Appoint a time keeper and a questioner

0:03Speaker 1:Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's tip is to appoint a timekeeper and a questioner. Having people with certain roles that help to move things along can make meetings far more fruitful. I know we have all gotten stuck in meetings that meander off topic and as a corollary, take longer than they need to. Creating an agenda is great, but as with any plan, if people don't stick to the plan, then the plan is not so helpful. So how do you help people stick to the plan? I like the idea of appointing a timekeeper and a questioner. The timekeeper role is straightforward. This is the person who keeps you on pace with the agenda.

1:04Speaker 1:If a presentation or a discussion is going on longer than it is supposed to, this person plays the bad cop who says you have to move on. The topic can be talked about at another time, either with the whole group or, this is probably more likely, with fewer people who need to hash this out on their own. Now, if the discussion is fruitful, The group can decide to stick with it even if the agenda says otherwise. No one is condemned to follow the agenda if you are about to solve your most important business challenge. Have at it.

1:40Speaker 1:But you don't want the meeting to drag on just because no one wanted to be the person pointing out that time was passing. By appointing someone specific to this role, you get over the natural human tendency not to rock the boat. The questioner role may be a little less common, but I have sometimes seen this used well too. The idea is that if someone is presenting something or asking for ideas or feedback, you want someone to keep the discussion targeted, sort of like a moderator. Sometimes people will start telling stories or explain a lot of context or start complaining about something else. A questioner or moderator is the one who focuses the material. I saw this happen recently in a professional networking group where someone was asking for advice. This person started talking about unhappiness with world events.

2:36Speaker 1:I'm sure no one in the room was happy about these world events, but this time was specifically reserved to help figure something out. The questioner kept the presenter from losing this time. What the timekeeper and the questioner roles do is is recognize that time is valuable. When just you are doing something and you meander or you're off topic, you are only wasting your own time. When you have gathered six people in a room, the opportunity cost is six times as high. When we meet, we should do so to accomplish things that we can't on our own.

3:20Speaker 1:So that requires making sure the dynamics support timely, efficient decisions. It is human nature mostly to go along to get along. Now, there are some people who naturally love the idea of cutting other people off and telling everyone they are out of time or telling people that they shouldn't be talking about X, Y, or Z. But most people are not like that. Group dynamics are strong. So by creating roles specifically for people to be a bit more caustic, you remove the feeling that they are being bad for doing this.

3:58Speaker 1:You get the benefit of having something of a party pooper without undermining the sense that you are all part of a team. So that can make a gathering far more effective. If you try appointing a timekeeper and a questioner, I'd love to know how it goes. You can reach me at laura at lauravandercam.com. In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening. And here's to making the most of our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach me at laura at lauravandercam.com. Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia.

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