Tame the Meeting Monster
Do you suffer from meeting mania? Is the meeting you just scheduled really necessary? What are your alternatives? Do you need to convey a message? Put it in a memo. Do you have to make an urgent decision? Take executive action yourself. Do you need group input? Call one or two individuals and survey their feelings. At Paramount Flag Company, the executives don’t have formal meetings because they get together to open the mail every day. President Christophe Morin says, "It only takes half an hour, forty-five minutes at most. And we never have to have formal meetings, because we get together every day." The idea came from Paramount’s parent company, Doublet, a $30 million French manufacturer whose executives also get together every morning at mail time.

Since there is often a huge time commitment involved, meetings either add some thing to a person’s life or take something away. Sadly, for many people, it's the latter, and too often, when the meeting is over, the feeling is one of relief. In this fast-paced world, meetings can be an ideal forum for making decisions. Yet meetings often end up as buffers, as a convenient way to avoid making a choice, taking a stand, or reaching a decision.

Provide Relief from the Pressure Cooker
Our goal is to build productive, healthy companies. Not to do more of the same. Meetings that stretch beyond their point of productivity, meetings that are held "just because," and frequent, important "sacred cow" meetings steep us deeper in time’s pressure cooker. Watch out, because the lid at your place could blow off!

Here are three more innovative ways not to hold a meeting:

• Institute a "meeting patrol team" to inspect the conference room hourly. Fine any groups that overstay the hour limit.
• Create an outrageous reward system for the person or department holding the fewest meetings per week.
• Purchase a nifty phone system that makes it easy and fun to receive and leave messages. Get creative with your voice-mail system by rotating greetings that "spoof" the boss.

Centuries-Old Pitfalls
Whether you are observing through the "looking glass" or facing meetings on a daily basis, you will notice that common traps plague most meetings. Let’s take a look at the most-cited drawbacks of meetings as reported in a recent survey we conducted with executives across the United States and Canada. Are any of these common barriers evident at your meetings?

• Apathy and boredom
• Running overtime
• Straying from one subject to another
• Talking at the same time
• Disruptions and personal attacks
• Win-lose approaches in decision making
• Unclear roles and responsibilities
• Chaos
• Lack of preparation and/or follow-up

"Mad as Hell" About Meetings?
Just how upset were executives, managers, consultants, and board presidents about meetings? I wanted to know, so we questioned them and found an enlightening answer. Although I thought my desk would be burning with red-hot anger pouring from the survey sheets, surprisingly, I found that not to be the case across the board. Instead, there was almost a counterbalance on each end of the scale. Eighty-one percent of the executives from small companies (0-10 employees) felt "not at all" to "somewhat" mad about meetings, while 53 percent of executives from large corporations (500+ employees) ranged from "somewhat" to "mad as hell" about meetings. It appears that in small organizations the meetings are better focused, are more efficient, and provide consistent ongoing follow-up to the participants, thus producing more powerful results.

Go Ahead and Hold a Meeting, But ... !
"Although meetings should be a management tool," states George David Kieffer in Success Magazine, "they sometimes become weapons in the hands of terrorists, holding hours of salaried time hostage." Understanding and applying the basics of the Thunderbolt Model can help to alleviate the threat of holding your employees or anyone else hostage. I summarize the basics this way:

1. Prepare, then tighten your focus on exactly what you want to accomplish.
2. Construct a blueprint to follow and have a timepiece handy.
3. Mix the right brains together, splashed with a dash of fun.
4. Call them into action.

This really boils down to one essential for me: preparation. Don’t get confused; preparation is not just a before-meeting task. You must continually "prepare" for each stage of the meeting: before, during, and after. In our "Mad as Hell" survey, I was pleased to see the distribution of time spent on meetings. The results indicated that of the 49 percent of overall time people spent in meetings, 12 percent was spent in preparation; 25 percent was spent in the actual meeting, and 12 percent was invested in the follow-up.

"Invested" is exactly what I mean, because every meeting sends a message. The message you want to transmit is: "It was worth it to attend." Preparation ahead of time ensures that you’ll have strong follow-up on the agreed-upon actions. Transforming meeting hours into action steps becomes an exceptional investment for those who attended, you and others in your organization.

Prepare More, Excel More
The following are ideas for polishing your preparation skills:

• Establish this "golden rule" for all meetings: know precisely what you want to accomplish in every single meeting you run or attend.
• Create a solid agenda, but not one set in cement. Keep it pliable so you can adjust, flex, and stretch it as needed. Keep a flexible focus.
• Put as much information into a visual format as possible. We retain visual stimuli about 85 percent more effectively than if we just hear it. Draw pictures, diagrams, charts.
• Visualize. Mentally walk through the various scenarios for each stage of the meeting. Picture the outcome you want.
• Help others: send out the agenda and other pertinent documents prior to the meeting, formulate key questions that will help prime the participants’ thought processes, and deliberately ask for their commitment to action before they enter the room.
• Hold a dress rehearsal. Mike Allred, CEO and president of Visual Information Technologies, Inc., a graphics-imaging company in Dallas, Texas, wanted to stop employee gossip about his monthly board-of-directors’ meetings, so he decided to hold dry runs of the meetings with his staff of ninety. "It goes over like gangbusters," says Allred. "Delivering the same spiel we give the board shows we respect employees’ participation." Employees ask tough questions, which gears management up for the real McCoy the next day.

Create a "Rules of Trust" Model
Many employees work their entire lives and never experience a positive meeting. What a waste! Not just of time, but of the talent that could have been developed in each one of them. "There I was in a meeting with my key manages trying to figure out what employees wanted," says Sally Tassani, founder of Tassani Communications, Inc., in Chicago. "I realized I should ask them myself. Boy, was I surprised." She learned in her first meeting with employees that a benefits package she had been agonizing over wasn’t worth the effort. "The meeting was so successful that I decided to do it on a regular basis," Tassani says. Now she meets with a board of about ten employees twice monthly.

Think about it, then wipe the slate clean. Now is when you have the opportunity to break the "monotonous meeting syndrome." Put away the Robert’s Rules of Order and install Rules of Trust that focus on building on each other’s ideas, instill commitment, and call for action.

Start Now -- The Power Is in the Moment
For your next meeting, make a mental note of these eight items and weave them into your thoughts as well as into the actual agenda. Well-functioning groups have:

1. Clear role definition: Participants know why they are together, what their purpose is, what the organization expects of them, and what they need to do.
2. A high level of sensitivity: Members demonstrate sensitivity and understanding of others’ needs and expressions. They listen to and respect others’ opinions.
3. A relaxed atmosphere: An informal exchange occurs between members. The discussions flow freely rather than tensely or formally.
4. Good time control: The leader pays attention to time. The meeting stops and starts as scheduled, unless participants have willingly agreed to extend the time.
5. An interruption-free environment: Participants have committed their attention to the meeting. There are few delays or interruptions.
6. Acknowledgment of contributions: The leader and participants recognize the individual contributions being made.
7. Group check-ups: Participants and the leader continually evaluate group performance. They adjust the agenda as needed.
8. Lots of laughter: All the members of the group are able to have a good laugh at themselves and others.

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