Don’t Run! How to Manage Meeting Conflict

Don’t Run! How to Manage Meeting Conflict

by | Apr 4, 2019 | Communication Skills, Facilitation Skills, Leadership Skills, Managing Conflict, Meeting Support, Meeting Tools

A meeting without conflict is a boring meeting, and we’ve seen very little value derived from predictable and unexciting meetings and workshops. However, internal and external conflict reflect emotions that, when harnessed, enable creative change and improvement.

So rather than run, learn how to understand and manage group conflict. Additionally, the *International Association of Facilitators aspires for you to:

  • “Help individuals identify and review underlying assumptions
  • Recognize conflict and its role within group learning / maturity
  • Provide a safe environment for conflict to surface
  • Manage disruptive group behavior
  • Support the group through resolution of conflict”

To Manage Meeting Conflict Consider the Synergy of the Tuckman Model and Integral Theory

Facilitators manage groups. Therefore, first understand how groups function and appropriate ways to support them to manage group conflict.

Manage Group Conflict, Group Conflict, Facilitation Group Conflict

Stages to Manage Meeting Conflict

To Manage Meeting Conflicts, Understand a Group Life Cycle

Groups, like people, develop and evolve. Similarly, they can also regress. Therefore, as a session leader, you strive to move your group through a developmental sequence. Most groups evolve through four stages as they change. Hence, for any given group, you may see only the first two or three stages. Do not forget—in a room of ten people, there are at least eleven personalities!

To manage group conflict, understand the stages and characteristics of groups, including:

  • Forming — Orientation, hesitant participation, search for meaning, dependency
  • Storming — Conflict, dominance, rebelliousness, power
  • Norming — Expression of opinions, development of group cohesion
  • Performing — Emergence of solutions, formation of a “team”

Note:  The four stages are adapted from Tuckman, B.W., “Development sequence in small groups,” Psychological Bulletin, 1965, 63, 384-399.

Meeting Conflict — Stage 1

Forming— Keyword: Confusion. Groups at this early stage are working on two primary areas, the reason they are there (purpose) and social relationships. In addition, the Integral theory states that at the beginning of any meeting, people are thinking of themselves, as “I”. Consequently, you will see some landmarks such as:

  • “I wonder WHY I’m here?”
  • “I wish I had a cup of coffee.”
  • Concern over purpose, relevance of meeting, “How this helps?”
  • Looking to the leader for structure, answers, approval, acceptance
  • “Why are we here?”
  • Quiet groups
  • Looking to the leader to prove that the meeting will work

Cultures that find themselves locked into this stage are frequently described as “Command Control” where much decision-making is completed by management. Participants stay focused on “I” such as, “I wish I had eaten something before this meeting.”

Meeting Conflict — Stage 2

Storming—Keywords: Conflict (differences) and creativity. Here groups begin to acknowledge differences in perspectives; conflict is characteristic between members or between members and leader. The Integral theory states that the impact of the meeting deliverable can get people to stop thinking selfishly. Consequently, some landmarks include:

  • Struggle for control
  • Some members with strong needs to dominate
  • Hostility towards the leader
  • Looking to, expecting the leader to be magical
  • Open expression of differences
  • Accepting conflicts as sources of creativity

Cultures in this phase focus on cultivating and changing through personal and professional improvement. Participants get nudged to begin thinking about what “It” is that justifies their time together.

Meeting Conflict — Stage 3

Norming—Keywords: communication and commitment. The participants are more comfortable expressing their opinions. The Integral theory states that once participants understand “it” (deliverable), they can contribute effectively. Hence, some landmarks:

  • More open communication
  • Unwillingness to be fully responsible for the outcome
  • Inter-member support

Cultures here display and value competence, especially on the expert capabilities of a few members of the group or team. Most importantly, individuals can start thinking about the deliverables and how it impacts others (“Thou”) throughout the organization

Meeting Conflict — Stage 4

Performing—Keywords: Community, consensus, and collaboration. Rather than focusing on differences, members begin to recognize the commonality and shared interests. The Integral theory states that once participants collaborate, the “I” dissolves into the pluralistic “We”. Therefore, the participants form a cohesive team—they unite, with landmarks including:

  • Open communication
  • Pride in the group
  • Focus on getting the shared goals and tasks of the group accomplished
  • Inter-member support

Here we have a collaborative culture where decisions are consensus-driven and the team works in complete partnership toward success. Hence, the individuals view themselves as an integral unit, known as “We”.

To Manage Meeting Conflict, Understand Boundaries

Boundaries between stages are not always clear. Nor do groups permanently move from one stage to another. Therefore, as the facilitator, you guide the group through the earlier stages of performing. In working with the group during a meeting, you need to gauge how the group, as a whole, is able to perform the task at hand. Depending on the readiness of the group, you as process leader will lead in diverse ways. Meanwhile, readiness consists of two qualities, job or task readiness and psychological readiness (motivation, confidence).

To Manage Meeting Conflict, Assess Readiness

To assess the group’s readiness, ask yourself these two questions:

  1. “Do they have the necessary skills or information?” (task readiness). Groups in Stages 1 and 2 lack task readiness.
  2. “Do they have the appropriate emotional qualities or resources (relationship readiness)?” Groups in Stages 2 and 3 lack relationship readiness.

Most importantly, groups in Stage 4 are ready to complete the task and build relationships.

Leadership Styles to Manage Meeting Conflict

As a leader, you monitor these two dimensions (task and relationship) constantly on both group and individual levels. As you monitor, you express your assessment of the situation with two types of leadership behavior. Consequently, these include:

  • Task/ directive behavior (i.e., process policeman)
  • Relationship behavior (i.e., empathetic listening)

Understanding Task Behavior

Task behaviors are characterized by the degree to which a leader engages in directing or controlling group activities (tasks). Direct or control meetings when you assess that the participants have exhibited a comparatively low level of readiness to do a specific task, with examples of task behaviors including :

  • Controlling (intervening to change the method or situation)
  • Defining roles
  • Directing (supervising and tracking accomplishments against the plan, recommending or insisting upon certain methods or procedures)
  • Explaining the agenda and ground rules
  • Organizing (providing access to resources, establishing procedures, etc.)
  • Setting goals, deadlines, planning

Therefore, use task leadership behavior to move a group from Stage 1 (by telling) to Stage 2 (for selling).

Understanding Relationship Behavior

Relationship behaviors are characterized by the degree to which a leader engages in developing a relationship amongst participants knowing that the relationship is a key factor in completing. Therefore, such behaviors are appropriate when the leader’s assessment is that the participants have exhibited a level of readiness to do a specific task. Some examples of relationship behaviors are:

Therefore, use relationship leadership behavior to move the group from Stage 2 (where you are selling) through Stage 3 (with a participating style) and into Stage 4 (where you delegate).

Differences Between Task and Relationship Behaviors

Another way to think about the difference between task-leader behaviors and relationship-leader behaviors is to remember that task behaviors focus on how the job is done while relationship behaviors focus on how people work together. Task behavior enables the group to do the job. Relationship behavior empowers the group. Therefore, remember that you are a temporary task manager. Hence, determine where the group is with readiness and use the appropriate type of behavior to move them toward successful and efficient completion of the task and deliverable.

To Manage Group Conflict . . .

When you hear communication problems consider the following:

  • Capture what each person is saying—write it on the flip charts without putting their names by the ideas.
  • Draw pictures using visual aids, flip charts, and models. By using visual support or other exercises, participants learn about their business.
  • Get the group to see both similarities and differences.
  • Move the focus of the group away from people and onto the issue(s) at hand.
  • Summarize both similarities and differences and get the group to decide what to do with them or move along to the next step.

By augmenting discussions with visual support or other exercises, participants create shared learnings about their organization.

Paradigms Put You on Alert to Manage Meeting Conflict

Paradigms are established accepted norms, patterns of behavior, or shared sets of assumptions. Hence, they are models that establish boundaries or rules for success. Therefore, paradigms may present structural barriers to creativity based on psychological, cultural, and environmental factors, with examples including:

  • Flow charts, diagrams, and other conventions for presenting information (e.g., swim lane diagrams)
  • Stereotypes about men and women and their roles in business, family, and society
  • Where people sit in meetings—once they find a seat it becomes their seat for the rest of the meeting

Groupthink Demands You to Manage Group Conflict

As creatures of habit, we blindly subscribe to our cultural paradigms, unknowingly allow our biases and prejudices to affect our decision-making, and readily fall prey to groupthink. Because, there is power in large numbers, but not necessarily quality. Voting, for example, reflects a method of groupthink decision-making. As you know, the winner is not necessarily a better decision, it only reflects a bigger number.

Challenge Both Paradigms and Groupthink

To cause groups to challenge their paradigms or groupthink:

  • Ask the “Paradigm Shift” question—“What is impossible today, but if made possible . . . What would you do differently?” 
  • Force the group to look at a familiar idea or scenario in a new way by changing their perspective. Shifting perspectives frequently helps “shake” paradigms. Consider using Edward de Bono’s Thinking Hats or imposing some other perspective or comparison such as:
    • Ant colony compared to a penal colony
    • A weather system compared to a gambling system
    • Monastery compared to the mafia
  • Have a few tools in your hip pocket that can be readily found with Scannel and Newstrom’s series or many other sources.
  • Use the “Five-year Old” routine—ask—“But why?” frequently, or until the group thoroughly discusses an issue, its assumptions, and implications. Also consider the simple challenge, “Because?”

Don’t Forget, People DO Change

Manage Conflict Because People Do Change

People Do Change

Dr. Wayne Dyer proved that people do change. Because there is a quantum shift of values after living twenty to thirty years with both men and women. Hence, the shifts shown occur after a notable change in maturity, such as we find today with “empty nesters” or people who find themselves no longer hosting others, in particular, their own children.

For some clear and specific suggestions, here are four straightforward activities you can perform to resolve conflict. Additionally, see the article for detailed support on the four activities below:

  1. Appeal to the common purpose
  2. Active listening (for reasons and rationale)
  3. Appeal to objectives
  4. Document and escalate

 

*IAF Core Facilitator Competencies C3

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Don’t ruin your career by hosting bad meetings. Sign up for a workshop or send this to someone who should. MGRUSH workshops focus on meeting design and practice. Each person practices tools, methods, and activities daily during the week. Therefore, while some call this immersion, we call it the road to building high-value facilitation skills.

Our workshops also provide a superb way to earn up to 40 SEUs from the Scrum Alliance, 40 CDUs from IIBA, 40 Continuous Learning Points (CLPs) based on Federal Acquisition Certification Continuous Professional Learning Requirements using Training and Education activities, 40 Professional Development Units (PDUs) from SAVE International, as well as 4.0 CEUs for other professions. (See workshop and Reference Manual descriptions for details.)

Want a free 10-minute break timer? Sign up for our once-monthly newsletter HERE and receive a free timer along with four other of our favorite facilitation tools.

______

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Facilitative Leadership – How Novice Facilitators Can Succeed Quickly

Facilitative Leadership – How Novice Facilitators Can Succeed Quickly

by | Feb 7, 2019 | Communication Skills, Facilitation Skills, Leadership Skills, Managing Conflict, Meeting Support

Using the principles of facilitative leadership, novice facilitators will succeed when they draw a line of sight from the meeting deliverable to the quality of life of the meeting participants.

To understand “facilitative leadership,” begin by understanding the two terms: ‘facilitative’ and ‘leadership’. For example, the root term for ‘facilitative’ means “to make easy.” Therefore, the role of a meeting leader primarily relies on making it easier for their people to succeed. Leadership begins with line of sight and knowing where you are going. Assuredly, a leader needs to know the destination and focus on reaching milestones during the journey. For instance, in meetings and workshops, a leader needs to know what DONE looks like. In other words, they need to know the destination.

Similarly, facilitative leadership demands understanding about . . .

  • How to approach group decision-making
  • Importance of the holarchy (i.e., organizational goal alignment, dependencies, and reciprocities)
  • The role (of the facilitator) is not as a person, but rather as a temporary position (like a referee)
  • Skills such as clear speaking, precise questioning, keen observing, and active listening
  • The criticality of being content-neutral; passionate about results, yet unbiased toward content

We aspire to develop understanding among our readers about the differences and challenges of becoming a facilitative leader. We seek primarily to shift the thinking of our readers from facilitation (as a noun or a static way of being) to facilitating (as a verb or a dynamic way of doing). Therefore, truly making it easier for meeting participants to make more informed decisions. Facilitating creates value because the method encourages speaking with people rather than at them. For that reason, facilitating is about creating an environment that is conducive to productivity and breakthrough. Above all, the role of the facilitator is about stimulating and inspiring people. In other words, facilitating amplifies the DNA of the modern leader.

Consequently, Learn to Overcome Challenges with Meetings

Facilitative Leadership, Novice Facilitators

  • Avoiding judgment, both positive and negative.
  • Avoiding the first person singular, especially the word “I.” Therefore, putting the focus on the plurality “you” or the integral “us.”
  • Being able to clearly articulate the meeting purpose, scope, deliverable, and agenda.
  • Building and using an appropriate meeting design called an agenda. The agenda represents the method or how the leader will get the team from the introduction to the wrap in a consensual and expeditious manner.
  • Challenging participants to make their thinking visible. Understanding that people think about symptoms, not causes.
  • Constantly observing the participants’ body language or using a roll call method to further include online participants.
  • Having well-built questions that avoid vagueness and ambiguity. Understanding that the meeting deliverable (call it ‘Y’) is a function of many details (call them ‘X’ for weighty issues and ‘x’ for the minor points). Therefore, Y is a function of many Xxes. Participants do not need answers. However, they need someone who knows the right questions to ask, and the optimal sequence for those questions.
  • Removing distractions during the meeting, especially electronic leashes.
  • Showing up for meetings prepared and that includes having properly prepared participants so that the meeting can take off running.
  • Staying conscious about everything above, while carefully administering and adjusting to a method using appropriate tools to get more done faster.
  • Substance over style, speaking with clarity when required (i.e., aspiring toward rhetorical precision). Realizing however that the “facilitator” role is primarily geared toward listening rather than preaching.
  • Understanding there is more than one right answer and decision-making quality is sensitive to the conditions under which one solution may or may not be better than an alternative.

Nine Characteristics of the Facilitative Leadership Difference

Facilitative leadership benefits are best realized for projects and teams where the leader is coordinating competent specialists in complex situations. The best leaders are flexible because both command control and facilitative leadership have their place. Task-focused direction is required for the close oversight of tasks. Structure-focused direction works best when leading teams of experts.

Modern Leaders Facilitative Leaders
  • Are receptive to change
  • Communicate and receive feedback
  • Can also structure activities to ensure that participants evaluate themselves and each other
  • More than people savvy, they are group-focused
  • Believe that staff work for them
  • Work to exceed the expectations of all stakeholders, including their staff
  • Have meeting management skills
  • Can also use groups to build complex deliverables and structure any type of conversation with collaboration
  • Involved in directing tasks
  • Strive to build collaborative decisions based on staff input
  • Leads groups whose members are highly skilled and accountable for outcomes
  • Focus on providing structure that supports superior performance
  • Work to meet the expectations of management
  • Operate without status or rank consciousness

When to Use Facilitative Leadership

We want you to see that facilitative leadership does not apply to all situations but is ideally suited for projects and teams where the leader is coordinating the efforts of subject matter experts. Use facilitative leadership when you have:

  • An effort or project requiring breakthrough, creativity, and innovation
  • Decisions requiring broad support and commitment from stakeholders
  • Diverse team members who get evaluated with different performance measurement systems
  • Extremely complex or sensitive decisions
  • Group members who need to be self-motivated because they are working independently
  • Historically hostile parties or complex bureaucracies
  • Leaders operating without direct authority over some of the members
  • Projects crossing multiple lines of business or departments
  • Projects tied to a critical time frame
  • Situations calling for leaders to be seen as neutral by all parties
  • Strong subject matter experts need to align around new goals or outcomes
  • Teams communicating across time zones, cultures, and organizational boundaries

Organizational Benefits of Facilitative Leadership: Improve Quality, Reduce Costs, and Optimize Timing

Facilitative Leadership, Novice Facilitators

Facilitative Leadership Benefits

Benefits ensue both to the organization and participants. Organizations that deploy skilled facilitators have allocated resources to ensure the success of their meetings.

  • Ability to test for the quality of the deliverable before the meeting concludes (valuable since the worst deliverable of any meeting is another meeting).
  • Agendas, approaches, tools, deliverables, and outputs become more repeatable and consistent.
  • Analysts obtain higher quality, more comprehensive information.
  • As context is carefully managed, teams focus on higher-quality content.
  • As stakeholders’ ideas are included, meetings become more collaborative and innovative.
  • Facilitative leadership makes it easier to develop new leaders.
  • Faster results: Facilitated sessions accelerate the capture of information, especially if the meeting participants arrive knowing the questions and issues that need to be discussed.
  • Fewer omissions—projects accelerate with increased clarity and reduced uncertainty.
  • Greater commitment and buy-in from all stakeholders.
  • Higher quality results: groups of people make higher quality decisions than the smartest person in the group. Facilitated sessions encourage the exchange of different points of view enabling the group to identify new options, and it is a proven fact that people or groups with more options at their disposal make higher-quality decisions.
  • Increased return-on-meeting time and investment.
  • Modern leaders who have been successful with their existing style accrue additional benefits from the increased flexibility of adapting a facilitative style.
  • More coherent communication among workshop participants, project, steering, and dependent teams.
  • Properly facilitated sessions lead to innovation because multiple perspectives generate a richer (360-degree) understanding.
  • When staff is treated as collegial, commitment and motivation increase.
  • With assertive structure and facilitation, quality dialogue becomes the focus.
  • Witness a decline in smart people making dumb decisions.

Six Personal Benefits of Improving Your Facilitative Leadership and Meeting Skills

As you increase your facilitative leadership skills, you and your team participants will become more successful. For example, let us consider six substantial areas of success for improving your facilitative leadership and meeting in more detail:

  1. Consensual Understanding and Higher Quality Decisions

Properly facilitated, participants understand both WHAT is decided and WHY. Since groups are capable of generating more options than the aggregate of individuals, they arrive at higher-quality decisions that are capable of reconciling seemingly contrary points of view.

  1. Flexibility and Breaking through Stalemates and Deadlocks

Structured approaches afford a higher degree of flexibility than approaches without structure. With structure and topical flow, meetings can take the “scenic route” because there is a backup plan to provide a respite from the stream-of-consciousness approach taken by unstructured meetings. By exploring newly created options and challenging working assumptions, teams can break through their stalemates and deadlocks by rediscovering common ground or by creating options during the meeting that did not walk into the room at the start of the meeting.

  1. Impactful Groups through Improved Working Relationships

Conflict becomes responsibly managed rather than ignored. Complex issues may be addressed face-to-face as they should, rather than through a series of e-mails and innuendo. Proper facilitation will demonstrate the opportunity and method for discovering win-win solutions. Consequently, as stakeholders’ ideas are sought, meeting activity becomes more collaborative and innovative.

  1. Integral Decision-Making

Defined as better alignment with organizational goals and objectives. Structured decision-making must appeal to organizational goals and objectives supported by the meeting; typically, the project, program, business unit, and enterprise. Alignment with the “holarchy” perspective ensures that proposed actions are appropriate and supports prioritization based on the impact of proposed changes across the entire enterprise. Therefore, effective decision-making reflects the integral perspective.

  1. Knowledge Transfer and Increased Organizational Effectiveness

Learning organizations understand the need and power behind the transfer of knowledge from those who know to those who do not know, but should. Facilitated environments provide the opportunity for challenge, reflection, and documentation that underlies shared understanding and amplifies organizational effectiveness. Facilitative leadership also makes it easier to develop new leaders.

  1. Saving Time and Increased Personal Effectiveness

Session leaders (aka facilitators) will get more done faster. As staff is treated as colleagues, commitment, and motivation increase. By becoming an expert on methods and tools rather than content, they can continue to use tools that generate consistent and repeatable results. Meetings only fail because either the participants do not have the talent, do not have the motivation, or do not know how. The role of the facilitative leader shows them how.

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Don’t ruin your career by hosting bad meetings. Sign up for a workshop or send this to someone who should. MGRUSH workshops focus on meeting design and practice. Each person practices tools, methods, and activities daily during the week. Therefore, while some call this immersion, we call it the road to building high-value facilitation skills.

Our workshops also provide a superb way to earn up to 40 SEUs from the Scrum Alliance, 40 CDUs from IIBA, 40 Continuous Learning Points (CLPs) based on Federal Acquisition Certification Continuous Professional Learning Requirements using Training and Education activities, 40 Professional Development Units (PDUs) from SAVE International, as well as 4.0 CEUs for other professions. (See workshop and Reference Manual descriptions for details.)

Want a free 10-minute break timer? Sign up for our once-monthly newsletter HERE and receive a free timer along with four other of our favorite facilitation tools.

______

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How to Facilitate Multiple Generations — All the Time

How to Facilitate Multiple Generations — All the Time

by | Jan 8, 2019 | Facilitation Skills, Leadership Skills, Managing Conflict, Meeting Support

Staying relevant and compelling when you facilitate multiple generations presents significant challenges.

Problems develop when meetings include different mindsets, communication styles, and personal preferences. Scheduling, work patterns, and technology intensify friction. Teams are ever-changing and often cross time zones and cultural boundaries. A servile attitude provides you with the simple secret when you facilitate multiple generations — all types of people — because one trait, common to all, is that people would rather be asked than be told.

Traditional stereotyping needs to be avoided, but frequently suggests that . . .

  • Baby Boomers (born between 1946 and 1964) remain competitive,
  • GenXers (born between1965 and 1977) exhibit skepticism, and
  • Gen Yers (aka ‘millennials’, born since 1978) like technology

Whether you prefer Meyers-Briggs (MBTI), DISC, eColors, or others, most agree that not everyone thinks alike.* Dare to compare:

  • Some focus on differences while others focus on similarities.
  • Some follow logic while others are guided intuitively.
  • A portion looks at the risks while others focus on the benefits.
  • Some require structure while others prefer independence.
  • Some are influenced by language and others by graphics and visual displays.

(Sensible Humor . . .)

To Facilitate multiple Generations, Let It Be

To Facilitate Multiple Generations, Let It Be

By the way, our favorite (only half-seriously) personality typing remains the Beatles’ “Let It Be” album. After all, why else would they be arranged in the clockwise order shown?

While servility will help you facilitate during a meeting, embracing the following preparatory considerations will help solidify your chances of meeting success:

  • Anticipate a variety of personality types and learning styles
  • Be careful not to stereotype based on appearances and comments
  • Don’t overgeneralize groups based on individual character traits
  • Prepare as if every stakeholder plans to attend your meeting

As professional facilitators, consider the following suggestions that will improve your ability to facilitate multiple generations, and all types of people, all of the time.

  • Appeal to the “Zen” of the experience. Use break timers with music. Provide and build graphical support to complement the narrative world. Remember, we facilitate ‘meaning’, not words. Meaning can be captured with illustrations, icons, and numbers—in addition to words. You can use the Creativity Tool or Coat of Arms anytime you need consensual answers to questions.
  • Be flexible and willing to adjust and accommodate participant constraints such as timing and availability. When a participant runs into an unexpected personal “issue”, let’s do what we can as a group to show support and respect for that person, rather than charging ahead. Decision quality demonstrates that a complete answer is better than a quick answer (see Daniel Kahneman).
  • Both remain and stress your content neutrality. Stop judging (even cheerleading), making comments about content, and avoid using the first person singular, especially the word “I.”
  • Do not let one person or group dominate the contributions. Prevent “Broken Records” by writing down their contributions. Prevent scope creep by asking precise questions. Avoid DUMB questions (Dull, Ubiquitous, Myopic, and Broad).
  • Embrace an icebreaker activity to get everyone contributing sooner. Likewise, anticipate and plan for additional team-building activities as appropriate. Make it easier (facilitere) for your participants to enjoy and value one another. Similarly, prepare some quick exercises (eg., Man in the Moon) that prove “nobody is smarter than everybody.”

Keep participants focused on “what DONE looks like” rather than HOW it gets done.

  • Nobody wants more meetings. Nobody wants longer meetings. And NOBODY wants more, longer meetings.
  • Keep people moving around. Supplement breakouts with ergonomic “stretching” every thirty minutes. Take breaks every 60 to 75 minutes so that people stay off of their electronic leashes, knowing they will have frequent and ample time to reply to their electronic mail and messages, all at once.
  • Send your participants and executives to facilitation training so they develop an understanding and appreciation of the challenges faced by meeting leaders. There are ample resources invested in “Diversity” training but where diversity appreciation becomes needed most may be found in situations that involve groups, teams, and meetings. Diversity training encourages the appreciation of individuals but does little to increase heterogenous group performance.
  • Spend some personal time with your participants and get to know them better. Meeting participants respond better to leaders they respect, and respect must be earned. Formally or informally interview them. Discern their core competencies, concerns, and unique talents, everyone has one you know. (See below from Howard Gardner).

Stress participant equality regardless of tenure or title.

  • Demand that participants leave their egos and titles in the hallway. If they cannot leave their titles behind, do not invite them. If they are “senior” and already have an answer, do not have a meeting. Meetings are an ineffective and very expensive form of persuasion.
  • Strive to conduct meetings where either everyone is live (face-to-face); or, everyone dials in, including people in the same building or facility. If not, at least place your virtual participants ‘up front’ and call on them first (not last) when seeking participant input. People dialing in become treated like second-class citizens so enforce a protocol whereby everyone, even those attending live, identifies the face behind the voice before continuing.
  • Test the quality of your meeting output before adjourning. The worst deliverable from any meeting is another meeting. If you do not know how to test the quality of your meeting output, take an MGRUSH class on facilitation.
  • Use breakout sessions liberally by mixing up your teams frequently. People become more conversational in small groups (two to five people) and develop a stronger appreciation for one another. As you sense dysfunction, intervene and take a mentoring approach. Coach your participants about how to treat one another in a public environment. You will discover that more conflict arises around personality types and toxicity than by different age groups.

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NOTE:

In 1983 an American developmental psychologist Howard Gardener described 9 types of intelligence:

  • Naturalist (nature smart)
  • Musical (sound smart)
  • Logical-mathematical (number/reasoning smart)
  • Existential (life smart)
  • Interpersonal (people smart)
  • Bodily-kinesthetic (body smart)
  • Linguistic (word smart)
  • Intra-personal (self smart)
  • Spatial (picture smart)
Facilitate multiple Generations -- Garner's Types

Facilitate All Generations — Gardner’s Types

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* Please note trademarks associated with Apple Records, Adioma, and personality-typing organizations.

______

Don’t ruin your career by hosting bad meetings. Sign up for a workshop or send this to someone who should. MGRUSH workshops focus on meeting design and practice. Each person practices tools, methods, and activities daily during the week. Therefore, while some call this immersion, we call it the road to building high-value facilitation skills.

Our workshops also provide a superb way to earn up to 40 SEUs from the Scrum Alliance, 40 CDUs from IIBA, 40 Continuous Learning Points (CLPs) based on Federal Acquisition Certification Continuous Professional Learning Requirements using Training and Education activities, 40 Professional Development Units (PDUs) from SAVE International, as well as 4.0 CEUs for other professions. (See workshop and Reference Manual descriptions for details.)

Want a free 10-minute break timer? Sign up for our once-monthly newsletter HERE and receive a free timer along with four other of our favorite facilitation tools.

______

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Product Owner — Creating Products that Customers Love

Product Owner — Creating Products that Customers Love

by | Dec 4, 2018 | Meeting Structure, Meeting Tools, Scrum Events

Product Owner, product backlog“Creating Products that Customers Love” strikes us as highly poignant, as much of the world heads toward a holiday season with much gift-giving. 

Roman Pickler’s book,  “Agile Product Management with Scrum” provides the single best book, barely over 100 pages, to understand the role of a Product Owner. Some even claim it remains one of the seven must-read books about the Agile mindset. Therefore, with a foreword by Jeff Sutherland, and included within the set of Mike Cohn’s signature books, take two to three hours and give it a quick read. However, it does presume some previous familiarity with the Agile Scrum framework.

Product Owner Role

Beginning with an understanding of the role of Product Owner the old-school versus new-school comparison of product management certainly reads like MGRUSH’s explanation of traditional leadership versus servant leadership. Stressing the importance of self-organizing teams, our “Nobody is Smarter than Everybody” gets duplicated with Pickler’s:

“The wisdom of many is preferred to the brilliance of one.”[1]

Naturally, the Product Owner role stresses collaboration, particularly with the Scrum Master and product stakeholders. Because, as Product Owner, they . . .

  • Represent the customers and the product users
  • Identify and describe customer needs and product functionality
  • Lead the visioning activities that bring the vision to life
  • Stress teamwork and collaborative decision-making to ensure shared ownership

Envisioning the Product

Therefore the Product Owner, through the Product Backlog, converts the product vision[2] to attributes by securing answers to solid questions such as:

  • Who is going to purchase the product?
  • Who is going to use the product?
  • What needs does the product address?
  • How much value does the product add?
  • What attributes are critical for the product’s success?
  • Where will the product excel?
  • Compared to competitive alternatives, what are the unique selling points?
  • Where and how much revenue will be derived?
  • What do we need to do to win?

Pickler leans on Cockburn’s logic of prioritization, namely:

  • Sacrifice others for this
  • Try to keep
  • Sacrifice this for others

After that, they are combined into a product roadmap. MG RUSH covers numerous methods in other articles, such as:

Working with the Product Backlog

Pickler follows with evidence-based support for managing the Product Backlog. He begins by applying DEEP that he attributes to Mike Cohn:

He further suggests that Product Backlog descriptions can be detailed, or course-graining (called epics). The Product Owner is responsible for structuring and refining the Product Backlog. Items may be grouped by functionality to create themes. For instance, the calendar function is a theme of a smartphone. Each theme generally represents “between two and five-course requirements. (epics)”

Next, he discusses methods of valuing or prioritizing backlog items that help the Product Owner prepare for Sprint Planning. Therefore, the Product Owner is encouraged to decompose and refine product backlog items breaking down epics into detailed user stories. This technique is referred to as “slicing the cake” (Cohn, 2004, pg 76). He also references, but does not discuss in detail, Bill Wake’s INVEST criteria (stories need to be independent, negotiable, valuable, estimable, small, and testable).

For sizing stories Pickler offers up t-Shirt sizing (XS through XXXL) and Planning Poker, using a Fibonacci scale through 13 and then substitutes 20 for 21 as Huge (or, XXXL). Today there are apps abounding for smartphones. Therefore, simply search “planning poker app” to generate numerous options for Android and iOS. Ours includes a coffee break symbol and a questions mark and includes pure Fibonacci and t-shirt sizing options as well.

In addition, his discussion of nonfunctional requirements and scaling the product backlog demand careful reading. Similarly, slow down to review his along descriptions of common mistakes when refining the product backlog such as:

  • Disguised Requirements Specification
  • Wish List for Santa
  • Requirements Push
  • Grooming Neglect
  • Competing Backlogs

Other Product Owner Considerations

Finally, his book ends with commentary focused on large projects, discussing items like velocity and burndown. Prior to his final discussion of transitioning into the role of Product Owner, he stresses additional collaboration and makes comments covered by many other posts such as:

  • Sprint Planning
  • Definition of Done
  • Daily Scrum
  • Sprint Backlog
  • Burn down and Velocity
  • Sprint Review
  • Sprint Retrospective

Therefore, every Product Owner should review this valuable book, and other Sprint Team members could learn as well. After all, “Nobody is Smarter than Everybody.”

[1]  Likewise, according to Google’s 10 Golden Rules:

7. Strive to reach consensus. Modern corporate mythology has the unique decision-maker as a hero. We adhere to the view that the “many are smarter than the few,” and solicit a broad base of views before reaching any decision. At Google, the role of the manager is that of an aggregator of viewpoints, not the dictator of decisions. Building a consensus sometimes takes longer, but always produces a more committed team and better decisions.” — by Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google

[2]  Defined by Ken Schwaber as: “The vision describes why the project is being undertaken and what the desired end state is.” — Agile and Project Management with Scrum (2004, pg 68)

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Don’t ruin your career by hosting bad meetings. Sign up for a workshop or send this to someone who should. MGRUSH workshops focus on meeting design and practice. Each person practices tools, methods, and activities daily during the week. Therefore, while some call this immersion, we call it the road to building high-value facilitation skills.

Our workshops also provide a superb way to earn up to 40 SEUs from the Scrum Alliance, 40 CDUs from IIBA, 40 Continuous Learning Points (CLPs) based on Federal Acquisition Certification Continuous Professional Learning Requirements using Training and Education activities, 40 Professional Development Units (PDUs) from SAVE International, as well as 4.0 CEUs for other professions. (See workshop and Reference Manual descriptions for details.)

Want a free 10-minute break timer? Sign up for our once-monthly newsletter HERE and receive a free timer along with four other of our favorite facilitation tools.

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12 Critical Facilitation Do’s and Don’ts to Lead Successful Meetings and Workshops

12 Critical Facilitation Do’s and Don’ts to Lead Successful Meetings and Workshops

by | Nov 6, 2018 | Communication Skills, Facilitation Skills, Leadership Skills, Managing Conflict, Meeting Support, Meeting Tools

Our readers and students have clamored for a quick-reference checklist of the most important facilitation Do’s and Don’ts. Therefore, we bring you this brief, yet powerful, set of reminders below (alpha-sorted by the highlighted term or phrase).

Please note that the highlighted facilitation do’s and don’ts are linked to best practices articles that provide additional examples and evidence-based rationale.

facilitation do's and don't

Facilitation Do’s and Don’ts

Facilitation Do’s and Don’ts

Facilitation Don’ts

Active listening:

Make contact, absorb, reflect, and confirm; confirming WHY somebody said something or WHY the facilitator is doing something.

 Don’t allow arguments and discussions to go around you, as facilitator. Make them go through you and provide frequent and thorough reflection so that everyone is driven to understand the same rationale or evidence.

Annotated agenda:

Visualizing and documenting what needs to be done and said in advance, especially instructions for the methodology and tools you plan to use.

 Don’t assume that everyone shares an understanding of the terms being used because filters and biases cause misunderstanding. It’s better to assume that it’s unlikely you have a consensual understanding, even when participants claim to agree.

Decision-making:

Teach your participants the components of high-quality decision-making and illustrate using a decision matrix:

  1. Verify the purpose of your objective
  2. Detail your options
  3. Delineate criteria
  4. Prioritize the criteria
  5. Apply prioritized criteria against the most qualified options
  6. Test the decision quality to see how well it supports the original purpose
 Stop cheerleading with positive remarks such as “great idea” or “I like that.” Dr. Thomas Gordon (Harvard) proved that judgments or affirmations of the positive can be more injurious to group participation than negative comments.

Definition Tool:

Put the MGRUSH Definition Tool in your hip pocket and use it regularly, recalling the five activities a robust definition demands, namely:

  1. What is it NOT
  2. Describe it
  3. Detail the attributes, characteristics, requirements, or specifications
  4. Illustrate it
  5. Get two examples from the business
 Don’t forget the MGRUSH 3-step method for resolving conflict:

  1. Active listening to prevent ‘violent agreement’
  2. Appeal to objectives, from project through enterprise (see Holarchy)
  3. Thoroughly document, then take off-line, typically to the executive sponsor

Deliverable:

Know what DONE looks like; nothing can save a leader when they don’t know where they are going. Hence, codify your deliverable and share it, before the meeting begins. While others call it “right-to-left thinking” some say “start with the end in mind.”

 Don’t rely on “one size fits all” and overuse the same tool (e.g., PowerBalls). Decision-making ranges from the simple to the complicated through the complex, and extends from the qualitative through the quantitative—so use the most appropriate tool in your specific situation.

Focus:

Value the importance of focus and perspective. The hardest thing to do with a group of smart people is to get them to focus on the same thing at the same time. Consequently, remove distractions so that focus is all that remains.

 Avoid using the first person singular, specifically the terms “I” and “me.” Additionally, avoid too many thank-you’s and self-references such as “I think”, “I want”, and “I believe.”

Holarchy:

Connect the dots; provide a holarchy explanation that quantifies the importance and impact of your meeting, typically measured in terms of investment at risk (e.g., $$$) and/ or FTP (full-time person).

 Don’t permit groupthink and reliance on habits and patterns of the past. “We’ve always done it this way” will not persist forever. Hence, incites participants to understand that change can be proactive or reactive.

Preparation:

7:59 AM preparation and interviews. No facilitation class in the world will make you successful when you show up unprepared.

 Don’t forget or skip the MGRUSH professional 7-activity Introduction and 4-activity Review and Wrap. Consider rehearsing the introduction so that the meeting begins smoothly, thus giving participants confidence. Participants remember the last five minutes so close with clear action steps.

Precision:

Rhetorical precision or clarity of word choice increases its importance the more complicated the topic or scope of discussion. Hence, closely monitor and remain vigilant about your rhetoric.

 Don’t permit discussion and comments when you are in a listing mode. Brainstorming demands that during ideation, there should be no discussion. The facilitator is normally the first person to violate this principle.

Roles:

Stress roles in the meeting emphasized that all participants are equals, regardless of title or tenure in the hallway. Then treat everyone the same, and don’t be deferential to “executives.”

 Don’t lead a meeting without first sharing the purpose, scope, deliverables, and simple agenda, preferably in writing and preferably shared with participants before the meeting or workshop begins.

Structure:

Structure your discussion to avoid asking for the deliverable; rather ask for parts of the deliverable that aggregate to the final deliverable. Remember the mathematical expression: Y = f(X) +(x) + (x) and ask about the little “x’s”, not the “Y” or even the large “X’s”.

 Don’t string on virtual participants at the end. Put them in a virtual seating arrangement up front, and call on them first, not last. Next, enforce a protocol even among the live people so that virtual participants know who is speaking.

WHY First:

WHY before WHAT before HOW; Always build consensus around the purpose of something before beginning your analysis and solution development.

 Don’t discount the value of visual feedback. Remember that more is better and it is easier to edit stuff ‘out’ of your final documentation than it is to fully remember what was said. Therefore, capture verbatims and edit later.

______

Don’t ruin your career by hosting bad meetings. Sign up for a workshop or send this to someone who should. MGRUSH workshops focus on meeting design and practice. Each person practices tools, methods, and activities daily during the week. Therefore, while some call this immersion, we call it the road to building high-value facilitation skills.

Our workshops also provide a superb way to earn up to 40 SEUs from the Scrum Alliance, 40 CDUs from IIBA, 40 Continuous Learning Points (CLPs) based on Federal Acquisition Certification Continuous Professional Learning Requirements using Training and Education activities, 40 Professional Development Units (PDUs) from SAVE International, as well as 4.0 CEUs for other professions. (See workshop and Reference Manual descriptions for details.)

Want a free 10-minute break timer? Sign up for our once-monthly newsletter HERE and receive a free timer along with four other of our favorite facilitation tools.

______

With Bookmarks no longer a feature in WordPress, we need to append the following for your benefit and reference