Quotes About Engagement

few groups of leaders actually work like a team, at least not the kind that is required to lead a healthy organization.

The healthier an organization is, the more of its intelligence it is able to tap into and use.

I think we need to start having a Headline News every day, for five minutes. We could call it a Daily Check-in or something. That means we should get together in a conference room, standing up, and just announce what we're all doing.

avoid, as much as possible, telling clients what they would do if they were to be hired; instead, they just start serving them as though they were already a client. And

When players on a team stop caring about the scoreboard, they inevitably start caring about something else.

The leader is going to have to be ready to not only light the fuse of good conflict but to gently fan the flames for a while too.

This failure to build trust is damaging because it sets the tone for the second dysfunction: fear of conflict. Teams that lack trust are incapable of engaging in unfiltered and passionate debate of ideas. Instead, they resort to veiled discussions and guarded comments.

morale at the company was undeniably higher, and turnover had dropped markedly. But Jeff was adamant that it shouldn't go away completely: "If no one is leaving or being asked to leave, then we're probably not truly living these values.

Team leaders must give members a reason to care at the beginning of a meeting or discussion. They must raise the anxiety of the team about why the issues about to be discussed matter, and what could go wrong if bad decisions are made. By doing so, they immediately get everyone engaged

And we have to stop focusing on agendas and minutes and rules, and accept the fact that bad meetings start with the attitudes and approaches of the people who lead and take part in them.

What is the real problem? Actually, there are two. First, meetings are boring. They are tedious, unengaging, and dry. Even if people had nothing else to do with their time, the monotony of sitting through an uninspired staff meeting, conference call, or two-day off-site would have to rank right up there with the most painful activities of modern business culture.

Meetings are boring because they lack drama. Or conflict. This is a shame because most meetings have plenty of potential for drama, which is essential for keeping human beings engaged. Unfortunately, rather than mining for that golden conflict, most leaders of meetings seem to be focused on avoiding tension and ending their meetings on time.

There was no sense of unity or camaraderie on the team, which translated into a muted level of commitment.

Now imagine if I were to ask a room full of executives which they enjoy more: meetings or movies? They would probably think I was joking. And yet, meetings should be more interesting than movies because they have more inherent potential for passion and engagement than movies do.

moments of truth ... are best handled face-to-face

I see a trust problem here in the lack of debate that exists at staff meetings and other interactions among this team.

commitment cannot occur if people are unclear about exactly what is being committed to.

To make meetings less boring, leaders must look for legitimate reasons to provoke and uncover relevant, constructive ideological conflict. By doing so, they'll keep people engaged, which leads to more passionate discussions, and ultimately, to better decisions.

And so a leader of a meeting must make it a priority to seek out and uncover any important issues about which team members do not agree. And when team members don't want to engage in those discussions, the leader must force them to do so. Even when it makes him or her temporarily unpopular.

The lack of conflict is precisely the cause of one of the biggest problems that meetings have: they are boring

Whether we like it or not, meetings are the closest thing to an operating room, a playing field, or a stage that we have.

In consulting, entering the danger comes into play in those moments when you're in a meeting and someone says something that is either strange or politically sensitive, and you know that the level of anxiety and discomfort in the room is high. What you're tempted to do is just be quiet and let the moment pass, but what great consultants do, at least according to Lighthouse, is walk right into the middle of the situation and call it out.

If we hate meetings, can we be making good decisions and successfully leading our organizations? I don't think so. There is simply no substitute for a good meeting—a dynamic, passionate, and focused engagement—when it comes to extracting the collective wisdom of a team. The hard truth is, bad meetings almost always lead to bad decisions, which is the best recipe for mediocrity.

Let me assure you that from now on, every staff meeting we have will be loaded with conflict. And they won't be boring. And if there is nothing worth debating, then we won't have a meeting.