10 meetings

Meetings.  some are necessary, many are not.  As long as there has been business, there have been meetings.  Getting together to...do business.  Here are a few meetings you are probably involved with.  It's ok.  There isn't anything you can do.

10 - Why am I even here? - The obvious meeting.  The one you were called to that doesn't appear to have anything to do with you.  Even better, you aren't sure who invited you.  Two ways to handle this meeting.  One:  Up front mention that you probably don't belong here.  This is no fun, but probably a more effective use of your time if not the companies.  Two:  Own it!  Flog that meeting with all of your uninformed insights.  Make them explain all the processes to you.  Get them to give you an 'Overview' of what's going on.  In short pretend to be management.

9 - This is an email - Often managers will call meetings that should be emails.  These are easily identified by the fact that your actual input is not only not encouraged, but completely unnecessary.
This meeting is for the manager to spout off the top of his head something he or she should have thoughtfully written down in an email.  The problem is of course that once you write something down, you can be held to it.  If you sing it in a meeting, you are able to spin and adjust what was said.  Business as usual.

8 - derailed meetings - The meeting started out with good intentions, but someone there is going to turn this meeting into a grindingly long bout of minutiae that will get nothing done for those that are unfortunate enough to remain conscious.  Meeting derailers are people that really think they should be in a higher managerial position than they currently are.  They will interrupt with the same feel of authority that the organizer of the meeting has.  They have important things to say...they think.  The only way to improve this meeting is to stop it.

7 - One on One - Meetings are like farts.  The fewer participants the better it is for everyone.  The one on one meeting can be the most important ones because there are only 2 communicators talking and listening.  The chances of misreading what was said or intended are pretty low.  Normally in a one on one situation one party will do most of the talking.  They will carry the burden of imparting understanding to the other party.  With any luck the same manager will have experience on both ends depending on the meeting.

6 - I'm lonely - A pathetic meeting where the manager is just bored.  A bored manager is very tempted to start improving things.  This can be very dangerous.  It's fine to improve things that have very clear and obvious short comings, but when you start improving things that are working, you may end up improving them right into uselessness.

5 - Useful meeting - I will admit there are useful meetings that exist.  The skillful manager calls them to get information quickly.  They usually consist of 2 - 5 people and are specific to a task or event.  The reason they are useful is because they are quick and to the point and disseminate information quickly.  They don't waste a lot of time with conjecture or finger pointing.  There is usually a plan of action that follows the useful meeting that is clear for each member.  They come in many varieties and you can recognize them after they have happened.  You feel like your time wasn't wasted AND you have a good idea of what you should be doing.  The difference between this meeting and a well worded email is that the manger is usually looking for a plan of action and that requires input.  No email.

4 - Stand up - This is the Jekyl and Hyde of meetings.  You never know if it is going to be a good meeting or if it will expand into a worthless waste of time.  A good stand up will include people standing up mentioning quickly their status on whatever project they are working on.  Nothing more or less.  The person running the meeting will inform everyone of anything that needs to be widely known.  The meeting is then done.  5-10 minutes is the most this meeting should be.  If this meeting goes out of control, it becomes a much longer 20 - 30 minutes, and it involves small details of other parts of a project that have nothing to do with you AND too many people, around 10-15.  You know when there are too many people when everyone else looks bored and disinterested because they don't want to know your status.

3 - I'm hungry - This is the meeting that is held during lunch.  a 'working lunch'.  These are brutal if they are an actual meeting held during lunch.  If they are just an excuse to give you lunch on the other hand, then they are ok.  Often the lunch meeting is a sales pitch by some vendor and they want to buy everyone lunch in exchange for your attention.  It's rarely worth it.  On the other hand, at least it's lunch, so it can't be too bad.

2 - Have you got 5 minutes? - The most insidious meeting there is.  5 minutes is about how long it takes to get nothing done.  The amount of times a 5 minute meeting was less than 10 minutes I could count on one hand of a Taiwanese factory worker.  Once in a while it is exactly just a point of information or something that needed some attention, but I have yet to hear the words 'hey have you got a minute?' from a manager and not cringe.

1 - Brainstorm - One of the few good meetings there is, if it's directed in a way that rewards creativity.  Very hard to pull off because one or two strong personalities will usually dominate the brainstorm.  If someone can moderate and draw out the opinions of everyone invited sometimes you can  bring out some great ideas and really get something to build direction from.  Otherwise you might be spitting in the wind.









There they are.  Meetings.  Nuff said.

Top 10 ways to tell if you are a suit.

Art v.s. Business.  Age old problem.  Art is essence of communication.  Business is the essence of exploitation.  Exploitation is not bad.  At least not in my book.  We look to be exploited on a daily basis.  Look at it this way, you go to work every week day.  You answer to someone every day you work.  You draw a check in exchange for the patience of answering to that someone every day.  You are being exploited.  Sorry, it's true.  Even if you enjoy your job.  You are still being exploited.  But look at the other side of this weary coin.  When you go to the store, you are looking to purchase a good or service at the lowest possible price for the highest possible quality.  Say you see Oreo's on sale for 20 cents a box instead of 2 dollars a box.  Clearly a mistake, but the store has labeled it that way.  You will gladly pick up those marked boxes of oreos and take them to the register.  You have just exploited the mistake of the retailer.  Even if you don't go that distance, you are constantly on the lookout for the better deal.  You are behaving in a BUSINESS fashion.  The reason a lot of us don't like business is because they tend to do it better and more consistently than we do and we are jealous.  It's ok, it's natural.  Art on the other hand is done for the sake of expression first and the money second.  This is why the phrase STARVING ARTIST seems to always fit.  There are those few that have broken the mold, but only because they have learned the BUSINESS of ART.

Here is where I get my blog entry from.  Suits (Business) tend to want the most cost effective (cheap) elements in their product while not diminishing it's ability to get money.  Suits are not concerned with the lasting effect of art, they are concerned with the fleeting effect of money.  When a suit becomes too involved in the process of the art, then the whole process suffers and dies.  Much like chopping down the apple tree to get the fruit, when picking the fruit might be a better idea.  So are you a suit?  or an artist?  I suspect we have a little of both in us and the side that comes out will depend on how much we appreciate the basis of the medium we are looking at.

10.   Do you read Business Self Help books?  -  You know them.  Good to great.  7 Habits of Highly effective people, etc.  Here is the problem, in the religion of business those books are scripture.  Unfortunately, just like in Religion, you only take out the bits that make sense to your particular flavor of business.  Your company is highly nepotistic?  I don't know any book that calls that good, so you pull out that bit.  Your company doesn't play by the same rules for everyone in the company?  There are probably some other chapters that need to go for that.  If you read and embrace these books, you are likely a suit.  The exception to this is if you are assigned to read these books by suits that are SO excited that they give you reading assignments.

9.  Do you watch a children's playground and think 'hey, that might be a good team building activity?'  -  How to waste money in your department budget in the name of business.  This is a constant problem.  Team building!  Managers will often come up with some team building experience that supposedly will open lines of communication between members of the subordinate group.  Unfortunately, you can't put on the same show twice, or the employee monkeys will take notice and start throwing poo at you.

8.  Do you find yourself supporting the 'Money is a bad motivator' argument so popular amongst the suits? - This one is precious.  Money is a bad motivator.  Easily proven wrong.  Just pay someone nothing and see if they come to work.  How's that for motivational proof for you?  This being said, once you have made enough money, time becomes a better motivator, but usually you can have one or the other, but certainly not both.

7.  Do you find yourself 'evaluating' people that you aren't in charge of?  -  Bad mouthing your fellow employees will put you in the special TOADY camp of management.  Being a suit is a lonely affair, few people like you and fewer people still trust you.  So in order to deflect scrutiny, You find yourself making sideways comments about 'Bob'.  'Bob?  Oh yeah, no he's good, he's fine, it's just that...no, I won't say anything, it wouldn't be fair'  and thus the seeds of doubt about dearly departed Bob have been planted.

6.  Do you find yourself never eating lunch?  or much of anything else?  -  An old management strategy is you never eat with your subordinates because it makes them feel like you are one of them.  Clearly you are not.  Familiarity can be a problem in management so there is limited fraternizing with employees because you never know who you have to fire.  There is still another strategy that says that you don't eat or excuse yourself for a 'bio break' in front of subordinates so they think you may in fact be immortal.

5.  Are you constantly thinking of politically correct ways of saying things?  -  Hmmm...How to get your point across without sounding like a jerk.  Diplomacy and tact are the mark of good communicators.  Uncomfortable silence followed by a clumsy description of a simple problem comes under the purview of a suit.  'Maybe Ramierez took the 5th of May off because he's you know, Meso-Amero-neo-quasi-latin.  I love political correctness.  It stretches the mind to illogical proportions.  Native Americans?!?  Really?  I was born in America, am I not a native?  I am.  I am not however an American Aboriginal which would be the correct term.  So it's not political correctness but rather political acceptedness....   SUIT

4.  Do you accompany tips to your waitress with a bullet-point checklist of things that should be improved -  Go back to that restaurant and what ever you will be eating will in fact be that 'blue blood special' now with extra protein.  Seriously, Suits love EVALUATIONS.  This introspective examination of your faults is only fun to a suit, and the truth is, only people that don't perform these evaluations think they are any good at all.

3.  Do you dream about how everything can be improved? - A manager is there to direct the flow of efforts in the company.  They are in charge of a few people or departments and will typically have anywhere from 2 to 15 people answer to them.  If things start deviating from plan, it's the managers job to keep the employees direction 'on track'.  But what if things are going according to plan?  That's where the SUIT comes in.  Now it's time to IMPROVE.  Everything can be improved.  Just ask a suit.  They will improve things right into uselessness.



2.  Do you use acronyms all the time and you aren't in IT? - Suits LOVE the acronym because they think their time is worth so much that they have to use acronyms to simultaneously save time and baffle people around them.  The suits favorite pause that refreshes comes when someone says 'TPC report?  What does TPC stand for?'  The ever helpful suit will inform you of the acronyms meaning eagerly to show that they know what's up and who's on the ball (not you).  It happens all the time in IT as well, but that's more of a geeky dueling banjos at that point.  Most suits can't keep up, unless they are IT suits (shudder).

1.  Do you find yourself saying things you yourself don't believe? - One of the biggies.  Motivational suits often will spout platitudes they don't believe at all.  'Your attitude determines your altitude'  and  'Those who fail to prepare, prepare to fail'  You kind of hope that if you keep saying them, maybe you too will actually buy what you are selling.  Snap out of it, or size up for Mens Warehouse!







I'm no purist, I understand that we can all be a bit suit-ish from time to time.  Sometimes because we have to be for our very lively-hood.  If you see yourself light up more than a couple of things on this list, just take it as a warning.  On the other hand, if you are looking to be a suit, think of them as guidelines ;)   It just helps to get a checklist of possible fail points so you can start emergency procedures and nip it in the bud ASAP.   Uggggh.

That might be this blogs motto...'The next one will be better, I promise.'