Day 10 – 15 January 2014
Only our second full week in and already the natural rhythms of work are settling down. The cycle of work – wasn’t that an Elton John song? Wednesday is management day.
Every so often I get a whim and rearrange our meetings to try and cover the important things we need to do. The latest change came after reading a book called ‘Death by Meeting’ by Patrick Lencioni. I found it on a bookshelf in the Head of HR’s office and it was an unlikely find. I would highly recommend it.
We meet as a senior management team (I must change that to senior leadership team) every week. One week it is a ‘people’ meeting and a fortnight later it’s a ‘performance’ meeting. In-between we have some free-form sessions where we talk about whatever is on our mind that day. This way we have time to mull over the things that matter most.
When I was at North Tyneside I came up with a clever way of arranging our calendars so that everyone could attend whichever meetings they needed to by having particular types of meeting layered throughout the different days. It was a work of genius, clever yet easy to implement and so was never taken on board.
This morning was about people but somehow we’ve got out of sync. I hadn’t taken into account that we had a four week meeting cycle but a monthly reporting cycle and so all the performance stuff ended up in with the people stuff. What we need is a leap-meeting or perhaps someone else to sort it out.
We had an awful lot to talk about and agreed to carry forward two of the most important things until next Wednesday. For some reason the team had their tails up and there was a lot of healthy, if at times a little heated conversation. I got the distinct impression that they were trying to wind me up and I fell for it most of the time. I will remember though and some day they will get their comeuppance. I’m glad we only have one of these a week.
No doubt it will seem to have been a much calmer meeting by the time that Pam has finished with the notes.
Another school visit in Hartlepool.
Learning points for today: We have a great team, not afraid to speak their minds; Keeping control of a meeting can be challenging and draining; I can’t always tell if they are serious or pulling my leg.
Today’s enjoyment rating 7/10 – Bit of a slog this morning and not enough time to talk about everything.
Thoughts from a Guerrilla Worker 