MANAGING TEAM MEETINGS

• You will be reminded of the twelve action points that create good meetings.

• You will appreciate the extra complexity caused by having diverse people at a team meeting.

• You will become familiar with the extra tools and approaches you can use to make a multicultural team meeting participative and effective.

From this tutorial…

This tutorial will take you about 15-30 minutes to complete.

You may want a pen and paper handy to write down your thoughts.

12 Practices for Good Meetings

1. Agreeing and circulating a clear purpose for holding meeting 2. Inviting the right people to achieve a rich result 3. Scheduling clear uninterrupted time 4. Distributing a clear agreed-upon agenda well before 5. Starting on time… whatever 6. Taking an inclusive approach from the start, agreeing how things will be

achieved 7. Structuring and allowing good debate to get full input from each person 8. Listening actively, questioning, clarifying, checking understanding,

seeking feedback 9. Effectively capturing the main points discussed, rationale for decisions

made 10. Generating a clear agreed action plan, who, by when 11. Finishing on time 12. Promptly writing up the minutes and actively following up

What makes a good team meeting?

The same twelve points as for any meeting.

12 Practices for a Good Meeting

You have seen these before…

1. Agreeing and circulating a clear purpose for holding meeting 2. Inviting the right people to achieve a rich result 3. Scheduling clear uninterrupted time 4. Distributing a clear agreed-upon agenda well before 5. Starting on time… whatever 6. Taking an inclusive approach from the start, agreeing how things will be

achieved 7. Structuring and allowing good debate to get full input from each person 8. Listening actively, questioning, clarifying, checking understanding, seeking

feedback 9. Effectively capturing the main points discussed, rationale for decisions made 10. Generating a clear agreed action plan, who, by when 11. Finishing on time 12. Promptly writing up the minutes and actively following up

So what is different when

come from different

national, disciplinary, functional, social, racial, economic backgrounds?

NATIONAL CULTURE

ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE

DISCIPLINARY/ FUNCTIONAL CULTURE

ETHNIC CULTURE

GENDER CULTURE

INDIVIDUAL CULTURE

NATIONAL CULTURE

ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE

DISCIPLINARY/ CULTURE

ETHNIC CULTURE

INDIVIDUAL CULTURE ‘Personality’

GENDER CULTURE

The web of culture through which we perceive and act in the world is multi-layered

We see the world through different…

• Cultural lenses: based on our personal and acculturated preferences and ways of seeing the world. E.g.The patterns of logic and norms underlying our different mother tongues, whether tasks or relationships take highest priority, how much we focus on the past, present or future, how much we prefer expressing individuality over collective harmony, how much authority and power we invest in a leader.

• Social lenses: our role and advantage or disadvantage in many situations can depend on how our gender, race, ethnicity, height (believe it!), educational background, physical abilities, and sexual preferences are seen by others in that context.

• Functional and disciplinary lenses: scientists usually have a different attitude towards money than the finance department. Social scientists will focus on different aspects of a situation than a natural scientist.

These, in turn, shape our expectations and actions.

Let’s meet our team; Jose, Ingrid, Aung Li, Moses and the team leader, Ravi.

They will portray some of the classic norms of different regions, just to emphasize differences. We appreciate that there are no ‘norm’al people. Each one of us is unique.

They are gathering for a meeting at 3.30pm to discuss whether or not to put in a proposal for a small grant.

Let’s start with Jose, a Brazilian senior natural scientist.

Jose needs to finish his conversation with an upset friend and is aware that it will make him 15 minutes late for the meeting .

He wants to share this issue with the team and then find out how the rest of them are.

He expects to explore the issue in general and see how it unfolds. He expects to talk and joke a lot.

He assumes the decision will become clear as they raise all the issues.

He expects Ravi to indicate his preference quite early on and for the rest of the team to more or less follow him.

He presumes Ravi will make the final decision.

I expect…

Ingrid comes from the finance department. She intends to show up to the meeting five minutes early.

She wants Ravi to follow the agenda exactly; to give a short introduction of the relevant facts and data.

She anticipates a 30 minute discussion of the implications, a clear decision by vote and a joint creation of the exact plan to implement the decision.

She expects that rational debate based on data, financial and policy facts, will result in her having a strong equal influence on the final decision.

I expect…

Aung Li is the senior social scientist on the team. She will be on time. She expects Ravi to lead the discussion in such a way that allows active critical debate and argument. The small grant is to start action research on a large development focused project. She believes this needs social scientist input and will be a significant component of future work in the center. She thinks the group should reach consensus and end on time.

I expect…

Moses is a senior research assistant

He will arrive at the meeting on time.

He has worked closest with the donor concerned with a previous senior scientist who left. He is aware of all the issues around the discussion. He expects that Ravi has already made his decision and will lay it out with his rationale.

He assumes that he will be asked for his opinion when Ravi wants it, so otherwise he will keep quiet.

He is happy to contribute to any follow up decision.

I expect…

Ravi is a senior natural scientist and the team leader.

He arrives at the meeting at 3.30pm precisely.

He does not anticipate much discussion, as the new policy is against applying for small grants.

He would still like to hear what all his team have to say.

He has some experience in managing his multicultural team meetings.

He has found that making them participative speeds up implementing the action plan. It also helps in getting the team to accept a negative decision.

I expect…

As Ravi walks in at 3.30pm, Ingrid is looking very upset.

Moses and Aung Li are seated, chatting casually.

Jose is absent.

Ravi greets everyone and asks where Jose is. The others say they do not know, but that he was clearly informed about the meeting.

Does Ravi wait for Jose or not?

What would you do?

Ravi realises that he cannot start on the content of the discussion until everyone is there. He explains the purpose of the meeting.

He goes to the flipchart.

Pause here… Write down what you think they might have come up with.

“Let’s make some working agreements on how we are going to run the meeting. What do each of you think our working agreements should be?”

Their list might look like this:

Let’s start and finish on time, whatever.

Switch off mobile phones.

Listen actively, be free to question each other.

Let’s agree our common purpose and what we want to achieve by the end of the meeting.

We need to appreciate and share our different points of view and experience with mutual respect.

Let’s respectfully be free to test out our own assumptions.

Let’s use simple English, give second language speakers time to think and reflect, respect pauses and silences, avoid idioms, and be careful not to interrupt each other.

Let’s keep our inputs focused and to the point.

…and the meeting continued…

Aung Li chuckled and raised one eyebrow to Moses, who smiled.

‘What was the point of that? It did not help the real discussion.’

Everybody laughed. Ravi noticed and said softly chuckling…) ‘Jose, in Taiwan and Germany, things are still more formal and a hand shake will do just fine.”

Ingrid shrugged her shoulders just as Jose walked in. He walked around the table to shake everyone’s hands and kiss the ladies on either cheek. Both Aung Li and Ingrid looked uncomfortable.

‘Good question, Ingrid’ replied Ravi. ‘Now I have your mandate to facilitate the meeting and ensure we do these things. I feel these agreements will assist us to stay on track and make the most of all our different knowledge and skills.’

…and the meeting continued…

Action learning points:

1) Lightly acknowledging differences can diffuse a lot of tension and discomfort.

2)Using ‘cultural value checklists’ can do it more formally. You can check the collated results and see how different we all are on this conference.

3) Teams are mature when they can appreciate,respect and mutually chuckle at our different ways of greeting, relating and expectations of what should happen in meetings.

Ravi greeted Jose warmly and chatted as he sat down. He let Jose explain where he had been.

Ravi said that they had waited for him and then went on to show Jose the working agreements they had come up with so far. He went through each point, getting Jose’s agreement and asking if

he had any other input.

Ravi made a joke of the first issue, ‘ Start on time, whatever’ saying that in one workshop the facilitator had made people sing a song if they were late.

Jose quipped that he loved singing and would gladly

serenade the ladies.

Aung Li laughed and said. ‘Some other time and only if you promise to be on time in future, as you kept every one else waiting’

Jose agreed and they worked through agreeing on the other processes. Ingrid restlessly tapped her foot under the table.

4) ‘Start slowly and end fast’

Start on time, but start the content slowly by first agreeing on the purpose, creating working agreements and clarifying the task.

This team took the time to get everyone together at the beginning. They reached a comprehensive, inclusive agreement

Two people dominated this team meeting from the start. The others ‘resigned.’ No agreement was reached

Time

Performance

Action learning point:

Ravi asked Moses if he was okay and Moses said ‘I’m fine, but, as you are asking me, I do not understand the need for all this technical discussion. We know our science around this is solid’. Ravi was about to defend himself and the others, when he caught himself and realised Moses had a point.

What would you do next?

After 20 minutes, Ravi noticed that Moses had said very few words. He seemed to be listening but was mostly quietly doodling. Ravi caught himself starting to dominate the meeting with long arguments in favour of the research and against going for the small grant.

Aung Li and Jose were freely participating, sometimes arguing loudly about the research design in very technical language. Ingrid came in sometimes reminding them that time was passing and they needed a decision and a plan.

Ravi took a deep breath and decided to try a different approach. He suggested that they leave the discussion of the research itself and use cards for each to put up their arguments for and against applying for the grant. He suggested that each person use as many cards as they need to list all their points. Moses put up six cards ‘for’ and five cards ‘against’ as compared to everyone else’s two or three. Ingrid commented that she was surprised that he had so much to say and had not said it yet. Jose said ‘ well I guess that is the importance of listening, but Moses, why did you not speak up?’ ‘Well’, said Moses, ‘you were all talking so much I could not find a way into your conversation. Anyway, I knew that if you asked me directly, then you would take what I say more seriously’. ‘Wow’ said Jose’ I thought the point was to speak up as we felt like it’

5) Different structured processes, such as consciously asking each person on an important topic, structured brainstorming, or posting cards, can bring in quieter people or those working in a second, third or fourth language. 6) Such processes protect minority views, especially if there is a dominant ‘sub’- group working in their mother tongue, often in English and talking a lot at the same time. 7) There is no one right way to build trust and rapport…try to see it from the other person’s point of view. 8) Search for ways to open up and integrate the discussion and make it work, rather than singling out any one person’s expectations or preferred type of behaviour. 9) Be creative.

Action learning points:

Good multicultural team leaders use structured processes to foster collaboration while, at the same time, maintaining each person’s individuality. This means managing dominating individuals and not trying to make everyone the same.

This nurtures respect, as well as developing creative flexibility.

Both ‘weaves’ may look brown from a distance. Both teams have external coherence. Z By actively encouraging each person or ‘thread’ to remain their own bright individual colour, you can reweave any other pattern and colours to face any complex challenge and context, Homogeneous threads of only one colour can only solve that one coloured ‘brown’ problems.

Almost all problems these days are ‘multi-coloured’ and complex.

The of Collaborative Individuality

To make an informed choice, Ravi needs the input of both Jose as a natural scientist and Aung Li as a social scientist.

He needs Moses to explain fully about the donor and Ingrid to see if they can manage the overheads on such a small grant. He will need to champion any decisions with management.

To keep the meetings useful, interesting as well as fun, he needs a someone watching the time and pushing for action and decision. He values those who add some humour.

He needs someone who watches for the whole group and someone who quietly will speak up when they are not focusing on the most important issue.

The team laid out the cards for and against applying for the grant on a pin board and started to discuss.

Jose was active, but Ravi began to notice that Ingrid was dominating and pushing the organisational policy against small grants.

He heard Aung Li say resignedly ‘ Aye ya, I guess this is a no brainer, pity’. Jose quickly chipped in ‘Yeah Let’s go do some ‘team building’ over a good lunch,’ and Moses was falling silent again.

Ravi realised that Ingrid pushing the organisational policy advising against small grants was now dominating the discussion, and that in fact, one or two other cards might hold the real crux of the best decision.

What would you do next?

Ravi stopped the discussion and handed each team member two small round coloured stickers. He asked them to put one each on the two cards that each one of them felt really held the deciding factor. The team got up, chatted informally around the cards and thoughtfully placed their stickers. As the team sat down again, they heard Aung Li say ‘Wow!’. While three stickers were on the organisational policy cards, four had landed on a card that Moses had posted. Ravi asked Moses to explain.

Moses explained that he had done some research on the history of a large grant that they already had with this donor and that it had started the same way….. with a small grant first.

He had checked with other Centers. They all concurred that this donor liked to test out a team with a small grant. If they were timely, reliable and did good science, it was highly likely that a larger grant would follow.

What is more, they were very unlikely to get the larger grant without first going for the smaller one.

This revelation refocused the whole discussion onto whether or not to make this an exception to the new organisational policy. Moses was asked many questions. He responded thoughtfully and argued the case for going for the grant. After much debate and jointly clarifying their rationale, they agreed to go ahead for the small grant. Ingrid led the drafting of an action plan on how they could best approach the management.

The ‘petals’ of diverse knowledge and skills woven held together by the ‘stem’ of common purpose, agreement and values.

Ravi offered to champion the proposal and suggested that Moses come with him to meet management.

With a big grin on her face, Ingrid offered to type up the main points, action plan and rationale and distribute it by the next day. She liked orderly planning and clear decisions.

In the end… Let’s recap our working agreements and see what we

have learnt for next time.

I promise to get here on time for the next

meeting! Thank you!

‘I know you are only being friendly Jose, but I feel more professional if we only shake hands next time’

Jose laughed “I understand!”

Ravi gently asked Moses if it was hard to contribute at first . Moses explained that he thought that Ravi would have had already made up his mind, so there was little point in speaking up without being asked. Ravi smiled and asked if Moses was now convinced that he played an equal part in decision-making in the team. Moses smiled and said ‘yes’.

Jose suggested that they go for a drink to celebrate reaching a proactive decision. They all agreed and he sang as they left the room.

Aung Li laughed and noted that they had finished fifteen minutes early.

Action learning points:

10) Use the trust and good energy created by a successful decision and participation to reflect on what went well.

11) Dig a bit deeper into the underlying behavioural expectations that create the patterns of interaction.

Reflection points:

SO To be a successful participant, you

need to be both self reflective

AND to be reaching out creatively to build

connections

AT THE SAME TIME This starts to build a foundation of

trust and connectivity that lasts beyond the meeting.

Active inner and outer negotiation to reach self-understanding as well as connectivity

Own knowledge, expertise, thoughts and belief systems

Own preconceived ideas of the answers and desired outcome

Own preconceptions about the context

Active Questioning, Active Listening

Actively Reaching Out

Other’s knowledge. expertise, thoughts and beliefs systems

Other’s idea of the answers and desired outcomes

Other’s perception of you, your motives and and context

It helps others if we make our own assumptions and thinking as transparent as possible.

It challenges us to find ways of discovering how others see us, and how to fully engage them.

Multicultural team meetings are a great opportunity to find out how others can see you, as well as understand others better. You can discover how creative you can be in communicating and creating community. Despite all expectations to the contrary, twenty years of research shows no communication losses in diverse teams. Maybe we consciously try that much harder when people are visibly different from ourselves.

Multicultural team meetings are also the best place to change the organisational culture for the better and to make inclusion REAL.

In summary, follow the twelve initial actions that support any good meeting ..and..

Start slowly, end fast

Create a set of working agreements that acknowledges everyone’s different expectations and creates a level playing field

Actively reflect, question and listen while also reaching out to create more lasting connectivity

Be aware of different expectations, communication styles and preferences and use straightforward English

Use structured processes such as brainstorming, written cards, and quick voting to get everyone’s input

Have fun, enjoy the differences and celebrate when it goes well

And next time a meeting does go well.

Show your appreciation, and give the leaders a flower.

The International Center for BioSaline Agriculture. Dubai June 2006

Thanks and acknowledgements

• Sue Canney Davison, for the designing the tutorial, based on her own research and facilitating experience.

• www.dreamstime.org for a good collection of photographs • Farid Mohamed for posing as Ravi. GDA”s for the photos of their last meetings. • Mohamed AL-Attar and Eric McGaw of The Center of Biosaline Agriculture for

permission to use the final picture. • All those who have done good research on multicultural teams over the last

twenty years and contributed to our knowledge and understanding. In particular, Guenter Stahl, Insead, Martha Maznevski, IMD, Andreas Voigt, LBS. and Karsten Jonsen IMD for their recent meta- analysis of the this research. ‘Unraveling the Diversity-performance link in multi-cultural teams’: paper presented at Atlanta, Academy of Management Conference August 11-15th 2006