Episode Transcript
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JIM (00:00):
Welcome to The OrgHealth
Podcast
organizational health.
I'm Jim Brown.
MARGOT (00:10):
And I'm Margot Thompson.
We're consultants and coaches toleaders who are creating healthy
organizations.
JIM (00:15):
We talk about leading at
the executive level, not just
the key points, the highlights.
We like to go deeper.
MARGOT (00:22):
Under the surface.
We like to talk about what isn'tobvious.
JIM (00:26):
And maybe what isn't
comfortable!
MARGOT (00:27):
Right! And we come at
these things with very different
viewpoints (00:30):
easy, because Jim
and I are very, very different
from each other.
JIM (00:35):
That's true.
But the good news is we'veworked together long enough that
we see our differences asstrengths.
MARGOT (00:41):
In fact, they actually
allow us to create more health
in our team and the teams thatwe help.
And we're going to do some ofthat right now.
JIM (00:47):
This week we're going to
talk about daily standup
meetings.
We're going to explore why we dothem.
We're going to talk about how tomake them work.
We're going to talk about whatgoes wrong with them.
(01:09):
And the truth is that theconcept of having meetings every
day actually rub some people thewrong way.
What are some of the things thatpeople say about this, Margot?
MARGOT (01:20):
So what I hear most
often from teams is
people come to this meetingevery single day.
They all give the top threethings that they're doing that
day.
And that's their job descriptionbasically.
And so they do the same threethings every day.
Why do I have to go to thatmeeting to hear what, that Bob
is doing one, two, three things,and it's the same every single
(01:41):
day?
What do you think about that,Jim?
JIM (01:43):
Well, I think let's come
back to why we're doing these
meetings anyways.
We want everyone to be in theloop together.
There's some thing that we'retrying to make happen in the
company and we're allresponsible to make it happen.
Let's be on the same page.
We also want to be understanding, and connected enough to each
(02:04):
other.
So the comment that you madethat, well that's, these three
things, that's his jobdescription.
And it's almost like we're boredbecause we know his job
description.
The truth is they probablydidn't before he kept saying the
same three things.
I'm not saying he should onlysay the same three things, but
already there was some value.
(02:24):
I think the problem is thatthere isn't enough visibility of
the payoff to the people fromthese messages.
And so let's talk about what thepay off can look like.
Remember, we're not trying toget the conversation to come up
with a solution.
We're trying to expose theproblem and identify who around
(02:48):
the table—not even table becausethey're standing up—who around
the team should have thecontinued conversation with me
because I've got a problem.
And great, Frank mentions,"Oh,I've had something like that.
Why don't we talk right afterthis meeting?" The whole team
needs to hear next week what Igot from my conversation with
(03:13):
Frank and how that helped meovercome the problem.
See what I'm getting at?
MARGOT (03:18):
I do.
And conversely to what I justsaid, I think that there is no
leader out there who hasn't hadsomething happen suddenly and
been shocked by it because theydidn't know that there was a
problem in that area.
So one of the beauties of adaily standup is that all the
issues are—the important issuesare on the table every day and
(03:41):
you know them and you see them.
It won't go 24 hours without youknowing that there's something
happening that's not good in anygiven area.
JIM (03:49):
Right, right.
So you don't get blindsided.
Absolutely.
So then there's, then the,another payoff is that when
you've got that kind of all onthe same page start to every
day, it actually reduces theemail inquiries that start to
get copied to everyone on theteam.
And we had a team start thiswho...
(04:12):
I got an email back from theteam leader saying within a week
her email reduced by 25 messagesper day!
MARGOT (04:22):
Right?
Hooray.
JIM (04:23):
Because of the meetings and
the clarity that they got from
those meetings.
MARGOT (04:27):
And who wouldn't love
that?
JIM (04:29):
Right.
Okay, let's, let's get into themeat of how the daily stand up
meeting works.
It's not long, so this is notgoing to be a long conversation.
Let's just walk through thepieces.
MARGOT (04:43):
So team members get
together and they're standing up
and it's about five minutes.
Every single morning, theyreport on the important
activities of that day or anychallenges or roadblocks that
they're facing.
Just the high points.
JIM (04:56):
Right.
They're just bullet points andlet's underscore it's five
minutes.
They stand up, as in, we don'teven take time to sit down
around the table.
You just stand up in a circleand you start into it.
MARGOT (05:07):
That's it.
Five minutes standing up.
That's it.
JIM (05:11):
Bang.
MARGOT (05:12):
I don't want us to miss
how important it is to think
about what this does for theleadership team on a different
level.
We talk a lot about cohesivenessof a team and this allows
everybody on the leadership teamto actually hear what the other
person is saying and thatdevelops a real bond between
people.
Having somebody listen to what'sgoing on in your day and knowing
(05:34):
what's going on in anotherperson's day and where are the
implications of connection andhow that affects each other's
areas of responsibility...
And then they can see how theycan collaborate better together.
JIM (05:47):
Okay.
Yeah, that's very important.
The problem is that we encounterchallenges.
So let's, let's be open aboutwhat some of those challenges
are.
MARGOT (05:57):
So I think one of the
things that happens a lot on
teams is that when they'recoming to this daily standup
meeting that's only supposed tobe a few minutes, people are
going off on bunny trails, ontheir own agendas and the
implications that they think arevery, very important.
But that holds it up foreverybody on the team.
(06:18):
And people are very frustratedbecause a 10 minute—or a five
minute, hopefully—meeting turnsinto 15, 20, even half an hour.
JIM (06:28):
[laughing] So, um, I think
we should be candid with, uh,
with our listeners that, uh,we've, we've had to walk through
some of these very strugglesourselves with our own team.
So, um, yeah! And you areespecially introverted.
So how do you show up at thedaily meeting?
MARGOT (06:48):
So one of my issues was
that I started earlier than most
people, and so I was alreadyheads down in work that mattered
to me before the meeting waseven supposed to take place.
So first of all, it felt like abit of an imposition, but I
would come with my three pointsand I would say boom, boom,
boom, here are the three thingsI'm doing today and the rest of
(07:10):
my time would be for the rest ofthe team.
JIM (07:12):
Right.
Very succinct, very selfless.
You are not going to use up anyof the team's time.
And let's be, let's, let's pushat this a little bit, Margot,
and sometimes that would be justcoldly factual, but it didn't
actually open the door to,"here's what I might need some
help with" or...
(07:34):
There, there was no invitation.
It was really just information.
I'm not saying that there'salways a need, but how would you
handle it if there was a need?
If you really did have aroadblock and you're looking for
some help?
MARGOT (07:51):
I would have asked for
it.
If I needed help, I would askfor it.
JIM (07:53):
Okay! That's crucial.
And I think that some peopledon't for other reasons.
This is not something you sufferfrom.
But sometimes around aleadership team we don't want to
ask for help because it makes itlook like we're weak, not good
enough to do our job.
So it's funny, there's like thisdouble, um, two sides of the, of
(08:16):
the road, right?
On one side it's very factualand not an invitation on the
other side it's verbose and ittakes them three minutes to
figure out what their threepoints are.
MARGOT (08:29):
Or more.
JIM (08:29):
Yeah.
[chuckles]
MARGOT (08:31):
And also some people
don't come prepared to a meeting
like that.
They are sort of thinking on thefly and just searching back into
their mind.
And they first come up withtheir first two points that are
important and then they think,oh no, there was something more
important than that.
And then they start talkingabout that and then another
thing comes up and they starttalking about that, and it
just...
JIM (08:49):
So, so let's talk about how
do we solve that problem?
Because it...
One, if we stopped the meetingat the time when the meeting
should end—10 minutes at thevery most—then some people
wouldn't have even have talked.
MARGOT (09:05):
Exactly.
JIM (09:05):
And that doesn't feel very
good.
So the tendency is, well, let'stake a little longer and we'll
hear from Burt and Sally andAndrew.
Now it's not a 10 minutemeeting.
So, how might we handle theverbose over-contributor?
MARGOT (09:23):
Well, I think one thing
that is fairly normal is that
people who are more likely to domore talking are also more quick
to volunteer to go first.
JIM (09:33):
[ laughing] Yeah.
They don't know what they'regoing to say, but boy, can they
start saying something!
MARGOT (09:37):
Just because they're
the, they're the thinker and
processor simultaneously types.
JIM (09:42):
Yeah.
MARGOT (09:42):
And so they're also the
ones who are most likely to take
the longest length of time.
JIM (09:47):
Uh huh.
[laughs] What do you think aboutthere being kind of a...
a one minute beep?
You can't use more than oneminute.
It doesn't matter what your lifecrisis is and you're done.
MARGOT (10:02):
I think that with the
right positioning, that would
make people laugh and actuallythink that the meeting was more
fun, that they've got to gettheir stuff out within one
minute and then BEEP! Okay,you're done.
Next person.
JIM (10:16):
I agree! I think that fun
can be a part of it.
It's kind of like and if, ifBurt is always cut off before he
finishes that, then people arelaughing before the beeper even
goes! They know what's going tohappen!
MARGOT (10:30):
Exactly! They're all
anticipating the beep.
[laughing]
JIM (10:36):
Yeah![ imitates countdown
and final BEEP] But I think that
holding to that is actually agood approach to, one, send the
message, Burt, you got to getthis crisper or you're not doing
what you're being asked to dofor this meeting to work well.
MARGOT (10:49):
I like that suggestion
much better than a hard cutoff
without limiting what eachperson has to say.
Because I, I really believe thatseveral people will not have
been able to have theopportunity, and the people who
were speaking more won't knowthe implications or the
connections that they shouldhave known about the remaining
people's...
JIM (11:10):
Yeah.
MARGOT (11:10):
Pieces.
JIM (11:11):
Right.
But one way or another, you haveto end these meetings in 10
minutes or people are going tostart resenting the meetings.
It was hard enough for you, yourrhythm was an earlier start.
So this was a, a break ofmomentum for you.
It was the start of most otherpeople's day.
So it was an easy kind of slowramp up, so to speak for them.
(11:36):
If it wasn't 10 minutes and itturned into 25 minutes, now it's
devastating.
MARGOT (11:42):
Well, in a busy
environment, it doesn't even
matter whether you started earlyor late.
If you're expected to give up ahalf hour out of your day, then
what are you doing to make thatup?
If your workload is enough tofill your day, then somewhere
you're having to find that halfhour.
Do you work through your lunch?
Do you stay late?
Do you take work home?
So people do end up having to,or feeling like they're going to
(12:02):
resent that a little bit.
JIM (12:04):
I agree.
I agree.
It's rare, like, we wouldencourage none of these teams to
be over 10 in number.
So if you limit each person to aminute, you can get through all
ten.
Yeah, we have to remember thatthe objective isn't to air a
potential roadblock and solve itas a team.
(12:26):
It's to air a potentialroadblock and identify who on
the team should have an on, likea continued conversation with me
to help me with my roadblock.
The meeting's over and Andrewsteps towards me and we just
talk about this for a few moreminutes, or we agree that we're
(12:46):
going to get together at twoo'clock and talk about this.
Something like that.
It's not, it's not a teamsolution.
It's a team discovery of whethersome solution needs to be found.
MARGOT (12:58):
Right.
Exactly! It's not to solve thesituation.
If it's something that needs tobe looked at deeply, you can
take it offline or it can moveto the tactical meeting.
JIM (13:08):
Right.
MARGOT (13:10):
So we talked about the
monthly strategic meeting and
the daily standup meeting andthe last meeting we're going to
be talking about is the weeklytactical meeting.
And that's next week.
JIM (13:19):
And, and the weekly
tactical meeting I would suggest
is the meeting that's going tomake the biggest difference of
all.
So you're gonna want to hearwhat we have to talk about on
that one.
Okay! We want you to go out andtry what we've talked about
today on your own leadershipteam.
MARGOT (13:39):
You can ask us questions
or download notes from this
episode at www.orghealth.coach.
We'd love for you to join usnext Thursday on The OrgHealth
Podcast.