Tag: meetings

What Are We More Afraid to Miss?

~ Sasha ~ Leave a comment

Which scares us more:

  • Missing something, or
  • Not devoting enough time to the important things.

To explore this question, here’s a short parable of modern work life: how I manage my Inbox.

Starting 15 years ago, I established my current approach to my Inbox. It is based on the philosophy that there are two kinds of emails:

  1. Ones I need to act on
  2. Ones I don’t need to act on

The approach is brutally simple:

  1. The first group is unread
  2. The second is read.

No filing of any kind. Search works great. Zero inbox is meaningless; zero unreads is not. Voila!

This approach, plus ruthless use of the “mark as spam / block sender” functionality in my Gmail interface, has served me well for years.

Last week, for the first time in ages, I decided I needed to adjust my system.

I think it’s because of an explosion of workflow-related emails: Calendar updates, Calendly updates, Zoom meeting updates, Docusign updates, Box updates, AI recording updates, etc.

Combine this with the general flotsam of subscriptions of varying degrees of usefulness, and the ratio of must read:optional to read emails in my Inbox had gotten out of whack.

My solution to this is that I caved in to using filters in Gmail (I’m sure there are many better solutions (Superhuman, etc.).

What’s interesting is the experience of setting up those filters: it’s the task of taking every nonessential but interesting email and putting it somewhere other than my Inbox—the only part of my email world that I’ve looked at consistently for more than a decade.

The feeling is the same one I have when there’s an “internal meeting I could join but maybe don’t have to join.” You know the one: the content is important, you will probably learn something and maybe will make the meeting a little better. But do you absolutely need to be there?

The same goes for the Slack channel that’s been there forever that I rarely read; the client call that might be helpful to join even though someone else is running the meeting; the conference that I always attend, even though I can’t show concrete business results.

Most of us feel short on time—including time to be unproductive. We ache for open space, time to be generative, time to do the things that matter most… “once all this stuff is out of the way.” We tell ourselves that there’s no real way to create this kind of space.

One way to explore if this is true is to experience the fear of missing something: that essential email, that meeting where a wrong decision gets made, that photo op at the conference….

Perhaps that fear is justified, and the consequences would be significant.. Maybe success is defined by you getting to everything right on time; you being present to optimize each and every decision; you seeing all the edge cases and fixing them immediately. That might be what we need most from you.

Or it might be that there’s more resilience in the system than you expect.

That the cost of tracking and sifting through everything is real.

That setting a different bar for “what requires me” would create such a seismic, structural shift in your days and your weeks that it would be a little bit, or even a lot, disorienting.

This is what the sixth stage of Kevin Kelly is all about: “finding those things to which you are uniquely suited, and doing only those things.”

Not the places you can add value, not the things you are best at. The things that only you can do.

It’s a really high bar, and it cuts against the culture in most organizations.

It’s also worth exploring.

Use AI to Turn Meetings into Action

~ Sasha ~ 1 Comment

My friend Irwin reminded me today of two things:

  1. How good it feels to figure something out
  2. How dangerous that good feeling can be

Meaning, if you’re a thoughtful, analytical, caring person, there’s a significant psychological payoff in diagnosing something correctly.

Imagine this:

  • There’s something not quite right going on in your company / organization (someone is unhappy, some process isn’t working, some results are off)
  • You and a colleague or two get together to figure out what’s what
  • You have a great conversation and unearth important things
  • Voila! You come up with real clarity on what’s wrong and what needs to happen

That’s all great, but be careful about how good that “Voila!” feels.

What happens next, for many of us, is that we jump to the next thing: another meeting, another task.

And the risk isn’t simply that we’ll lose some of the texture or nuance of the clarity we had in the meeting, though that often happens.

The risk is the fact that the meeting feels like success. We got to the answer!

At the extreme, a great conversation that leads to no action is literally worthless.

Even if you don’t fall into this trap, is it possible that the psychological reward of experiencing that insight and clarity lead you to do 70%, or 60%, or 50% of what you need to do? Could it be less?

If so, I have a proposal for you.

  1. Start by scheduling differently. For any problem-solving meeting, keep the hour after the meeting free / scheduled for just you.
  2. In addition (optional), record the meeting with an AI tool. (You decide your comfort level with this; I’ve found it very helpful.) In addition, take whatever notes you’d normally take during the meeting.
  3. At the start of your scheduled hour after the meeting, go to your paid AI tool of choice. While everything is still 100% fresh in your mind, speak (not type) freely to the tool. What’s the problem you were trying to solve? What were the specific issues you worked through? What solutions did you come up with? Talk as you would talk to a colleague who would want to understand all the ins and outs. Lots of detail. All the little juicy bits. Everything.
  4. Finally, take that text and ask the AI to summarize what you’ve told it. Ask it to give you a well-defined structure: headline problem statement; detailed issues that were discussed; proposed solutions.

(Here’s a starter prompt: What I just described is the output of a 90 minute problem-solving meeting. Take that detail and write a structured summary of the headline problem, sub-issues, and all proposed solutions. Be as detailed as possible. Before you start, make sure to ask me for any additional context you need and/or any clarifying questions. I want you to be confident you understand everything I’m saying and my proposed solution.)

These steps—from your input to the first AI output—shouldn’t take more than 10 minutes: you talk for ~5 minutes, write a prompt, respond to questions from the AI tool, get the first summary. Now the fun begins.

Read the output the tool has given you and start working with and through the AI.

You might say/write things like “this point you made wasn’t quite right: [quote the point]. Here’s why:” and explain it in more detail. Do this both for things the AI didn’t explain well and for areas where reading the summary helps you see gaps you didn’t see before. Keep at it until you have a document you’re satisfied with. This step can easily take 30 minutes or more.

Once you’re mostly satisfied with the content, structure, tone, and detail, you’re ready to put the finishing touches on the document.

I find myself consistently asking the AI to be a more specific with its points / language / descriptions, and I inevitably go into the document and edit some parts myself. I also always ask for specific next steps, a timeline/workplan for all parties involved, and a 1-2 page executive summary.

Voila! again, but now your best thinking is turned into a detailed action plan. With this approach, you’re:

  1. Capturing, and acting on, that beautiful moment of insight you have at the end of a great meeting
  2. Seeing what a professional summary of those insights looks like, so you can make it better
  3. Forcing yourself to engage in further brainstorming to refine your idea
  4. Creating clear next steps and a timeline
  5. Documenting it all in ways that makes it easier for everyone to act

If before you were acting on 50% of your best thinking from the meeting, this approach gives you 150% or more.

10 Minute Meeting Hack

~ Sasha ~ Leave a comment

The next time you mess up your schedule, get wires crossed, or are simply slammed for time, turn your hourlong 1-on-1 meeting into a 10 minute one.

“I’m sorry, I messed up, we only have 10 minutes, what do we absolutely need to cover?”

Then cover it.

And see what happens with those remaining 50 minutes, for both of you.

This isn’t a profound idea, but it’s a really useful one.

Unless, of course, you file it away under “someday.”

Most of your meetings will be better if you…

~ Sasha ~ 1 Comment

Have a purpose.

State a purpose.

Execute on that purpose.

 

This means you know what success looks like for you, and you actually say it out loud to the person you’re meeting with. For example:

“I want to make sure we cover these three topics.”

“I wanted to connect because I really want to understand ________ from your perspective.”

“I’m hoping that by the end of this meeting we will finalize the partnership we’ve been discussing for the past six weeks, and that your company will commit to $1M of funding towards that partnership.”

I’m surprised how rare it is to hear people actually articulate their goals for a meeting.  Especially fundraisers.  Doing so doesn’t make you pushy, it makes you clear and effective.

 

You, Me, We

~ Sasha ~ 1 Comment

Some of the best advice I’ve heard on how to give feedback involves the simple switch from “you” phrases to “I” phrases, meaning switching from, “You weren’t as clear as you could have been today in making that point” to “I was confused by the points that you made today, and I didn’t feel like your message got across.”  It’s a small shift in language that helps create connection and a sense of shared ownership, instead of a feeling of judgment and separation.

Lately, I’ve found myself pining for a parallel shift of language in big meetings.

In meetings, among polite company, I challenge you to find a lot of “you” statements or a lot of “I” statements.  Safe meetings are the world of “we,” as in “we need to think about such-and-such” and “it’s important that we take action to correct this problem.”

Unfortunately “we” as a standalone doesn’t get us very far.  “We” abdicates responsibility and ownership and follow-though unless it is followed by “I,” as in, “We haven’t prioritized this important project, and what I’m prepared to do to help is….”

In feedback sessions gone awry, the conversation is all about the other person and how he needs to change.  In meetings gone awry, the group and the organization transform to a collective “we” separate from the people having the meeting.  We use safe language to create the illusion that “we” is anything other than a collection of “I”s who either will or won’t take steps – starting now, starting today – to make something else happen, something new happen, something hard and important happen.

There’s no “we” but you and me.

Some talk is cheap

~ Sasha ~ Leave a comment

The meeting you cancel because the topic has been covered, because the work is done, is a gift to everyone.

The meeting you never have because the conversation is too real or seems too hard – that is the real waste of time and opportunity.

It’s not time that’s scarce, it’s courage.

Anything else?

~ Sasha ~ 2 Comments

So often in meetings we claim that we want to hear from folks but actually communicate that we’d like them to stay quiet.

Open-ended questions, silences that last more than five seconds, smiling – people respond to those.

“Anything else?”   That provokes silence.

Meeting math

~ Sasha ~ 1 Comment

Not so long ago I strong-armed a bunch of my co-workers into reading one of the Domino books,  Read This Before our Next Meeting (free for Amazon Prime members).  The book is a diatribe against the meeting culture and all the associated time that’s wasted in poorly designed, poorly conceived, poorly run meetings.

It’s a book that you don’t necessarily enjoy reading, because the author, Al Pittampalli doesn’t care much if you like what he has to say, spending most of his energy hitting you over the head with anti-meeting diatribes without making the medicine go down too easily.

That said, the conclusions are hard to ignore: most meetings are inefficient, we are lazy about them, and we could be drastically more productive if we approached them differently.

My starting point is that we underestimate meeting time the way we underestimate the impact of copying 10 people on an email: it doesn’t feel like having 6 people in a 30 minute meeting is three hours of productive work that’s we’re using up.   But it is – so shouldn’t the organizer be obliged to spend at least a half hour of prep time each and every time he proposes to use 2.5 hours of his colleagues time?

The most aggressive suggestion in the book is that we should not use meetings to make decisions, we should use meetings to ratify decisions that have already been made.

The building blocks underneath that recommendation are: no meetings without prior agendas, no meetings without significant work done in advance by the meeting organizer, and no meetings without a proposed decision for the group to ratify.

Easy to say, but how often do we get a group together and someone says, “OK, we’re here to talk about…..”  That’s not the same as, “We’re planning to do _____, and this meeting is being called to ratify that decision.”

If that is the bar, you get a lot fewer meetings, a lot more preparation, a lot more time to do real work rather than sit in a room and talk.

(Bonus: the next time you get 20 people in the room for a 30 minute meeting, make sure you’re getting 10 hours’ worth of organizational impact out of that half an hour).

Telephonitis

~ Sasha ~ 16 Comments

Twice in the last week I’ve been on important conference calls where severe “telephonitis” set in.  “Telephonitis” is the process whereby otherwise conversant, engaged, active people become silent in the face of a group conference call.

Maybe someday videoconferencing will become the norm, but I think phone calls are here to stay – at least for the next few decades.

You probably conduct enough business with meetings by phone that this is worth correcting.  Here’s where you can start:

  1. Create an “in the room” role.  You assign someone (or have them spontaneously volunteer) to be the voice of the sentiment “in the room,” explaining to people on the phone what’s going on.  This person fills in the silences with comments like, “Yes, everyone agrees,” or “Angela, you look like you’re not convinced by that last remark, can you tell us what’s on your mind?”
  2. When silence starts to set in, start cold calling people.  This has two effects: making sure you’re hearing from people, and creating an incentive (for those who don’t like being called on) for people to speak up when they have something to say.
  3. Create a norm that when an important question comes up, you’ll go around the horn and ask everyone to say something
  4. Have people who are not “in the room” lead the call.  Keeps them engaged and validates that just because they’re on the phone doesn’t mean they are less important.
  5. Never equate silence with agreement. It’s bad enough to do this in person.  Worse still on the phone.
  6. Keep calls short.  More than 30 minutes on the phone and you’ve probably lost the person dialing in.
  7. Keep groups small.  Less than 4 is ideal, but 6 or fewer seems to work.  After that, see above.

It’s almost impossible to overestimate how hard it is for someone on the phone to stay engaged in a conversation without visual / physical cues as feedback.  And if the person on the phone is not engaged (if they are a listener) or not getting feedback (if they are a speaker), you’re missed the entire point of a meeting – to inform the people who are on the call and, often, to get their input or assent to a set of decisions.

And one last suggestion: if you’re asking people to call in to a conference call at an inhumane time (very early or very late), be religious about starting the call on time.  It’s the easiest way to show respect for people who aren’t in the room.

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How busy should you be (the 125% rule)?

~ Sasha ~ 3 Comments

Whatever amount of time you set aside for work, you don’t want to be 100% busy.  You don’t want just enough work so you can get it done in the time you’ve set aside.  You want more.

How much more?  Lately I think the right amount is around 125% – that is, having 25% more work to do than you could really get done.

If you handle this in the right way, it forces you to work both smarter and faster: smarter comes from being forced to triage and put the most important things at the top.  Faster comes from learning to spend the right amount of time on things, which means less time for things that are less important (without throwing quality out the window).  Faster also comes from learning to say ‘no’ politely to things that you should say ‘no’ to (e.g. meetings you don’t need to attend); and smarter comes from making time for new things that could be great, knowing that something will be sacrificed in the meantime.

There’s a limit, of course.  200% busy is a disaster…it means the end of your personal time and your sanity, and it’s completely unsustainable.  I started my career as a management consultant with a 200% job.  I learned a ton, but I was always exhausted, I essentially sacrificed my personal life, and I never could have kept that up for the decades it takes to build a career.  And 25% is mind-numbingly boring (it’s possible – I actually had a job that devolved into this), not to mention you’ll never produce enough to get anywhere professionally.

So if you’re at 100% and have been asked to do more, take advantage. Don’t be afraid to work hard. And if you haven’t been asked to do more, find somewhere to jump in and do more.

What does 125% feel like?  It feels like (usually) controlled chaos…”usually” because there are always ebbs and flows, so if you’re normally at 125% you’ll have some 150% peaks that are very hard to manage.  125% is a little overwhelming, but it’s also exciting.  You’re stretched, you’re pushed, you’re learning.   And you’ll discover that you can get a lot more done than you thought possible.

(Oh, and if you hadn’t noticed, this is part of the reason that having a job you hate makes it very hard to be very successful.  Success comes from a lot of things, but hard work is part of the answer.  Think about how painful it is to work really hard for 10, 20, or 30 years at something you basically dislike or don’t care much about.)