Denise had just spent two intense hours explaining to Marcus why the changes he wanted were likely to set the project back. Marcus kept insisting that removing requirements should save time, not cost time, and Denise just couldn't explain to Marcus why that just ain't so.
Finally, Marcus understood her point, and that's when he told Denise that the changes had been agreed to at the CEO level. So that was that. "If only I had known," Denise thought, "I wouldn't have wasted the afternoon debating it." Not a great day for Denise.
How much time and energy do we expend, only to learn later that it was all for naught? How much anger do we experience, only to feel sheepishly regretful later, when we see the full picture? How often have we kept to ourselves words of kindness or appreciation, because of the embarrassment that we've felt about giving them voice?
The Temperature Reading, invented by Virginia Satir, gives team members an opportunity to speak their minds, with little risk of embarrassment or hurt. All you need is a quiet, comfortable room.
In its most usual form, the Temperature Reading has five parts. In each part, team members voluntarily come to the front of the group to offer their thoughts to all.
- Appreciations
- First we express appreciation for anything meaningful — large or small — for support, contributions, understanding, or even a good joke. Once the appreciations start rolling, they gather momentum, and they build positive feelings that make the rest of the Temperature Reading so successful.
- New Information
- Here we offer information that we think others might not know yet. Often this section clears up puzzles and resolves complaints even before they're voiced.
- Puzzles
- Puzzles are questions we have that we don't know how to answer. Offering the question to the whole group makes everyone aware of the puzzle at once, and helps engage everybody in resolving it, once the Temperature Reading ends.
- Complaints with Recommendations
- The Temperature Reading
gives team members an
opportunity to speak their
minds, with little risk of
embarrassment or hurt - Next we can complain, provided we also recommend something that helps resolve the issue we raise. Complaints are usually heartfelt and are almost always heard that way.
- Hopes and Wishes
- Closing the Temperature Reading on a high note — one of hopes and wishes for the future — gives us a chance to express our dreams. It can be inspiring and we can sometimes inspire others.
Like all group activities, the Temperature Reading improves with practice. Once you've learned the rhythm, regular Temperature Readings can keep a well-functioning team in the groove, and help take a troubled team — one that's too cold or too hot — to a place of comfortable warmth. Top Next Issue
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Related articles
More articles on Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness:
- The True Costs of Cubicles
- Although cubicles do provide facility cost savings compared with walled offices, they do so at the price
of product development delays and increased product development costs. Decisions of facilities planners
can have dramatic project schedule impact.
- Making Meaning
- When we see or hear the goings-on around us, we interpret them to make meaning and significance. Some
interpretations are thoughtful, but most are almost instantaneous. Since the instantaneous ones are
sometimes goofy or dangerous, here's a look at how we make interpretations.
- Twenty-Three Thoughts
- Sometimes we get so focused on the immediate problem that we lose sight of the larger questions. Here
are twenty-three thoughts to help you focus on what really counts.
- Team Risks
- Working in teams is necessary in most modern collaborations, but teamwork does carry risks. Here are
some risks worth mitigating.
- False Summits: II
- When climbers encounter "false summits," hope of an early end to the climb comes to an end.
The psychological effects can threaten the morale and even the safety of the climbing party. So it is
in project work.
See also Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness and Effective Meetings for more related articles.
Related programs
Although the Temperature Reading process was originally developed by Virginia Satir to support her work in family systems, it's no less valuable for groups in the workplace. My program, "Managing in Fluid Environments," explores how to apply this process to bring forth valuable but hidden information in situations where changes come along at such a rapid rate that the next change comes along before we reach the "New Status Quo" of the changes we're already dealing with. More about this program.
Are you planning an offsite or retreat for your organization? Or a conference for your professional society? My programs are fresh, original, and loaded with concrete tips that make an immediate difference. ChacoCanyon.com.
Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout
- Coming April 3: Recapping Factioned Meetings
- A factioned meeting is one in which participants identify more closely with their factions, rather than with the meeting as a whole. Agreements reached in such meetings are at risk of instability as participants maneuver for advantage after the meeting. Available here and by RSS on April 3.
- And on April 10: Managing Dunning-Kruger Risk
- A cognitive bias called the Dunning-Kruger Effect can create risk for organizational missions that require expertise beyond the range of knowledge and experience of decision-makers. They might misjudge the organization's capacity to execute the mission successfully. They might even be unaware of the risk of so misjudging. Available here and by RSS on April 10.
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