Effective Meetings and Side Conversations
Hello, I’m Andy Temte and welcome to the Saturday Morning Muse! Start to your weekend with me by exploring topics that span leadership, business management, education, and other musings designed to support your journey of personal and professional continuous improvement.
In today’s Muse, I’m going to focus on the topic of meetings. Love them or hate them, meetings are a meaningful part of corporate life and represent a significant opportunity for improvement—meaning making meetings more effective—as part of any organization’s continuous improvement practice. I’ve tackled the topic in my book, The Balanced Business—and my aim is to help improve the quality of your meetings so that they can become value-additive for all attendees. What I’m about to discuss may be a touchy subject for some—especially those who routinely engage in side conversations while a meeting or presentation is in progress. Here we go…
We’ve all been there. The conference room is packed with attendees for the big presentation. The projector comes to life and the speakers begin walking everyone through the next big corporate innovation, the quarterly financials, or an update on a cross-functional project. The room is professional and focused, with the exception of Suzie and Quentin, who are whispering so loudly that their side conversation is impossible to ignore. As the presentation progresses, Suzie and Quentin continue to chatter periodically amongst themselves—unimpeded and oblivious to their surroundings. Nobody steps in to call them on their behavior. Why?
Humans naturally shy away from confrontation, so the speaker is unlikely to interrupt the meeting to call out Suzie and Quentin for their behavior for fear of retribution—especially if Suzie and Quentin are at or above their level in the organization or report into a different functional area. Other participants in the room will also be reticent to ask Suzie and Quentin to focus and stop their distracting behavior for the same reason. They might give Suzie and Quentin the standard “church pew” glance of disapproval as a feeble attempt to get them to stop, but this is typically the limit to any confrontation over the matter. Worse yet, Suzie and Quentin are probably repeat offenders who are unaware of the negative effects of their behavior because they’ve been engaging in side conversations for years with little or no repercussions.
Four Reasons Why Side Conversations Should Be Minimized
Why is this issue important to improving the effectiveness of meetings and, as an extension, corporate culture? Why are side conversations so detrimental?
Disrespect. First and foremost, when participants in a meeting or presentation engage in side conversations, they’re disrespecting the speaker, meeting organizers, and attendees. The speaker is likely already nervous, so seeing participants “check out” to engage in a side conversation serves to exacerbate feelings of self-doubt and inadequacy. Meeting organizers (hopefully) put a good deal of thought into the meeting, crafting the agenda, intended outcomes, securing speakers, etc. The attendees have dedicated their time to attend—they expect to derive value from the meeting and understand that everyone’s time is valuable. Individuals who engage in side conversations are signaling through their actions that they are more important than the content, speakers, organizers, and attendees.
Distraction. When you engage in a side conversation, your mind is now focused there and is no longer retaining any information being provided by the speaker. Worse yet, everyone who notices the side conversation is also distracted and are no longer efficiently processing and retaining information. The speaker(s) are also distracted and not functioning at peak performance. Close your eyes and think about the last time you were giving a presentation and folks in the back of the room were huddled together, whispering back and forth. How did you feel? You were likely thrown off your game and wondered things like, “Is my talk really that bad?” or “Unbelievable! There they go again…” So for everyone involved, the distraction from side conversations leads to limited learning, performance, and meeting outcomes.
Reputation. If you’re a chronic side conversation offender, you’re becoming ‘known’ for your behavior. “Ope, here come Suzie and Quentin again. I wish they could just sit there and listen for once!” What is the chronic side conversationalist becoming known for? Here are some of the descriptors: selfish, self-centered, rude, unaware, oblivious, egotistical. While I applaud people who live an “I don’t care what other people think of me” life, the reality is that in business your success is built on relationships and results. Your reputation matters in this context and can impact the relationships side of the success equation. Why put your reputation at risk by engaging in negative behavior that’s completely within your control?
Sign of skill or behavioral deficiency. Routinely engaging in side conversations may be a sign of a skill deficiency. Active listening, self-regulation, critical thinking, and courage are four critical workplace skills that should be continually honed throughout one’s career. As I’ll discuss in just a moment, these four skills stack on top of one another and if practiced in meetings can yield more positive results for everyone involved.
Recommendation for Growth
The next time you feel the urge to engage in side conversations during a meeting or presentation, use that energy to exercise the skills of active listening, self-regulation, critical thinking, and courage. Self-regulation is needed for active listening. Active listening is necessary to gather data and information to think critically about the issues at hand. Critical thinking is needed to formulate a good questions, and courage is needed to put yourself out there, in front of the whole group, to ask a question that’s likely on everyone else’s mind.
So the bottom line today is this. If you’re a chronic side conversationalist, STOP!
