One of my favorite quotes to remember as a leader is from Peter Drucker. He said, “Communication is in the mind of the recipient. You’re just making noise if the other person does not understand you.” Unfortunately, we see a lot of leaders out there who are just making noise, failing to really communicate to their teams because they are not focused on ensuring understanding.”

Six Questions To Help You Avoid Wasting Time In Meetings

Dan Greer — Sun, 22 Sep 2019 13:22:52 +0000

As an executive coach, I can learn more about a leader’s potential watching them in a meeting than anywhere else. If they are using best practice’s effectively in this environment, then I rarely ever have major challenges in any other area. This Forbes post as always is spot on:

“How many times have you walked away from a meeting frustrated because you’re unclear on what just happened? How many times have you gotten back to your desk and thought, “Okay, now what am I supposed to do?” Or “that was a colossal waste of time.” Researchers estimate that senior managers attend nearly 23 hours of meetings every week. Like most people, you don’t have time to waste on unproductive, unclear and useless meetings.”

To Build An Inclusive Culture, Start With Inclusive Meetings

Dan Greer — Wed, 18 Sep 2019 20:04:23 +0000

There is absolutely nothing worse than asking for collaboration, when it is nothing more than everyone having an opportunity to participate. The goal of meetings should be mutual involvement with the intent of making a contribution. Meeting effectiveness and organizational culture are both hot topics. This HBR post hits both:

“Chances are you’ve attended a meeting today. Was it time well spent or a soul-draining exercise in futility? Although no two meetings are the same, their collective impact on the culture of a company is significant. Meetings matter. They are the forum where people come together to discuss ideas, make decisions, and be heard. Meetings are where culture forms, grows, and takes hold.”

The Most Productive Meetings Have Fewer Than 8 People

Wed, 27 Jun 2018 06:00:08 +0000

My soap box these days is that there is an over value given to collaboration. I see too many people spending time in long meetings for the expectation that everyone being involved will produce the best results. In my experience that is almost never the case. This HBR post drives home one critical aspect of why this is true:

“There are many problems with the way most meetings are run. One of the most political is the invite list. Deciding who to include can be tough but too many managers default to including everyone. In an effort to not make anyone feel left out, they unknowingly decrease the quality of the meeting. Robert Sutton, a professor of organizational behavior at Stanford University, looked at the research on group size and concluded that the most productive meetings contain only five to eight people. Why? There is a tipping point beyond which the quality of the conversation begins to erode.”

5 Common Complaints About Meetings And What To Do About Them

Fri, 08 Jun 2018 06:00:42 +0000

Meetings can be the most expensive waste of time within your organization. On the other hand, they can be the most effective strategic platform for collaboration and sustaining your competitive advantage in your market. So with those two extremes representing either potential failure or incredible potential for innovation, pay attention to Paul Axtell’s great post:

There are specific complaints that can be tackled, however. When I ask people in the workshops I lead what they most want help with, five issues consistently come up:

One or two people dominate the conversation and no one does anything about it.
My boss doesn’t lead meetings effectively.
Most of our meetings are just passing along information that could easily be sent in an email. We don’t talk about real issues.
No one is paying attention because they’re on their phones or laptops.
We keep having the same conversations because nothing gets done between meetings.

5 Ways To Make Sure Your Meeting Will Be Productive

Wed, 07 Feb 2018 06:00:48 +0000

There is nothing worse than a bad meeting. The lost productivity for everyone in the room not to mention the ongoing withdrawals of trust are painful. In a collaboration culture they are necessary but they must be prioritized for maximum effectiveness. This Fast Company post is helpful:

“Meetings can be the bane of working life, but they don’t have to be a waste of time if you ask yourself a series of questions before every meeting, and only attend meetings that are really necessary. So before you click “accept” on that new calendar invitation, look out for these signs that indicate it’s not going to be a waste of your time.”