3D rendering. One person raising arm in crowd
The other day, the so-called ‘helper’ here tried to pull me into an argument. Now this person is the kind whom should never have been hired, and if hired, quickly fired. But, she is here.
A few weeks ago she said something, I answered, and that was my defeat. She could babble and shout and sing and feel she had ‘won’. She had ‘won’ because she decided to pick a fight now, and I obliged.
Now, she lost.
She lost because I didn’t let her choose when I would get into an argument, if I would get into an argument. So she could make as much noise as she wanted. I shut the door.
As I sat here, typing, I thought back over how infrequent it had been in the past few years to let people ‘set my agenda’.
I recall a function that was going on to which I had not paid fees to enter, but wound up in the room. I was in discussion with someone when the organisers asked if I wanted some of the soup.
“No thank you…”
“Come on, it’s really good.”
“I’m a vegetarian..” I smiled.
I smiled because I realised that they had set up this function, charging entrance, some how letting me enter ‘free’ and now wanting to make the others grumble because I would get the ‘free soup’.
Of course, I didn’t touch the soup.
At most functions to which I am invited I don’t touch the food. I don’t know what it is, who made it, what the ingredients are. I carry lunch from home. So now, people are suddenly having vegetarian alternatives.
They have vegetarian meals not because they are interested in health but because it is really hard to keep someone out of a function they don’t want to attend, or attempt to charge them for a meal they won’t eat. By deliberately catering to me, as I am the only vegetarian, they seek to force me into a function and put my hand in my pocket.
As I know this, and as I don’t want to get too deep into the fantasy world of the members of the organisation, I am absent more than present and ‘free food’ doesn’t pull me.
Over the years I’ve been left pretty much out of their frame. This is because I set my own agenda.
I decide if I will be angry or not. I decide if I want to go here or not. I decide what issues I will expend a brain cell on and which I will miss.
Sure, I stumble once and a while, like previously allowing the helper to engage me in her argument, but most times, I choose.
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We’ve all been in meetings where participants are unprepared, people veer off-track, and the topics discussed are a waste of the team’s time. These problems — and others like it — stem from poor agenda design. An effective agenda sets clear expectations for what needs to occur before and during a meeting.
It helps team members prepare, allocates time wisely, quickly gets everyone on the same topic, and identifies when the discussion is complete. If problems still occur during the meeting, a well-designed agenda increases the team’s ability to effectively and quickly address them.
Team meeting time is expensive and difficult to schedule. It should mainly be used to discuss and make decisions on issues that affect the whole team — and need the whole team to solve them. These are often ones in which individuals must coordinate their actions because their parts of the organization are interdependent.
They are also likely to be issues for which people have different information and needs. Examples might include: How do we best allocate shared resources? How do we reduce response time? If the team isn’t spending most of the meeting talking about interdependent issues, members will disengage and ultimately not attend.
This serves two purposes. First, it requires you to do the math — to calculate how much time the team will need for introducing the topic, answering questions, resolving different points of view, generating potential solutions, and agreeing on the action items that follow from discussion and decisions.
Leaders typically underestimate the amount of time needed. If there are ten people in your meeting and you have allocated ten minutes to decide under what conditions, if any,