Contributions in Team Meetings: Content

Team meetings tend to consist of mostly-focused discussions that move from agenda item to agenda item, sometimes making decisions, sometimes not. Most discussions are unstructured, consisting of sequences of contributions that occur in an order determined, in part, by exactly when a contributor thought of the contribution. Some contributions are helpful whenever they arrive. Some contributions would have been way more helpful if they had arrived ten minutes ago.

Classifying contributions is an important fist step to more productive meetings. For example, some contributions are "puzzles," while others are "news reports." If we agree in advance that news reports come before puzzles, rather than having the time order correspond to an agenda ordered in some other way, some puzzles might resolve themselves immediately, saving time and avoiding trouble.

This post provides the beginning of a taxonomy of contributions to meeting discussions, with some suggestions for exploiting the taxonomy to make meetings less painful and more productive. In this post and more to come, I describe nine "axes" that are useful for classifying meeting discussion contributions. In these descriptions I use the term debate to refer to the discussion, and the term proposition to refer to what is being debated or discussed. This post emphasizes the axes most closely related to the proposition content.

From Puzzles to News reports

Puzzle contributions are content-related issues unresolved. News report contributions might be responses to Puzzles that are currently open, Puzzles that once were open, Puzzles that haven't yet been opened. A Puzzles valet tracks Puzzles and their status (open or resolved). This enables the group to keep moving forward even though one or more Puzzles are still open.

And as mentioned above, entertaining news reports early in the meeting can reduce the burden of material to be covered. The "news-first" order can also help by enabling the group to adjust its focus while there is still time to benefit from the adjustment.

From Content-oriented to Process-oriented

A Content-orientedA Content-oriented contribution is one
that directly pertains to the proposition.
A Process-oriented contribution is one
that pertains to the conduct of the
debate about the proposition. contribution is one that directly pertains to the proposition. A Process-oriented contribution is one that pertains to the conduct of the debate about the proposition. Occasional process-oriented contributions are helpful, as when a participant notices that someone has violated one of the group's behavioral norms of respectful debate.

Unless the process is the current agenda item, process-oriented contributions are almost always out of order, with one important exception. At times the debate can become mired in process-oriented contributions without the group's awareness of having done so. Members must have a way to call attention to this state whenever it occurs. For a group that often finds itself in Process debates unawares, appointing someone to the role of Designated Process Detector can aid in detection and deterrence of unwelcome process contributions.

From Clarifying to Obfuscating

A contribution is clarifying if it restates the proposition or some earlier contributions to help the group come to a more widely shared understanding of what is being restated. With that shared understanding as a basis, the group can more readily move forward to further develop the proposition.

In obfuscation, the contributor intentionally confuses the proposition or its effects with other propositions or their effects. Because it is a form of sabotage of the group's work, the purpose of obfuscation is usually opposition. But because straightforward, honest opposition is more likely to lead the group to a durable outcome consistent with the group's mission, obfuscation is rarely helpful. The group would do well to identify a repeated patter of obfuscation and address it as a performance issue.

Last words

Next time I'll explore the very fertile ground of advocacy and opposition.   Next issue in this series   Top  .

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Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout

Coming September 3: Contributions in Team Meetings: Advocating

An agenda in the form of an ordered list of topics might not provide an appropriate framework for a given meeting. For example, if A depends on B, and B depends on A, we must find a way to discuss A and B together in some orderly fashion. Here are some alternatives to linear, ordered agendas. Available here and by RSS on September 3.

And on September 10: Contributions in Team Meetings: Scoping

Some meetings focus on solving specific problems. We call them "working sessions." More often, we delegate problem solving to task teams, while meetings wrestle with the difficult task of identifying or "scoping" problems rather than solving them. Scoping discussions can be perilous. Available here and by RSS on September 10.

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