Facilitating Effective & Inclusive Meetings
Read this if you hate quiet meetings
In a six-person meeting, two people do more than 60 per cent of the talking.
Innovation breeds ground-breaking ideas and to have those ideas we need diverse thoughts. Ever wondered, what brings you those diverse thoughts when your (unconscious) biases are inclined toward the same group of people. Having a diverse workforce is not equal to diverse ideas, especially when people are not heard and allowed to speak, safely.
In meetings, we all have had our share of filling the void situation where filling the silence with words felt more appropriate than taking a moment to process the information.
Listen to the silence, it has so much to say. — Rumi
According to Leigh Thompson, Northwestern University, in a typical six-person meeting, more than 60 per cent of the talking is done by just two people. I see you nod.
This brings us to the “babble hypothesis”, which suggests that people think that leaders emerge from the quantity of speaking rather than the quality. Refer to the visual below for more clarity.
In a world that can’t stop talking, we need to embrace the power of shy and quiet individuals. To abolish the dominance of talkative individuals in your meetings, here’s what you can do as a leader and facilitator, - start having silent meetings. Yes, you heard that right.
Silent Meetings.
“But, how?”
By brainwriting.
“What is that? Tell me more”.
Leigh, suggests instead of brainstorming and verbally jotting down the ideas, pull up a shared whiteboard and write the ideas. Do not identify which ideas belong to whom, rather, focus on the value of the idea than the status of the person who gave it. This neutralizes the Hippo philosophy and gives everyone a fair share of collaborative thinking.
Some of the smartest people rarely speak in work gatherings but everyone listens when they do.
Friederike Fabritius and Hans W. Hagemann, in their book ‘The Leading Brain’, mention implementing a rule in boardroom meetings that time spent in silence should match or exceed the time spent speaking. If you speak for x minutes, then you should also observe silence for x minutes. The outcome of this experiment led to productive and less conflicted meetings. What do you think about this, will you try it?
What other innovative meeting approaches have you observed or experimented with? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
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