The Cranky Middle Manager Show #312 The Future of the MBA Ken Starkey
The Cranky Middle Manager Show #229 Meetings that Align With Strategy Calloway and Young
Posted on 26. Feb, 2010 by Wayne in General, Podcast
Today Wayne Turmel talks to Joe Calloway and Kris Young about their book “Never by Chance- Aligning People and Strategy Through Intentional Leadership” and especially how meetings can align or detract from the task at hand. We also discuss a Roman Emperor with a tough facilitation gig and the usual silliness.
Joe Calloway
Kris Young
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Show Notes
0:00 Welcome to the show. Today we are talking aligning people and strategy. That happens -or doesn’t- most often in meetings. We’re talking today about meetings: what works, what doesn’t. So we dedicate this show to Emperor Constantine who had to facilitate one of the toughest meetings in history, the Council of Nicaea. Trying to launch a religion without a scope of work from the project sponsor makes any problems you or I have seem pretty minor.
3:46 The quote of the week is from TE Lawrence, better known as Lawrence of Arabia. Do you dream at night or in the daytime? One of those is infinitely more dangerous.
4:30 Welcome to Joe and Kris. The book is Never by Chance…but that’s how many managers got their jobs. If you’re going to do the job, though, do it on purpose and do it like you mean it.
6:30 Do people really understand what the strategy they’re supposed to implement even is? Ask yourself a simple question: Is what we are doing at this moment acting on our strategy? Can you even begin to answer that one? If the manager doesn’t build strategy, do we have to do that so deliberately?
11:30 Oops, apparently we have no excuses because even on the team and project level you can do this.Oh, and asking “is everyone okay with this?” isn’t going to get the job done. These are tough conversations to have, but you have to have them. Leadership has a high discomfort level.
14:27 We talk about culture a lot…but do you and your team understand what that means? Do you have a culture of truly saying what you mean?
16:00 The biggest complaint people have about their work is meetings. Kris gets a word in edgewise to talk about common mistakes. No big surprise it’s holding a meeting when you don’t know what you’re meeting for. Seems a no-brainer so why does it happen so darned often? I take Joe to task for something that sounds too good to be true. I could be wrong…..it’s been known to happen.
21:00 The format and setup of a meeting is important. Play with different formats like panel discussions rather than speech after speech.
30:55 The most important skill for leading a meeting is not talking or presenting- it’s listening. You have to hear what’s said and especially what’s not said. Trust me, it makes sense.
Resources
Check out Bizbash.com
Ted Talks are worth checking out for sure
Corporateevent.com
Steve Farber (check out his latest Cranky Interview here)
Mark Sanborn
Don’t let the weasels get you down!
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