Everyone loves to rant about meetings and offer pithy advice.
"This could have been an email"
"Never invite more than 5 people"
"If there's no agenda, don't show up".
Meetings are (mostly) universally hated, but also necessary to some degree in order for collaboration to function: the problem is that nobody can agree on just how much.
I've been a manager for decades, with my own strengths and weaknesses. A couple of years ago one of my reports asked me candidly:
I hate meetings, but for some reason, I love coming to your weekly staff meeting. What's going on? Why is it different?
I had no answer at first. I had to spend a few days letting my subconscious ponder the question, before I came back with a detailed answer over lunch. I realized I was being very deliberate in the way I planned and executed my staff meeting:
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I always constructed an agenda beforehand, deciding exactly which topics and challenges I'd present to my reports.
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I was careful to only choose topics that were relevant to everyone in the room... so that nobody would ever get bored.
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At the start of the meeting, I'd always recap the status of previous decisions, and summarize where we had last left off.
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During the meeting, I always paid attention to the "spotlight" -- that is, who was speaking and had the attention of the moment. When necessary, I would deliberately move the spotlight to people who hadn't yet spoken, or seemed hesitant to speak.
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At every opportunity, I would try to avoid making unilateral decisions myself. Instead I would encourage the group to discuss, collaborate, and come up with a joint decision if possible.
If the title of this post hasn't already given it away, I'll state the obvious: my revelation is that all of these practices are exactly how I run D&D games as a Dungeon Master. Somehow, my decades of running gaming sessions had instinctively bled over into management techniques.
But in retrospect, it all makes sense too. All of these techniques are designed to keep participants maximally engaged, excited, and equitably included in the discussion. It makes the gathering feel important, useful, and something to look forward to.
Give it a try. See if it works for you.
published June 27, 2024