How you know when you’ve lost the meeting

I was reading my mousepad today. Yeah, weird, I know. But somehow I never noticed the tiny little print all around the outside of the circle. It's ringed with a list of clever uses for the somewhat-dated disk. My favorite: "signal flag when stranded in sinking client meeting."

We’ve all been in THAT meeting. The one that has gone completely, irrevocably off track. The minds are closed. The conversation is over. And, there’s nothing to do but try to wrap it up with a little grace and courage.

Here are my 10 signs that the meeting is over already – whether you’re finished or not:

1. The funny voice: The frustrated client reads a headline, a PowerPoint slide, a clever piece of web copy back to you with an em-pha-SIS on a very different sy-lla-BLE  than you ever intended. The exaggerated reading, often in  cartoonish voice, suddenly makes what you've earnestly written sound either plainly dumb or - in the worst cases - overtly sexual. *ew*


2. The “V” Word: When the references to you and your firm change from partner, consultant or agency to VENDOR, things are not going well. You're about to marginalized.


3.  The big flip: This move often starts with "wait a minute" and always includes "not on the same page." Somehow you've gone from chugging comfortably along to rethinking the entire project in 30 seconds flat. Bonus pain points if this happens during the one cell phone / bio / coffee break your boss takes during the entire four-hour meeting.


4. The Blackberry daisy chain: Let me assure you: this really happened. It is not the stuff of folklore. I heard it from the stranded facilitator herself. First, one Blackberry buzzes away on the conference table. It's picked up to a smirk. And then before you know it, they're all buzzing away. An underground meeting taking over your meeting! And a comically themed one no less.


5.  The grocery list: Walking behind your favorite client, you inadvertently look casually down at her notebook. Unless you've got the Dairy Council in, the last word you want to see is: milk. Or, remember the dry cleaning. Or what looks like a draft Netflix queue. Any decisions made that day will not stick. 


6. The sigh heard ‘round the office: Is it disappointment? Boredom? Frustration with the process? Who knows, but when that long, deep, loud-as-the-sound-of-the-tornado-coming-in-that-weird-Helen-Hunt-movie sigh rushes out, it's time to wrap it up!


7. The summary: It's a painfully abrupt conclusion. It starts with "Look, what we’re saying here is." And, importantly, it's rarely what we're actually saying here. 


8. The slow drain of people: This derailing is most likely to happen on a Friday afternoon or during those first few weeks of back-to-school before the parents get back on the right carpool / handoff / soccer schedule. Someone announces that they have to leave 15 minutes early. Someone else gets an urgent cell phone call and trucks off to the lobby (and eventually the parking lot). Another "realizes' that the meeting runs 30 minutes longer than her calendar noted. Before you know it, you're presenting to the leftover pastries and the two enthusiastic interns.


9. The flip to the back of the book: Why, why, why do we continue to put the budget on the last page? They know to look there. And if you get that number wrong enough, all the other pages are for naught.
   


10. The therapy session: Phrases to listen for: "you know why we can't do that?" and "I'll tell you why that wouldn't work here." They're harbingers of the moment when a meeting goes from idea generating to therapy seeking. Lots of organizations are broken. And, sometimes it feels better to talk about why. And just how badly. Agenda be damned.

Comments

[Jude]

Good read, I like your ideas and this blog in particular!

[Sandra]

Great one!! Thanks.

[Jo Jordan]

Got to be like CISCO chief and ask people in the first 15 seconds- what do you expect from this meeting?

[Dirk Singer]

Love it - thankfully I've been spared point one though. And on budgets, too right, we know full well it's what they turn to while we are still speaking, so why do we do it?!

[Bryan Jones]

Pride be damned, I've produced all 10 of these signs. (not in the same meeting, mind you...although I'm pretty sure that I could reach such a goal)

Fun write up, thanks!