Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Today we will learn how Tiffany Ferris's experiment with transparency became a fascinating look in the mirror
Speaker 1 00:00:08 And how Cory Munden will make his organization's meetings more meaningful.
Speaker 2 00:00:12 Welcome to the Epic Agility Leadership podcast series where you embark on a journey of business agility and leadership evolution with your hosts Ron Labio and Lisa Atkins, who help you face today's leadership challenges head on.
Speaker 0 00:00:27 Hey folks, we are back with Tiffany Ferris, the CEO of palantir.net. You might recall if you listen to the last episode that she is doing an experiment around transparency, she got some insight from chapter 17 of the lead together book called Transparency Determine When, how, and Why to Share Information. And you're gonna hear about her brave and some of you would consider it a radical transparency experiment. Coming up now, Tiffany, welcome back.
Speaker 3 00:00:56 Thank you so much for having me back
Speaker 1 00:00:58 To kick us off, how about you remind our listeners with a little overview about what your experiment was all about? Yeah,
Speaker 3 00:01:05 I can do that. So as I thought about what kind of experiment I might be able to do, I, I really wanted to lean into a transparency experiment, right? You know, getting the right information at the right time to the right people at the right level. So the experiment that I designed was around translating our company level financials, which have been widely distributed and, you know, we go through every quarter, and I've done that for years at this point. But, but taking that information and actually making it accessible and visible to each of the project teams. And the idea behind that was that we want teams to be able to connect with the impact of the decisions that they make on their project teams and the actions that they take. Company level financials are an accountability tool for me, you know, is the company going in the right direction? So they're, they're much, I think they're much higher level than what teams would need to actually be able to, you know, make some of the decisions that I would like ultimately for them to be able to make themselves.
Speaker 1 00:02:11 And, and what you were saying was that you already have a mode of transparency with the weather report that you were bringing out and you were gonna take that a step farther
Speaker 0 00:02:19 Or a step deeper, or a step more granular perhaps? Yes. So, okay, so what's, what was one thing you were looking for that actually did happen? Well,
Speaker 3 00:02:28 I expected naively to come back and be like, oh, I did it, it's done. I wait, I, the, the teams have these project level p and ls and all as well, right? And I think I, I, I come back to you rather humbled and reminded of the African proverb, right? If you wanna go fast, go alone, and if you wanna go far, go
Speaker 0 00:02:49 Together. Yeah. So what are learning?
Speaker 3 00:02:52 I, it's not so much about the output, it's really about the outcome that I'm looking for. So what was important about the experiment isn't can I give teams a p and l, right? That's an output. But the outcome I want is do teams have that kind of deep understanding? Do they have a connection with it? Is it useful to them? Ultimately, visibility isn't inherently valuable unless people know what to do with it. And, and I think that there's this notion of, you know, you can give people so much information, you can info dump on them that it actually gives the appearance of transparency, but without any sort of deeper meaning.
Speaker 1 00:03:42 Yeah. So you, so you pivoted in your experiment because what you sensed was that the system really wasn't ready for the whole, you know, whole rollout that you aspire to do. And instead what you're doing is you're going with a cohort that's really excited to work with you work and, and try that out initially. So what were the expected and unexpected feedback that you got?
Speaker 3 00:04:03 I, I think I was a little surprised by just the lack of engagement on it, just lack of en enthusiasm. But as I kind of sat with that, it made me, you know, kind of go back to a longer lens around those places where, you know, we have hit resistance to change. There's that tension when you have a leader driven initiative that kind of comes forward and says, oh, we can do this. They're like, yeah, but we're busy. We don't, we don't need that. Like the, there really wasn't a sense of urgency or importance around it at all for the team, which I was pretty surprised about.
Speaker 1 00:04:37 Right, because they weren't making the connection between the value statement really of what they were gonna get and what, what, what it would contribute to their daily work. And and with the cohort that that went with you, what was their motivation? Did you get any feedback on that? The
Speaker 3 00:04:50 Folks who were really interested in kind of playing along here are very interested in some of the lower level dynamics they don't yet understand around their teams, around team shape, team selection. I think there was a lot of energy and enthusiasm around that and, and I realized through their questions and their curiosity that that's one of the, the roles that I continue to play within the team is to help guide those team shapes to be appropriate to the need of the client, but also tailored for the needs of our financial model. And so I think that that's a place where I now have a couple of, again, co-conspirators who are really interested in making that very visible, making that very accessible and tangible within the system.
Speaker 0 00:05:34 You know, I'm really appreciating the, the level at which you're keyed into what's going on. And I think about the horror stories. I've heard about transparency in other organizations when, for example, all of a sudden everyone's salary just appears on the internal wiki. And then, and then like we're, we're all left to sort of, you know, go to like our worst selves essentially in duking it out with each other and fighting and trying to understand why do you make more than meme, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, all of that. You know, that's when an organization hasn't cleaned up or doesn't yet have a commitment to cleaning up those decisions that are inequitable and they just do an info dump and like, oh, hey, we did transparency, but you are in it for the meaning and for the use of it and for the, the, in the increased capacities of people in the organization through the information. So I just wanna like highlight that as a main distinction when people are thinking about transparency. Like for what,
Speaker 3 00:06:44 What is it solving? Yeah. You know, I think I picked the experiment if I'm honest, because it was, it was an area where I could, could lead on it. It's information that I have. I don't like inherent information asymmetry. So that's my motivation around this is I think that the more information people have and understand, the better the decision making becomes. And so I notice that that's a place where I lean on that information almost daily. And so I'm eager to have, you know, as you were saying this, I'm eager to have that, that muscle or that capacity exist within, within the organization. But when I can make those, the reason that I feel safe in making or proposing experiments around those topics is because they do largely rest on my shoulders. So it does mean that, that then there's gonna be low urgency, most likely, or low awareness or low capacity within the system. And how I respond to that goes towards some of the challenges that in modeling the agile principles, right? So if, if we're trying to not be top down, how do we actually continue to move things forward in ways that that reflect the organization and the leader that, that, you know, you wanna be.
Speaker 0 00:08:09 I think that's really important because I think a lot of leaders sort of aspire toward the notion of what a teal organization or a self-organized self-management organization is like, and they think like, as soon as we can declare that, then it's all gonna work. You know, all of a sudden people, yeah, all of a sudden people will take up the empowerment that I've always wanted to have. All of a sudden they'll make decisions all of a sudden they'll be interested in our financials, all, you know, and not necessarily. So it this very interesting time we're in, isn't it, that, that in our culture we have this sort of drive and desire for that kind of autonomy and freedom. Many, many, many people do, but it doesn't necessarily mean that we are socialized to be able to take it up, you know? So there's just a lot of inner work that comes along with this too. I think this is a, a perfect example of how much there's both structure and inner work and inner work with the individual human beings and the collective that is required to be in this sort of teal altitude of an organization.
Speaker 3 00:09:18 You know, one of the things that I constantly have to remind myself is that my default is to design a system where I would thrive. And my goal here isn't to design a system where I would thrive, it's to design a system or anyone could thrive. And, and I, again, it's a, that's one of those mistakes I make frequently is I start with like, oh, what, what I want, you know, I, I start at home and, and for me, I, I wanna see access to those things or I always crave more responsibility because I, I, you know, love being a part of that decision making process. And so making it okay for folks to say, you know what, I'm full right now. That's not where I'm going. I want to be, I wanna show up. I want you to put me in where I belong and that's okay for me for today.
Speaker 3 00:10:04 So I, I think it's about embracing the notion that this is an invitation, not an obligation really sits with me in that. And I think that is, that that is still very teal because it's, it's allowing them, the agency to be where they need to be in that moment and to meet them where they're at. And for me as a leader, what that means is that they're not limited by the structure or by the opinions of others in terms of how much they can choose to participate. So I think that's the, the thing I try to hold onto,
Speaker 0 00:10:41 And I think that's the inherent difference is that the structures you're put in place, don't limit them. They create the invitation, but not everyone has to say yes.
Speaker 3 00:10:49 That's right. That's
Speaker 0 00:10:49 Right. Yeah. And that's really, really different than structures that inherently limit, yet we have the rhetoric of, you know, you can do all these advanced things that's not necessarily so
Speaker 3 00:11:03 I was gonna say, or or organizations that, that have the patina of choice, but it's really just a surface. Ah,
Speaker 0 00:11:11 That's what I was getting at. Yes, yes. Yeah, patina is better. Let's go with that.
Speaker 1 00:11:16 What you're doing is you're actually creating a meaningful statement of safety really, because what you're doing is, it's a genuine invitation. You're saying it's okay not to jump on board, which is really contradictory of a lot of the ways in which I've been led before in other organizations where the mentality really is you, everybody's gotta be on the bus and you know, there's always those stragglers and we gotta chase and manipulate and coerce them onto the bus and, and the amount of damage that did was substantial. And, and what you're doing is exact opposite. You're, you're going where the people are feel comfortable and you're working really with a culture and, and, and where their motives are, right?
Speaker 3 00:11:56 Yeah. I think it's, it's not everybody has to be on the bus. We do all have to be going in the same direction, and you also have to not be upset when the people who are on the bus get further faster, right? It's, there are consequences to the choices you're allowed to make and you're not, you're nev psychological safety is about not being penalized. It's not that you're gonna get the same things, you know, just because they exist, right? Or that you're gonna be shielded from the consequences. I think that that's so important to embrace in a leaderful organization is that I get to make the decisions I'm willing to take the responsibility for the outcomes of, and to, to be able to deal with the consequences. So it's totally okay to make any decision that you want, but you need to be able to see it through.
Speaker 1 00:12:42 When I was in university, there was a statistics professor that showed us a bell curve. She called it something like the recurring universal law. She said the bell curve will be everywhere. And in my leadership practices, I started realizing that the bell curve is very real. If you step back and look at the larger scope of who people are, there's always 15% at the beginning of the bell curve, there's always 15% at the end of the bell curve and there's this 70% in between. And when we fight against that system, we cause a lot of resistance, damage and challenge. And what your experience really has been with your attempt with this, with this experiment is that not all a hundred percent, were all really excited to, to slap that ball out of the, out of the, out of the park. And instead you've got, and I'm curious to see if it's 15%, but you've got a cohort who is eager to lead the, the, the group because that 70, that 70% aren't careless and they're not uninterested, but they will be looking very closely at that 15% that decided to step ahead and, and it, and, and so as a leader you can recognize that you are influencing maybe even arguably 85% of your organization by just simply what you do with this 15%.
Speaker 1 00:13:55 Right?
Speaker 3 00:13:56 I think whenever you start with a leadership commitment in a transformation like this, you have to be prepared for lack of engagement. You have to be prepared for resistance to change. You have to be prepared for insufficient understanding or adoption because it feels like it's a top down thing, which then creates this, this perception of cultural misalignment. We're supposed to be agile, we're supposed to be self-organizing, what is this? Where is it coming from? And then I think as a, as a person on the other side there, the sustainability concerns, when you have people who don't buy in, it does create this increased pressure on you. It creates a lot of risk of burnout because you're carrying more than you can be expected to carry for the long term. And you're like, is it I power how you use it and when you use it really matters.
Speaker 0 00:14:55 That sounds like a pro tip for people who are wanting to take their organization. A further step into transparency is to just sort of be ready for a longer game and for the resistance and for the people not taking it up as much as you'd like and whatever all those wonderful things you just said,
Speaker 3 00:15:13 Those are consequences of your choice. That's not about the other people. I think that you always have to start with yourself as a leader and, and, and really be prepared. These are consequences of the choices that I made to go in this direction. I could have made other choices. I could have, you know, worked with the team to see where they were at and only ever put steps in place that, that they, that you know, got to through a, a consent process or a consensus process. I didn't do that. And so some of the hardest moments throughout this journey for us, I really have to remind myself I chose that and so that, that's my own agency, my own empowerment and you know, it, there are times it's frustrating or, or demoralizing or any of those things, but, but then I just hold onto and say, okay, well what would I do differently next time? Or what might I do differently next time? And I do think this experiment was a success because I realized that I was setting myself up for another one of those if I didn't read where they were at and meet them where they were at and then get some, you know, the folks who were interested and, and move it forward that way as opposed to just getting it fully to the 80% dropping in on people and then seeing what stuck
Speaker 1 00:16:28 And to follow that thread. What, what would you tell yourself before you ran this experiment? Like what other pro tips could you have given Tiffany before Tiffany had tried this experiment?
Speaker 3 00:16:38 I think that making sure you understand the pain points of others and can tie it into that, right? This ties directly into, I dunno if it's a pain point for me, but it is an area of, it's an area in Palantir where I feel sometimes I'm the only person who has that information, right? So I, you know, I felt like I'm not a knowledge hoarder, I'm not an information hoarder, but I did feel like a single point of failure. So, but that's my point pain point because I do always chime in on Slack and I do always answer their question when they need it because I, I know I'm a single point of failure on that moment. They weren't experiencing the pain. I never make people wait, they never made people, you know, sit with those things or, or make some decisions that they don't feel comfortable making. So I think it was, it's really, I I could either find something that addressed one of their pain points or I could make my pain is too strong a word, but I could make the limitations of the, of the status quo a little bit clearer before I come in with experiment to, you know, to, to make it better.
Speaker 0 00:17:51 I think there's something super important in what you're just saying because leaders hardly ever, number one recognize and definitely most often do not articulate the impact on them for things that are going on in the organization. And that's information the organization then does not have to self-organize around, right? So like I'll go ahead and use the word pain even though you backed off that word a little bit. Leaders are in a tremendous amount of pain right now, most of them that I work it with or in a tremendous amount of pain. And you're just highlighting for me, you know, maybe something I'll take into my practice is to help them get clear on that one, on that, on what that pain is and be able to articulate that in a way that's fair and not manipulative. That's actually clear and forward moving as an input to the system.
Speaker 1 00:18:46 Like in your attempt to run this experiment, was there anything that you noticed as a shift in the culture of the organization or even the organization itself as a whole?
Speaker 3 00:18:56 You know, I think as we enter into any of these as leaders and then as organizations, the mindset shift is the most important I think, indicator of the sustainability of any change or the durability of any change. So I think what we know is all, all human systems are flawed and all human systems are changeable. So I think the what is is so much less important at this point than the, than the why or the how and I've always been so clear about the why that the how is is the place where my work really lives. So in this case, moving from that, that directive posture over that collaborative posture of really engaging them around, you know, you know their valuable input as well as this kind of sense of partnership in rolling this out, I think that was a really good shift from even where I conceived the experiment when we last talked I I did touch on earlier about moving from outputs to outcomes.
Speaker 3 00:19:59 Again, you know, a transparent output is not as meaningful as a transparent outcome. And so it's not about do they have access to this project level p and l as it is about do the teams have what they need to see the impact of their decisions? Do they have the ability for that information to be accessible to them? It's deeply accessible so that they understand its meaning and it's important and it can help them make data-driven decisions. Those are much more valuable and I think those will take us a while to get to and I don't need to rush the output of this experiment. I need to really lay brick by brick toward that and include people along the way for that.
Speaker 0 00:20:49 So, wow Tiffany, you've given us so much to think about. I am walking away with couple ideas brewing in my head and ways that I might shift how I'm working with leaders and I imagine that's true for our listeners too. So thank you so very much for being with us and for experimenting and showing people that experimenting with your leadership is okay.
Speaker 1 00:21:11 Thank you so much for being with us Tiffany, I really appreciate it. Thank you so much.
Speaker 3 00:21:16 Thank you.
Speaker 1 00:21:18 Alright folks, you know what time it is. It's time for the takeaways. So Lisa, what's your takeaway?
Speaker 0 00:21:25 So my main takeaway was something that Tiffany said that really struck me and it was that there is a difference between an info dump on people to make it look like you're providing transparency versus information they can contextualize and metabolize to do something to create an outcome with so info dump versus real information they can use. And I think that is brilliant 'cause I think a lot of organizations right now trying to achieve transparency as an objective might tend toward the info dump and no one likes to be dumped on.
Speaker 1 00:22:01 Well Lisa, since leadership is about building, curating and nurturing teams so that they're effective, we need to ensure we start from where they need to be effective and it's most likely not similar to what we need to be effective as leaders. So when we're exploring what to make transparent, we need to resist projecting our own needs on others and we need to figure out and connect with what their needs are. Yep.
Speaker 1 00:22:28 So Lisa, well before we introduce our next guest, let's talk a little bit about meaningful meetings, which is chapter 15 in the lead together book. And it's really about designing gatherings that people want to attend. Now this is a very important topic for most executives simply because they know the statistics and to some degree it doesn't matter which research paper you look at, but there's always this variance, but it's really pretty much within the range. And that for those who work in an office, 50 to 85% of their time is in meetings. And that's why if we actually take a, an approach at looking at how we could design gatherings that people wanna attend and making meetings meaningful, we start to tap into something that could substantially improve the value of the organization, the flow of information, and also the quality of the output of the whole organization. For
Speaker 0 00:23:26 Sure, for sure. And if you think about 50 to 85% of every person's time is spent in meetings, then that makes meetings a really important asset and maybe an asset that a lot of people are wasting right now. So I love how this chapter in the Lead together book starts, it starts with this quote from Jason Freed and he says meetings should be like salt a spice sprinkled carefully to enhance a dish, not poured recklessly over every fork full.
Speaker 1 00:23:57 That's a great point. I'd love that quote. And there's now a time especially triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic as things got pushed remote that we should start looking at how we're scattering the salt across our daily work and start to understand the value that these things can actually become.
Speaker 0 00:24:16 Yeah. And there's just so many simple techniques that make a huge difference. And so I think it's exciting to explore these concepts with our next leader who's gonna be talking with us about how they want to apply meaningful meetings.
Speaker 1 00:24:31 Alright, so Lisa, I am very interested in the experiment that our next guest is gonna try with meaningful meetings. So I'd like to introduce you to Cory Munden, who is the CEO for the Atlantic Edge Credit Union. So Corey, thank you for being here and welcome.
Speaker 4 00:24:47 Thank you. Looking forward to our session.
Speaker 0 00:24:49 Yeah, welcome Corey. I am looking forward to getting to know you more through the session as well. So
Speaker 1 00:24:53 Thank you Cory for attending and to help us understand a little bit more about your experiment and what you're doing, we'd first like to learn a little bit more about you. So go ahead, tell us who are you and what do you do?
Speaker 4 00:25:06 So I've been in the credit union system for 25 years. I've, the credit union model is financial institution, but it's a cooperative. So it's owned by its members who utilize the financial services there on a day-to-day basis. So my history starts 25 years ago as I mentioned, and I've been in executive leader position for that same period of time. We have 15 branch locations and 130 personnel. Our corporate office is a decentralized structure, so that means that anybody working for the corporate team can live and work in any of our branch locations. So myself, I work in the channel port of Bass, Newfoundland Labrador portion.
Speaker 0 00:25:53 So Corey, you were struck by chapter 15 in the lead together book and that chapter's called Meaningful Meetings, design Gatherings that people want to attend. So I really would love to know what were some of the ideas or philosophies that stuck out for you when you read that chapter?
Speaker 4 00:26:12 When I read that chapter, it was like a light bulb went off because really the attention that you put on meetings has to be strategic. And I don't think that's something that we've been doing very well. I know it's not something that we've been doing very well. So it is something that we need to improve because it's very easy to get meeting fatigue and it's very easy for meetings to consume a good portion of our employees time. And if the results don't match the investment, then you know, we have to identify a way in which we could improve. And so I'm all, I'm excited to look at some of the suggestions in that chapter and how to apply them and see if we can make a unique difference in our organization.
Speaker 0 00:27:06 Yeah. Corey, have you ever sat around and looked at the people in a meeting and done some, like back of the envelope math in your head about how much this is costing?
Speaker 4 00:27:15 I actually just done it not an hour ago. We, we, in the credit union system, we have many, many partners because, you know, it's unrealistic that we would build a credit card department. So we strategically partner with other credit unions to mobilize these types of services. You know, when things go astray, you need to pull together your team and meet with a specific partner and then chat it out. And just today, you know, I had five personnel in a meeting and when I looked around at the salary cost of us attending a meeting, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's definitely not efficient use of time especially, but there, these meetings are necessary. But again, no agenda, no goals, no expected outcomes. And so the first 15 minutes is weather, how's the family water cooler talk? And although that's, that's great networking and, and I guess some probably somewhat necessary, I'm really focused in on what's our objective, how do we get there and what, what do we want to accomplish? And also what our takeaways and when do we need to remobilize so that we can decide if we were successful. And I'm saying that as if that these meetings are going that way and they're completely not, otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation.
Speaker 0 00:28:48 Well, I mean, take heart, you're not alone, you are not alone. Most organizations meetings are a horrific waste of time, honestly. And so I love that you're thinking about like meetings as a strategic asset. Like if we treat this as a precious thing, then what would we do? What would we we do to get the most out of it? And, and not only for the purpose, but but also for the people. I mean, no one likes to sit in a meeting that sucks. No,
Speaker 4 00:29:17 Yeah, I agree. The
Speaker 1 00:29:18 Other thing too is it, it statistically a lot of research has been shown that most office workers in North America spend 50% to about 85% of their time in meetings. And in many cases too, when you have customer sat reports and get feedback, one of the top five complaints is typically meetings. So I'm just wondering if there's any of that resonates with you and your organization.
Speaker 4 00:29:41 Yes, and you know, I I also think Ron, your stats are bang on, but, and I also think it's culturally based. So when I look at some of my executive team, I can, without question recognize who's quick to call a meeting and who's quick to resolve a problem triage, identify if a meeting is necessary and make those types of assessments. So I do know that that people, that people in our organization view meetings very differently. In a lot of cases there's value and in, in a lot of cases the value is limited. So is
Speaker 1 00:30:17 There anything that you have done or that you know, that others have done in the organization to try to strategically approach optimizing meetings?
Speaker 4 00:30:25 I don't, I don't, I don't see much evidence of of that taking place. The most recent merger that we just went through was as of January 1st of this year. So we, you know, we had to redesign our org chart so we got people in new positions, new reporting positions, new management, you know, so it's a bit of learning and feeling. So we haven't, or I haven't certainly tackled this, this, this issue around meeting efficiency as of it yet because of course we had, we have quite a few pressing agenda items, but this is something that certainly needs to be addressed. Well,
Speaker 0 00:31:04 It's a great time 'cause your organization is in a lot of change already, right? And so like there's really no better time than just sort of drive a truck through the fact that now now we have this merger, now we're actually a bit of a new entity and this new entity might want some, you know, tweaks here or there.
Speaker 4 00:31:20 Absolutely, I agree with that.
Speaker 0 00:31:21 So what specific things did, did you write about in the chapter that, that had you thinking, Hmm, I wonder if I could jump off of that and do something
Speaker 4 00:31:29 In my career, I haven't really thought much about meeting processes. So I, I guess that for me the biggest takeaway is, is that there are resources, there are outlines, there are best practices and you know, you just need to spend some time on investing into those and experimenting, I guess that's the word, you know, that's the purpose of this podcast is talk about having the courage to experiment with, with new ways of doing things and, and identify if you can see some success, move the needle on some, on some of the, some of the items. So that, that's kind of my takeaway.
Speaker 0 00:32:07 So what would be a needle that you would love to see moved? A little bit.
Speaker 4 00:32:11 I would like, I would like to see the participants in a meeting feel really good that, that their attendance was valued, that there's time well spent, that they have a good understanding of the objectives and that they also understand their role and responsibilities out on of, and because I do sense and I've gathered enough input from the participants that kind of leads to an impression that there's some opinions that some of the meetings are are, you know, not a good value, not a good, not a good use of
Speaker 0 00:33:00 Time. So you want people leave going, man, I'm glad we pulled ourselves together. I didn't realize that we really needed to talk this through. And that was like a great use of time.
Speaker 4 00:33:08 Exactly. Or, and, and you know, don't say, I don't even know why I'm here. Why, why, why is my, why is my involvement here? And then to be there and to be present and then go through a ad hoc meeting or you know, an emergency meeting or whatever you wanna call it. And then, you know, if you got an HR manager in the room and you talk everything about processes and there's no mention of a HR requirement, then why did we just tire tie up an HR manager one hour when they could be doing something more productive?
Speaker 0 00:33:45 Yeah, in the chapter they talk about prepare for facilitation and what a, what a professional facilitator will do. Corey, now that you're onto this, what they will do, the very first thing they will do is help the whoever's hosting the meeting to create the pow exactly what you're talking about, the purpose, the outcomes, and what's in it for me. And the purpose is exactly as you might imagine, it's a short statement we can all keep in our minds is like, why are we here? The outcomes are like maybe some specific things we'd like to make sure that we close on or maybe even open a conversation on. But the w in pow I think is pretty cool. It's, it's the question of what's in it for me from the perspective of all the different audiences that are gonna be in that meeting meeting. So you'd put yourself in the perspective of the HR director and you'd say, what's in it for, for them to be there the whole time. And you'd put yourself in the perspective of these other roles or these different sort of audiences and ask, you know, basically what's in it for them to fully engage. And if there's not a reason for 'em to fully engage, you know, maybe they need to just get a readout of what happened later or maybe they need to be consulted before and give some a asynchronous input. You know, there's just lots of options. So what do you think about a pal Corey?
Speaker 4 00:35:04 I love it. I love it. Like that is something that could be used immediately and, and a standard set defining that because again, it's total transparency. We're not using any particular tactic or you know, in, in, in, in meeting structure right now. And to move into a process where we would adopt such a simple, simple piece is p you know, I think that would, that would be a game changer and that would challenge because we have, you know, meetings that are called by various management teams or personnel, you know, if we had, if you had a process in which you had to, you know, funnel it through these particular areas and you have to set these expectations for a productive meeting, I think that would cut down on a lot of unnecessary meetings and, but it would also make the meetings more productive.
Speaker 0 00:36:10 Yeah. When we used to be in offices, all of us in offices together, I worked with one client, they had a little index card right there on the door jam as you walked into every conference room and it said, what is the purpose of this meeting? If you don't know, turn around now.
Speaker 4 00:36:26 I love it. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:36:28 So, so, so you're talking about some equivalent of that, you know, in our distributed virtual world.
Speaker 1 00:36:34 So, so does that work as an experiment for you?
Speaker 4 00:36:37 Yeah, I I like that. I like that. And, and obviously, you know, this is that it's, it's a fair sized topic, but with incremental changes, small changes, as you guys would know, you know, you can, you can see, you can start to move the, the needle on different results. So I'd like to try that and, and work with that first and then probably move into some other types of tactics to kind of mature the meeting a bit more. But I really lo I, I like that pal as simple as easy to understand is something that can be easily adopted and influenced no matter what skill or level that any of the team would be at. Yep.
Speaker 1 00:37:23 And it's, it's a great vehicle for you to implement the principles that were in the meaningful meetings chapter in the book lead together so you can, so that's a, a way to actually put it into practice really. Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:37:35 I love it because you know, once, once people get used to that and they get used to knowing what's this meeting about? Why am I really needed? Then you can move on to some of the other more self-organized tools like the wise agenda that they talk about in the chapter. That's something I use with a lot of my clients and I go, I just think it's beautiful what you're doing and I really wanna just encourage you to let yourself off the hook of like, oh, we don't do anything about this right now. We all just show up and have conversation organically and it may or may not be good. Like most organizations are in that situation, these facilitation skills are just coming into everyday use now. So like in a certain way, Corey, you're just right on time.
Speaker 4 00:38:19 Yeah. And it couldn't come at a better time for us, as you mentioned, you know, as our organization is going through tremendous change right now, everyone's in that change mindset and you know, it's a, it's a, right now it's a healthy change mindset because of course all the changes being presented to them. So it's an ideal time to do a few experiments around this piece. So excited to try that. Yep.
Speaker 1 00:38:42 So how do you think you're gonna roll this out? Are you going to implement this large scale? Are you gonna try this in a small group? Is there a group that you already have in mind that you'd like to try this with and what kind of results are you gonna be monitoring?
Speaker 4 00:38:54 Monitoring? Well, when I look at my, my meeting circle, let's call it that, I know that I'm involved in, in probably, I guess four or five circles. So I think it would be better to introduce this to that group and then lead by example of course by introducing it and showing them the value proposition of, of utilizing this tool. And then encourage them as well to in, in meetings that I wouldn't be attending to kind of experiment with it as well and then report back and, you know, outline to me what their results are. I obviously can make my own assessment on ones that I'm involved in, but really learning about what, what worked, what didn't work, you know, was there improvements required, what resistance they had. And then I guess also Ron, I'm sure I'll be tapping you on the shoulder for some advice on how to effectively integrate this within our organization. I'll, I'll, I'll certainly lean on you for some support there. Yep.
Speaker 1 00:40:12 Well, and thank you I, I'll be more than welcome of any invites to, to help you out, but I'm also curious too, how, is there a way you think you can measure your success given the objective that you had already highlighted before about what you wanted to achieve with meaningful meetings?
Speaker 4 00:40:29 Yeah, I, I think when I reflect back on some of the outcomes, you know, what, what would I deem successful as we, you know, maybe, maybe a tool, and again, I don't know if, if this is something that you would recommend or suggested or have experience in maybe a, maybe some kind of a survey type follow up, a meeting tool to kind of, you know, ask a few related questions to kind of measure the results
Speaker 0 00:40:56 It might be. But since you have such an open and transparent and honest group, here's a way to get feedback right away that I think might work for you at the, you could also institute at the very end of each meeting, they do a very simple thing that it's called a fist of five. And so a closed fist means that was not worth my time at all. I should have not been in that meeting. One is like, yeah, that wasn't a good use of my time. Two is, yeah, maybe I should have been here, but that could have been done another way. Three was like, okay, that's a reasonable use of my time. Four is like, wow, I'm glad I was there at that meeting. That was a good use of my time. Five was like, oh gee, I needed to be there. Like this was a great use of my time. So at the end of a meeting you could say, okay everyone, let's just do a fist of five on how, how much value you got from this meeting, how much it was a good use of your time, ready, 1, 2, 3 show. And people just honestly put up the number of fingers that corresponds with how much the meeting was a valuable use of their time. And then bang, you got it right away.
Speaker 4 00:42:04 Great idea in, in, just as a follow up question to to that suggestion. So do you take the time at that point when people, you know, give their feedback to deep dive a little deeper on say, Sally, you know, I noticed you put up one finger. Is there anything that contributed to why you feel that way? Or or five Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:42:29 Totally. And actually, yeah, the way you're asking the question is perfect because it's open and not punitive. It's like, like so what contributed to that is a great way to frame it if you have time, Corey. Yeah, I mean, and if, if people aren't just like closing their, their windows and going off to the next meeting, sure you do it then. But if you notice like some ones and twos, you know, or, or any, you could say, hey, you, you might even open a, a running document or something. You know, like, just, just put a one line in there about what the, about what your, your one or your two was about or your five, like what made this great, what made this a five is as important as like what made this
Speaker 4 00:43:06 A one? A hundred percent.
Speaker 1 00:43:07 I love your question. Another question you could, you could also explore if it's comfortable for you is what could we have done to have made it a five? Right? So if she puts up the one i, I like the forward thinking concepts of not looking back because 10 tends to get punitive blamey. When you look backwards and you look forward just say, well Sally, I'm just curious what could have been in place that would've actually made that a five. And she'll probably list off two or three things. You write them down. If you start to see a trend of those complaints constantly, then you just find another way to bring something in that replaces those.
Speaker 0 00:43:38 And the other sneaky thing that's happening here, Corey, is that you're actually increasing the systems intelligence of everyone. It's not just coming back to you as the CEO for you to metabolize and analyze and then feed back to them, right? They're seeing it in real time, they're hearing each other in real time and what can make it better. So now guess what, they're gonna close that browser window and open up another browser window and go to the next meeting and be able to have that in mind and maybe even apply it right away.
Speaker 4 00:44:03 Yeah, I think that was another takeaway in the literature was around this, this collective effort, you know, of improvement and you know, I certainly, I certainly don't lead our organization as, as a individual where everything gotta be manifested and created and developed and by myself. So I was really interested in that part that highlighted the importance of the success is when others start to utilize the theories and practices and, and develop it and then it just becomes its own, its own entity. And so yes. Great point.
Speaker 0 00:44:47 Yeah, I think you're well on your way. I really do. I think you've got a really great environment for it. You have a great moment in time to bring this in. And as you say, these are simple things that the people can experiment with right away.
Speaker 1 00:45:00 So thank you Corey. We wish you the very best with your experiment and we look forward to seeing you in a couple weeks to see how it went.
Speaker 4 00:45:05 Great. Thank you very much for having me and introducing me to this concept. I think that's the value proposition of working with you guys is that to to, to stimulate a change and bring forward new business concepts and ideas. And I have to thank you, Ron because without you showcasing me some information around this particular topic, I am pretty confident that meetings in the future would be carried out the same way they're being carried out today. So first assure I will be seeking some additional advice and assistance from you as we conduct this experiment. Thank you.
Speaker 0 00:45:52 Thank you for listening. And we invite you to join us for our next podcast when we learn from Corey's experiment with meaningful meetings. And we get to meet a new organizational leader Maryanne, who explores using feedback loops.
