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In my experience meetings can go wrong in several ways. Think about the last meeting you attended. Consider which of the following criticisms might apply:

• The purpose of the meeting was unclear 
• A meeting was unnecessary to achieve the purpose
• Some of the members had no reason to be there 
• Not all members knew who all the other members were 
• Some people who should have been there were not 
• The meeting suffered from a lack of leadership 
• No-one was taking adequate notes or minutes 
• The meeting was disrupted 
• People with important things to say were not given a proper hearing 
• The person in the chair talked too much 
• The meeting ran out of time 
• The meeting was allowed to go on long beyond the agreed finishing time 
• Several topics failed to result in decisions 
• Members felt their time was wasted 
• The costs (salaries, expenses, etc.,) involved in having the meeting were not justified by the results.

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What nightmares would you add to this list?

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Martin Smith is a highly regarded Freelance Learning and Development Consultant with many years experience of helping organisations, teams and individuals, to get the best from their people. His experience spans three diverse industries and encompasses sectors such as engineering, design, customer service, finance, supply chain and procurement.

Martin specialises in working with leaders at all levels to help them improve their communication skills and get the best from their relationships with people. Martin also provides Leadership Development, Executive Coaching, Team Development, Change Management and Managing People and Performance training.

The BIFF model is one of the simplest and most effective ways of guiding your approach to the situation that I have come across.

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B  ehaviour   

 What is it they are doing that is causing the problem? Present facts in order to reduce the risk of conflict. 

e.g. ”You have been more than 10 minutes late on three days occasions this week”.

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I  mpact  

What impact is their behaviour having? Again, present facts to reduce the risk of conflict. 

e.g. “Whenever you are late someone else has to cover your position and this means they are diverted from getting on with their own work”.

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F eelings 

Express how this makes you feel i.e. Angry, sad, frustrated, etc. We can all relate to feelings more than their cause so they are a powerful way to give some ‘scale’ to the problem.

e.g. “This make me feel disappointed with you”.

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F uture                 

Open the discussion on what changes are to be made. This is the start of 2-way discussion. Stick to the facts laid out in the BIFF steps to prevent denial or reasoning of the situation. 

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To keep on track and achieve a successful conclusion, have an ideal and fall back outcome in mind, but be prepared to be supporting where appropriate.

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Martin Smith is a highly regarded Freelance Learning and Development Consultant with many years experience of helping organisations, teams and individuals, to get the best from their people. His experience spans three diverse industries and encompasses sectors such as engineering, design, customer service, finance, supply chain and procurement.

Martin specialises in working with leaders at all levels to help them improve their communication skills and get the best from their relationships with people. Martin also provides Leadership Development, Executive Coaching, Team Development, Change Management and Managing People and Performance training.

The story continued in that the new Area Manager has now been in position for approximately 5 weeks and to date there has been no contact with their new team(s) either individually or collectively. It appears that the only way to get to meet with the new manager is to phone them direct and ask for an appointment in their diary.

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This approach raises a number of questions in my mind such as;

• Has the new manager any previous experience of taking on existing teams before?
• Has the new manager received any coaching/advice about setting up from their boss?
• How important is the team to the new manager?
• How does this aproach impact on the team? Will they feel valued or important?
• What expectations does the new manager have of their team and how will they find out about them?
• What plans do they have to communicate with their team?
• Have they received any training or coaching to help them prepare for managing/leading a team of people?

There are many more questions that could be asked here………..

 In my experience this is a far from the best way to start off with a new team for any new manager, let alone an Area Manager with perhaps more than one team. “So what would be the best start?” I hear some of you say, well certainly a more structured and perhaps thought-out approach would be more effective. Perhaps it might look something like this;

• Work with your boss to fully understand your job role
  - Company expectations of your new role
  - Your bosses expectations of you
  - The Performance standards expected
  - Specific targets or measures for you to achieve

• Plan Your Initial Approach to the team(s) - Understand your team and it’s role in the organisation (this may even be before you start your new job)
  - Look at your team’s fit within the larger organization or unit
  - Review the purpose of the team
  - Review objectives for the team with your boss
  - Take stock of the new team – who’s in it? background, feedback from customers/clients etc
  - Try to identify any likely problems or issues
  - Communicate with your boss and keep them informed

• Plan and run your First Team Meeting(s)
  - What key messages do you want to send?
  - What expectations and “rules for operating” do you want to establish?
  - What do you want to tell the team about how you like to work with team members?
  - What information from the team do you need to ask for?
  - What do you want to say about next steps?
  - How should you structure your agenda?
  - Make sure you use your agenda
  - Listen and observe everyone during the meeting. Make notes as appropriate
  - Focus on next steps, especially with objectives
  - How can you get to know each other better going forward? What would the team like to know?

• Schedule Individual Meetings as soon as possible
  - Get to know the individuals in your team
  - What do they like/not like
  - How do they like to be managed?
  - What support do they expect from you as boss?

• Conduct Individual Follow-up Meetings
  - Continue to get to know your team,
  - Monitor progress and offer support as necessary

• Continue communicating with your own boss.
  - They are a great source of information and advice
  - Keep them in the loop of progress and issues and what plans you have to tackle them

• Make plans to review progress and correct your direction as may be necessary
  

Of course, this is just one approach and each situation should be assessed carefully to ensure that the best approach is selected. My preference would be to work directly with the new leader, expploring options and ideas to help them set their team up to get the ‘smothest’ transition to new leadership as possible. 

What would you suggest best practice in the instance quoted above? I would be happy to see your ideas.

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Martin Smith is a highly regarded Freelance Learning and Development Consultant with many years experience of helping organisations, teams and individuals, to get the best from their people. His experience spans three diverse industries and encompasses sectors such as engineering, design, customer service, finance, supply chain and procurement.

Martin specialises in working with leaders at all levels to help them improve their communication skills and get the best from their relationships with people. Martin also provides Leadership Development, Executive Coaching, Team Development, Change Management and Managing People and Performance training.

Anyway it got me thinking about what particular Characteristics you would be likely to see in an Ineffective Team. I came up with the following;

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• Domination by the leader
• Warring cliques or sub-groups
• Unequal participation or uneven use of group resources
• Rigid or dysfunctional group norms and procedures
• A climate of blame, defensiveness or fear
• Uncreative alternatives to problems
• Restricted, poor quality or non-existent communication
• Avoidance of differences or potential conflicts

It’s likely that conditions such as those above would reduce the team’s ability to work together in collective problem-solving or project situations.  Ideally, the role of the manager would be to help the group become aware of its processes and begin to develop greater group skills. However, if the manager is part of the problem then this may be better achieved with the help of some external resource such as a Consultant or Specialist. 

In terms of specific actions, after becoming aware of a process problem, the group needs to establish a procedure, guidelines, or plan of action to reduce the negative conditions. Openness and honesty within the team will play a big part in resolving such issues and it is here that a skilled facilitator can be useful in helping the team to address such issues in an effective manner.

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If you would like your team to Work Better Together I can help. Please email contact@martin-smith.biz or call 07702110676 to discuss your needs and start working towards a solution.

Martin Smith is a highly regarded Freelance Learning and Development Consultant with many years experience of helping organisations, teams and individuals, to get the best from their people. His experience spans three very diverse industries and encompasses sectors such as engineering, design, customer service, finance, supply chain and procurement.

Martin specialises in working with leaders at all levels to help them improve their communication skills and get the best from their relationships with people. Martin also provides Leadership Development, Executive Coaching, Team Development, Change Management and Managing People and Performance.

Here are some ideas that I came up with;

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• People share the same basic goals

• People listen carefully to one another

• People feel fully committed to the team and its task

• The team accepts disagreement and dissent

• People don’t mind disagreeing with one another

• People support and help one another

• People praise each others’ good performance

• People encourage one another

• People are open about their feelings

• People try to find out what others think and feel

• Success is celebrated by everybody

• There is regular review of performance

• People believe in the team and believe it will be successful

• People communicate clearly with one another

• People give one another feedback on their performance

• Team members possess different skills, attitudes, values and use them

Is there anything that you would add to this list?

Martin Smith is a highly regarded Freelance Learning and Development Consultant with many years experience of helping organisations, teams and individuals, to get the best from their people. His experience spans three diverse industries and encompasses sectors such as engineering, design, customer service, finance, supply chain and procurement.

Martin specialises in working with leaders at all levels to help them improve their communication skills and get the best from their relationships with people. Martin also provides Leadership Development, Executive Coaching, Team Development, Change Management and Managing People and Performance training.

Blogging is a new adventure for me so I’ll be learning as I go along which is good as that is one of my philosophies of life. I hope that you will come along and enjoy the journey with me, for however long you can stay.

My blog is dedicated to helping individuals, teams and organizations to get the best out their relationships and their people, encouraging a learning approach to life and business. Although most of my work is focused in the business/working environments, many of the subjects and skills that I will explore are transferable to other parts of your life.

I’ll be writing here about things that I’m passionate about, things that capture my attention, things that interest me and that I believe will interest my audience. I’d like to this space to be somewhere that we can stimulate discussion on how, by changing behaviour, we can transform our professional development and help us and our companies to achieve our goals be they professional or personal.

Enjoy. I hope you find something of interest here. Feel free to let me know if there is anything specific that you want to discuss.

Regards

Martin

P.S. If you would like to know a little bit more about me……..

I would say that the easiest way would be to look at my bio or have a look at What I can do for you. Alternatively you are welcome to contact me direct, I’m quite approachable and haven’t bitten yet!

Martin Smith is a highly regarded Freelance Learning and Development Consultant with many years experience of helping organisations, teams and individuals, to get the best from their people. His experience spans three diverse industries and encompasses sectors such as engineering, design, customer service, finance, supply chain and procurement.

Martin specialises in working with leaders at all levels to help them improve their communication skills and get the best from their relationships with people. Martin also provides Leadership Development, Executive Coaching, Team Development, Change Management and Managing People and Performance training.