I have been doing a lot of reading recently on topics such as "Death by Meeting" and how to hold meetings that are both productive and enjoyable.
There are two things that have really stuck with me that are really simple, but things that we often neglect and don't sit down and discuss.
1. UNDERTSTAND FIRST, THEN AGREE
I was priveleged to be part of a mission building exercise at Nagoya International School (NIS) a few weeks ago. The school was smart, and employed a very experienced facilitator to help them build their mission, and subsequent strategic objectives and strategies.
What was really interesting amongst a very long 2 day session, was that 1.5 days were spent understanding each other, before things were decided. 30 people in a room with different views on the way the school should go, and we spent just half a day actually deciding on the missions and other details. The rest of the time was spent thoroughly trying to understand everyone's positions and opinions. If you had something to say, you had to explain why and get everyone's understanding.
From there, getting agreement on the best direction to go was amazingly easy amongst a group of 30 people. How tough do you find it getting agreement between 5 people in a meeting?
LESSON 1: You must get everyone to understand each other. Most people just want to be understood. They are not necessarily inflexible to doing things differently from the way they would do them; if they are understood. This makes incredible sense, but someone in a meeting needs to facilitate getting everyone to put out their feelings and opinions and explain "why". If there is no "why", it is not an opinion, but simply a blocker tactic. You can easily get rid of blockers by putting them on the spot and asking "why". No reason; the opinion gets thrown out.
2. CONFLICT IS A GREAT THING
The book I was reading talked about a meeting being like a movie. Movie's are exciting, but meetings generally aren't. Why? Well movies are made by smart people who know how to build conflict. Conflict creates tense situations and engages people in the story.
Meetings on the other hand, often don't have conflict at all. People generally try to end a meeting without conflict, so they can get out of there quick! So, in order to have meaningful meetings, ones that engage people, you need to have conflict!
LESSON 2: You must have disagreement in meetings to make them enjoyable. This means you must have people challenging each other, or as per above, you must have people initially not understanding each other. This means creating an environment where people can share their actual opinions on things and allow others to ask questions about those opinions. Once again, sounds really simple, but it is amazing how often it doesn't happen.
These two simple things, if better understood by all members of your organization, are invaluable to creating a environment whereby both opinions are shared and decisions are made. The ground rules need to be explained, and people need to be "adult enough" with each other to know that sharing a different opinion and not likeing a person are completely different. If you can have your staff understand that others are entitled to their own opinions and that understanding them is a great thing, you have won half the battle, and can have really engaging and exciting meetings rather than death.
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