“A meeting is an event where minutes are taken and hours are wasted.”   …Milton Berle

Somewhere, there is an unwritten rule that says all managers are required to conduct limitless meetings. It’s in the Manager Handbook or something. You get promoted to management, you are required by law to conduct lots and lots of meetings. Maybe there’s a quota – like a Merit Badge or something.

The challenge is that no one teaches people how to conduct effective meetings. Yes, you know it’s true – you sit in these train wrecks on a regular basis. You are either the victim or the culprit (or both), but you are spending way too much time in meetings. If, however, on the wildly off-chance you don’t have to participate in a lot of bad meetings, you will never know the pain…

Don’t get me wrong – some meetings are necessary. Occasionally, one is actually productive! Most meetings, however, are only marginally beneficial, and many are a complete waste of time. They start late. They are poorly led. They are long on ideas and short on execution. There is no follow-up or accountability. Good ideas are labeled “risky” while bad ideas are pondered for hours on end. Then everyone retreats back to their offices and races to catch up on their work before the next meeting is called. And the cycle starts all over again.

The Scourge That is PowerPoint

And, of course, there is the ubiquitous PowerPoint presentation. There should be an addendum to the aforementioned handbook that provides for excessive punishment for anyone that misuses PowerPoint presentation software. This one product might be the single most abused business tool ever introduced into the workplace. (OK, I’ll grant you that text messaging and Blackberrys would get a lot of votes.)

SunGard, one of the world’s leading software and IT services companies, works with just about every financial services company in the world. In a recent New York Times interview, Cristóbal Conde, President & CEO of SunGard, commented on the use of PowerPoint in the workplace:

I actively despise how people use PowerPoint as a crutch. I think PowerPoint can be a way to cover up sloppy thinking, which makes it hard to differentiate between good ideas and bad ideas. I would much rather have somebody write something longhand, send it in ahead of the meeting and then assume everybody’s read it, and then you start talking, and let them defend it.

Conde’s comments suggest there are actually two major potential problems with PowerPoint presentations. First, presenters are apt to use business jargon, 12-color charts, transition effects, and text-laden slides to disguise the fact that they don’t have a firm grasp on a problem or an issue, or to hide the fact that they are uncomfortable with detailed discussion about the problem or issue. Second, presenters dramatically overuse/misuse PowerPoint to create a presentation that participants would sacrifice parts of their anatomy to avoid.

As Conde notes, “The question from the beginning of the meeting to the end of the meeting is, ‘Have we added value: yes or no?’ And I would say that if the meeting is mostly the presentation of a deck of PowerPoint slides, you conveyed information, but you didn’t actually add value.”

An Effective Meeting

Unfortunately, some people just love to have meetings. In some instances, it is a great replacement for actually getting some real work done. In most cases, however, a manager simply hasn’t learned how to lead a productive meeting. So, let’s review the basics.

There are three parts of a meeting that must be done well for it to yield positive results: First, there is what happens before the meeting (the Agenda), then there is what happens during the meeting (the Leader), and finally, there is what happens after the meeting (the Follow-up). In fact, it is the follow-up process that ensures that all the heavy lifting done before and during the actual meeting results in good decisions and accountability.

Here are eight steps to follow that will help any manager produce shorter, more effective meetings:

1. Create an objective for the meeting (Before)
2. Create a specific agenda for the meeting (Before)
3. Ensure that any contributor to the meeting is fully aware of his/her individual role in the meeting (Before)
4. Establish a firm time frame for the meeting (Before)
5. Assign a note-taker for the meeting (Before)
6. Record all decisions, action items, and critical information (During)
7. Assign process owners to all action items (During)
8. Distribute notes immediately following the meeting (After)

As you can see, the success or failure of any meeting is largely determined before the meeting even starts. The first five steps are all about planning for an effective meeting (a novel idea, to be sure).  The balance of the steps are simply about good execution.

While a meeting is only as good as its agenda and follow-up process, the leader will ultimately determine the overall effectiveness of the meeting. Frankly, setting an agenda and distributing the notes after the meeting is not terribly difficult, but, if the agenda is poorly conceived or the notes outline a series of bad decisions or faulty action items, the meeting will ultimately be considered a failure.

And, if the meeting includes one or more of those PowerPoint monstrosities, you can bet your last dollar that meeting length is going up and meeting effectiveness is going down.

In a November 2009 Fast Company article entitled “How to Write a Mission Statement That Isn’t Dumb,” Nancy Lublin writes, “Mission statements are like corporate Hallmark cards. Often written in a bland cursive font and plastered conspicuously at headquarters, these aspiring epigrams are pretty words in Air Supply-like rhythm.” Need proof? Here’s a fairly standard example:

“Committed to building a family of the world’s best fashion brands offering captivating customer experiences that drive long-term loyalty and deliver sustained growth for our shareholders.”

Wow. Eliminate the word “fashion” and you could drop this gem into just about any company in the world. It does, however, contain many of the approved business buzz words: committed, customer, growth, shareholders. (The company? Victoria’s Secret.)

How does your company stack up? Quickly, off the top of your head, write down your company’s Mission Statement.

Welcome back. Some of you were curious enough to go look at the framed version in the conference room, or pull out your faded, dusty HR Manual and check inside. In my experience, less than ten percent of employees know the company’s Mission Statement. Which begs the question: why do companies create Mission Statements? If your people don’t know what it says, they almost surely don’t live by it, so what good is it?

Mission or Confusion?

Let’s take a look at the details of your company’s Mission Statement. Is your company dedicated to ‘unparalleled quality’ and ‘superior customer service’? Focused on ‘serving your customers’? Do you ‘provide value to your stakeholders’? Maybe your Mission Statement reads something like this classic:

“[We are]…engaged in socially responsible operations, worldwide. It is dedicated to provide products and services of such quality that our customers will receive superior value while our employees and business partners will share in our success and our stock-holders will receive a sustained superior return on their investment.”

As it turns out, this isn’t working out real well for General Motors. And no wonder – among the many problems the company has, their Mission Statement is about as motivating as yesterday’s leftovers. Again, you can cut-and-paste that generic dribble into just about any company in the world.

In 1989, Carl Larson and Frank LaFasto published a book entitled “Teamwork: What Must Go Right, What Can Go Wrong.” In researching high-performance teams, they discovered that these teams shared a common characteristic – what Larson and LaFasto called a “clear and elevating goal.” Their research revealed that a clear and compelling mission is a critical component of team success. High performance teams, they said, “have both a clear understanding of the goal and a belief that the goal embodies a worthwhile or important result.” Lublin’s Fast Company article points to survey results that arrive at a similar conclusion:

Mission statements don’t have to be dumb. In fact, they can be very valuable, if they articulate real targets. The first thing I’d do is forget the exact words and remember the reason for a statement in the first place. In 2006, Wilson Learning surveyed 25,000 employees from the finance and tech industries. Respondents said they wanted a leader who could “convey clearly what the work unit is trying to do.” The same applies to mission statements, which set the tone. Employees, vendors, and clients don’t get stoked by fuzzy mission statements. They will line up behind concrete goals.

Muddled mission statements are simply an exercise in futility. Employees rarely have any idea what they say, and they certainly have no influence on day-to-day workplace performance. On the other hand, a clear and elevating goal can galvanize a team, giving your employees something they can line up behind.

Want a great example of a clear and compelling Mission Statement? Here’s one that has created a legion of followers:

“These are the voyages of the Starship, Enterprise. Its 5-year mission: To explore strange new worlds; To seek out new life and new civilizations; To boldly go where no man has gone before.”

Clear enough?

The foundation of 1-on-1 Management™ is that critical employee development tasks like establishing expectations, creating career goals, and performance recognition (among many other things) are all done best one-on-one. I read an article this week by Carol Kinsey Goman, an executive coach and author who made this interesting observation:

“In this fast-paced, techno-charged era of email, blogs, wikis and IMs, one universal truth remains: Face-to-face is still the most preferred, productive and powerful communication medium.”

I wholeheartedly agree. The fact is, despite all the electronic tools available to us, another universal truth is that the vast majority of problems in the workplace are created by poor communication. In many cases, we have attempted to solve or address our communication issues by using those electronic tools, but, in most cases, email and IMs seem to make the problems even worse.

As a manager, you would do well to listen to Ms. Goman. While face-to-face communication can still be done badly, the odds of communicating effectively are far greater when you can observe body language and tonality, ask clarifying questions, and explore details. Even if an employee (or your boss) is a poor communicator, you can take up the slack by listening carefully and asking good questions.

That is actually one of the most common questions I receive: “How can I improve my boss’s communication with me?” Here are a couple of ideas:

• When the boss (or an employee) uses email in a situation that is critical, requires clarification, or may lead to misunderstanding, don’t respond with email. Instead, opt for a face-to-face meeting. Once you clarify details, follow-up with an email that confirms those details.
• When appropriate, ask the boss, “What are your expectations for this (project, assignment, or task)?”
• If you boss loves to have things done a certain way, ask “Do you have any advice or recommendations for this (project, assignment, task)?” If you get some specific directions that conflict with how you might proceed, you have the opportunity to say something like, “My first thought was to (proceed a certain way)…what are your thoughts?”

The chances that your boss will change in his/her management style are fairly remote unless he/she is committed to improvement as a manager. However, my experience is that micro-managers crave information and actually would prefer to communicate more effectively (for their own benefit, usually) even if they are not very good at it.

Take the lead and improve the communication from your end. The truth is, your boss might begin to catch on.

One of the more important tasks that managers face is making decisions – short-term, long-term, reactive, strategic, technical, critical or mundane – they come in all shapes and sizes. Unfortunately, according to research data, it appears that many employees tend to have a less than stellar opinion of the soundness of the decisions made by company leaders:

Leaders of organizations, as well as government leaders, need to be mindful of the importance of making clear-cut, well thought-out decisions. Unfortunately, many organizational leaders do not do a particularly good job of this. Our research shows that only one out of two employees believes the leader of his organization makes sound decisions (emphasis mine).

Good decision making is especially important during these challenging economic times, as leaders are being called upon to make big decisions about reducing costs, identifying new strategic directions, and whether to implement previously planned investments in the future.

If employees trust their leaders and believe they make sound decisions, they will follow them even when they don’t agree with their decisions. The key is that they believe their leaders can provide them with a clear, consistent direction. (Bruce L. Katcher, PhD. “When Leaders Waffle, Confidence Plummets.” AMA Leader’s Edge. May 2009.)

According to this research, only half of employees believe that company leaders make good decisions! While that is plenty scary, it would be even more interesting to find out why employees feel that way. Consider these possibilities:

• Decisions are inconsistent with each other
• Decisions are not consistent with corporate values
• Decisions are not consistent with corporate mission or objectives
• Decisions are self-serving
• Decisions show bad judgment
• Decisions fail to consider all factors or circumstances
• Decisions are made without consulting key players involved
• Decisions are all too often wrong

As you can see, there are many reasons why employees might not trust the decisions of their leaders. For a leader to gain that trust, his/her decisions must be consistent with the company’s objectives and values, include the opinions of critical players (where applicable), reflect sound judgment, and lead to success the majority of the time.

Communication is as Important as the Decision Itself

However, assuming your decision-making skills are solid, one item that is often overlooked in the process of making decisions is the communication of those decisions. Organizational trust can be eroded by poor communication of a decision almost as much as a poor decision itself.

This is particularly true if your decision creates changes for anyone. One of the more common mistakes in decision-making is to fail to consider every department, employee, and task that may be affected by your decision. The failure to communicate then creates a mistrust with the affected employee – how much depends on your previous history and your willingness to admit the mistake, no matter how small.

Don’t just work hard to make good decisions; work hard to communicate those decisions to all involved. One good technique is to simply put a sticky note on your computer that says, “Did you communicate to everyone involved?” That reminder can save you a lot of problems down the road….

Creating a vision is critically important for an organization. Vision not only creates purpose, but it unifies the organization and provides its guiding principles. A majority of CEOs agree that this particular skill is among the most important for their position:

The Center for Creative Leadership collected data from 146 CEOs between September 2007 and September 2008. They were asked to select the top five factors for success in their current position from a list of 13 items. The ability to communicate a strong vision emerged as the single most critical factor according to 75 percent of the CEOs surveyed. [Quotation from CCL Online Newsletter. Leading Effectively: Think and Act Beyond. March 2009]

Although CEOs find that communicating a strong vision is very important, the question for us to consider is whether or not this is a critical skill for a mid-level manager, department head, or other team leader.

The answer to this question, I believe, is unequivocally “yes.” Keep in mind that the vision may be one that originated with the CEO, the owner, or the leader of the company, but every manager needs to communicate a strong vision to his/her team because vision creates purpose for a team. Great teams always rally around a common purpose, a clear and compelling objective.

The challenge is that, in many companies, a strong vision doesn’t exist or is not communicated effectively. This creates a void that a strong manager will rush to fill because top performance is essentially unattainable in the absence of a clear and compelling objective.

If there is not a guiding purpose or vision articulated within your company, get with your team and create one together. Help them find a common goal, a compelling objective they can work towards together. When people find a purpose for doing their best, they will find ways to do just that.

The foundation of 1-on-1 Management™ philosophy is people development; hire talented employees with good character, work hard to develop their capabilities, and empower them to maximize their potential. There is, of course, a lot that goes into those three simple steps and it does not happen overnight – the great manager must invest a lot of time into his/her employees.

It doesn’t really matter what type of employee you manager – operations, administrative, sales – one of the keys to people development is good coaching. I was reminded of that in an article from the Selling Power sales management newsletter:

World-class managers do two things you should emulate in 2009, says Andrew Plunkett, a director with SPI. First, they make one-on-one coaching a priority. And second, they spend most of their coaching time on their middle performers because it’s those reps who can most impact your results. In short, world-class managers manage performance instead of non-performance. The difference is crucial because when you identify and coach the right people, it can impact your turnover by as much as 9 percent and increase the number of sales that occur in one to three months by 15 percent, according to SPI.

So why aren’t more managers using this powerful tool? According to Nathan Jamail, president of Jamail Development Group and author of The Sales Leader’s Playbook (Scooter, 2008), there are two big reasons sales managers don’t coach as often as they should – or even at all.

Reason #1: “I talk to my employees every day. I don’t need to schedule one-on-ones.” This is the most common reason managers cite for not coaching. It’s often followed by, “I have an open door policy so my employees can come see me any time they need me.”

Reason #2: “I’m busy! I don’t have time to coach people one-on-one.” The fact is, you’ll be less busy if you coach individually because performance will improve and turnover will drop. Coaching can help you get control of all those little fires you spend your days putting out.

The bottom line: Make coaching a priority in 2009… “Coaching is a process – not a one-shot deal,” concludes Jamail. “Successful coaching sessions with employees take time to develop. Be patient. The risk of trying something new is definitely worth the potential profit.”

Interesting… It doesn’t seem to matter if you are managing sales performance or any of several different types of on-the-job performance, 1-on-1 Meetings™ are extremely effective for engaging and coaching employees. The problem is that most managers don’t know where to start when it comes to coaching. The natural inclination is to view coaching as correction, which, of course, it often is, but coaching is much more than simply correcting failure. Coaching also involves training, helping an individual to see their potential, helping him/her to develop confidence in themselves, and providing opportunities to grow and develop. However, the key to all of this is to develop a relationship of trust with the individual you are coaching. Without trust, coaching is more akin to conflict.

In 2009, make time for coaching….and make time to develop a culture of trust that will allow you to coach effectively.

One of the primary components of 1-on-1 Management™ is a weekly 1-on-1 Meeting™ with your direct reports; a planned 30-45 minute, face-to-face session that provides the opportunity to communicate objectives, set expectations, review progress, coach, and – most importantly - listen.

I ventured across an excellent Blog this week called The Slacker Manager, written by David Zinger and Phil Gerbyshak (don’t be confused by the title – it’s not what you might think at first!). As I reviewed the last several Blog posts, I eventually found one by Phil entitled “You Are Your Only Competition.” His point is that each employee brings a different set of talents to the workplace and comparing one’s productivity with someone else is misguided. He starts the post with the following statement:

“As a manager, I have weekly reviews with each member of my team. We talk about 3 things:

1. What’s gone well (and how can we do more of that)
2. What needs improvement (and how can we improve faster)
3. What’s the general feeling of how things are going in relation to your goals and the rest of the team.

3 simple questions, but they get right to the heart of what we try to focus on, and that is living our strengths, shoring up the weaknesses enough that they don’t bring our strengths down, and how do we FEEL things are going.”

Weekly reviews – a page straight out of the 1-on-1 Management™ handbook! Savvy managers understand that employees engage in the workplace in direct proportion to the engagement skills of the manager. In this case, Phil outlines a process (weekly reviews) and a methodology (three questions) that will necessarily lead to a productive dialogue with an employee, the first step in employee engagement.

These questions are similar in nature to three others that can be used to initiate some very productive dialogue with an employee:

1. As a manager, what am I doing that I need to stop doing – that may be a hindrance to your effectiveness at work? (Stop.)
2. What do I need to start doing to help you be more effective in your work? (Start.)
3. What am I doing that that I need to continue because it’s working – it helps you to be effective in your work? (Continue.)

Again, employee engagement is mostly a manager’s responsibility, and it begins with strong communication. However, communication doesn’t just “happen.” It has to be a planned part of your management practices.

Weekly review sessions are a perfect place to start.

“A meeting is an event where minutes are taken and hours are wasted.” Milton Berle

We have all been required to attend meetings at work. Some of them are even necessary. Occasionally, one is actually productive! Most, however, are only marginally beneficial, and many are a complete waste of time. They start late. They are poorly led. They are long on ideas and short on execution. There is no follow-up or accountability. Good ideas are labeled “risky” while bad ideas are pondered for hours on end. Then everyone retreats back to their offices and races to catch up on their work before the next meeting is called. Then, the cycle starts all over again.

Many of the same bad ideas are debated all over again. While others argue, you wonder about the work you could be getting done. You doodle. You fume. You wonder why the leader doesn’t see how much valuable time is being wasted.

Sound familiar?

There are some people who just LOVE to have meetings. In some instances, it is a great replacement for actually getting some real work done. In many cases, however, a manager simply hasn’t learned how to lead a productive meeting.

Here are eight steps to follow that will produce shorter, more effective meetings:

1. Create an objective for the meeting

2. Create a specific agenda for the meeting
3. Ensure that any contributor to the meeting is fully aware of his/her individual role in the meeting
4. Establish a firm time frame for the meeting and stick to it
5. Assign a note-taker for the meeting
6. Record all decisions, action items, and critical information
7. Assign process owners to all action items
8. Distribute notes immediately following the meeting

If you follow these guidelines, you will definitely have more productive meetings, but, there is one last thing you need to do to have the best opportunity to have a productive meeting. In the old west, people were often required to check their guns at the door – too many chances of someone drinking a little too much and shooting up the place. Because of the chance of ruining an otherwise productive meeting, might I suggest that you have meeting participants check their cell phones at the door?

OK, you don’t have to actually collect them (lots of luck with that), but before you start the meeting, insist that all participants turn off their electronic devices. In the past, meeting participants may have needed them just to stay awake, but now they will serve as a constant meeting interruption if you don’t shut them down.

You would be hard-pressed to find someone who doesn’t know the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Unfortunately, in business, it almost seems like there is a corollary to the Golden Rule: “Unless, of course, we pay you. Then we can treat you any way we want and you have to like it.”

Managers always seem to want to know why employees won’t do a better job–or be more accountable, or pay more attention to details, or whatever–but, they also seem to be completely unaware of their role in determining the performance they get from those employees. Managers will often treat employees in ways they would never treat friends or family (sometimes they treat everyone poorly, but that’s another problem altogether).

They criticize. They ignore. They berate. They micro-manage to the last detail. They play favorites.

Get the picture?

Unfortunately, I think this is a vicious cycle. Employees who work under this style of management, upon being promoted themselves, often wind up practicing the same style of management they so despised as an employee! Why? In the absence of training, managers often resort to what they have experienced themselves.

Certainly, there are exceptions to this rule, and, unquestionably, there are good managers out there. But they are awful hard to find.

On the other hand, managers who excel and are well-respected have learned that management is about people. Yes, there is planning and organizing involved, and there are problems to solve and decisions to make. But, in the final analysis, the reason any team or department has a manager is almost always because there are people to be managed.

With that in mind, here is one of the most critical pieces of management insight you will ever get: people just want to be appreciated for what they do. Yes, studies have repeatedly shown that the most significant need that any employee has is the need to be appreciated. More important than compensation. More important than benefits. More important than interesting work. All, by the way, of which ARE important–just not as important as being appreciated.

When the chips are down, and all things being equal, employees want to be appreciated for what they do. It doesn’t mean they don’t want to make good money–it simply means that money won’t BUY you a good employee.

I have recently begun to read a book entitled The Secret Language of Leadership: How Leaders Inspire Action Through Narrative. The book is very interesting, but the title itself has caused me to ponder the “language” that leaders use. It has also caused me to think about the common language of those who have lost (or never had) the ability to lead. Frankly, the language that people use is often a primary reason that others quit following them.

There are many aspects of this idea, but I want to focus on one in particular. This is prompted in part by observing the actions of coaches during football games. If you look closely, you will see several different types of coaches on the sidelines: some scream and holler, some glare, some study and reflect, some cheer and high-five and get excited, some teach, some simply ignore the offending player. Usually, coaches will adopt more than one of these approaches during the course of the game.

Coaches, I suspect, are often not fully aware of the influence they have on players, particularly the long-term influence. In observing dozens of high school football coaches recently, I have seen a language pattern – one that I have seen frequently in the workplace as well. That pattern is the tendency to “condemn and accuse” following mistakes.

Let me illustrate. In a football game, when a player makes a mistake (misses an assignment, fails to make a block or a tackle, or commits a mistake that results in a penalty) it is very common to see a coach screaming at a player from the sidelines. The verbal onslaught continues as the player comes to the sideline, and then the inevitable question:

“Why did you do that?“

Why? Why did you do that? Why did you miss that block? Why did you jump off-side?

Why? Why? Why?

Think about this for a moment… Is this not possibly the very worst question to ask at the time?

Here are some possible player answers:

• Coach, I’m a horrible player. Really. I’m just horrible.
• Coach, I’m brain dead most of the time. I was actually thinking about the party after the game.
• Coach, I try to screw up as often as possible. It’s genetic.
• Coach, I pay no attention during practice, so I have no idea what I’m doing out there.

In reality, a player usually tries to explain exactly why he did what he did. This only serves to send the coach into further tirades about “excuses” and “the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen” and other equally motivating ideas.

The fact is that asking someone “Why?” after a mistake is counterproductive and demeaning. How about more teaching and less screaming and accusing? What, after all, is your screaming accomplishing other than to assuage your own feelings? If you truly want to make the player (or the employee) better, why not try to TEACH them how to prevent the mistake in the future?

First, mistakes happen. I have yet to see any athlete have a perfect game (or coach for that matter, but that’s a whole different story).

Second, mistakes are necessary to learn. When coaches scream at a player, it is difficult for the player to focus on corrections.

Third, the best time to teach is immediately following an error. The sequence of events is fresh and easy to review. Specific changes can be made. For instance, if a player misses a block, the coach can point out footwork issues, blocking technique, body position and so forth.

By asking an athlete “What?” instead of “Why?”, there is a much better chance to improve performance.

• “What can you do differently to make that block next time?”
• “What happened that kept you from getting that block?”
• “As you started to make the block, what did you see?”
• “What change do you need to make to get that block?”

“What” questions ask the player for information or introspection. With this information in hand, the coach can suggest changes in technique to improve the possibility of success. At the very least, the coach should simply take the player and tell him why the mistake occurred and explain how to prevent it in the future. While challenging a player on occasion can, indeed, have a motivating effect, the ultimate objective of every coach is to make the player better.

This is what managers are supposed to do as well – teach, train, and develop skills.

WHY don’t they do that?