The Dos and Don'ts of meetings
Not all meetings are equal
Another core point worthwhile considering is the different types of meetings we have at our disposal. Most meetings are a handful or more of people, and these should have clear guidance structures, an unbiased facilitation, and a good time management. However, there are other types of exchanges that we should check out in order to differentiate from such ordinary meetings
1) Meetings with two people This setting is the most intense, personal, and focused type of meeting. It also has a great flexibility, which makes it tempting to get distracted, but can also be great to create a joint identity. Being a mentor, it can be great to structure your thoughts beforehand, and to identify tangible goals that you want to reach. Two-person meetings without a goal can often be a pain, and I am often very insistent towards myself to derive goals in such personal settings, if only for myself. Yet we also have to acknowledge that just like any other meeting, such exchanges may build over a longer timeline. Having regular meetings i.e, with PhD students can be a beacon of hope, and are often the most fun. Since such settings are deeply personal, as a mentor I feel you need to adapt to each and every single person. Still, honesty goes a long way. Pushing people out of their comfort zone can be hard, but necessary if you are thriving towards a continuous development. I am often taking notes afterwards, yet try not to come to obviously back to prevoious points in a follow up meeting. Another key point is that within such meeting you may want to focus your attention without any compromises, yet be also clear when it comes to expectations and the time frame. If someone goes into such a meeting with a challenged mindset, you may not shift that within one hour, but it can be good to make that visible, and reflect about it. Things take time.
2) Brain storming sessions are an altogether different beast. Here, the timeframe should be more or less long, and you will not necessarily reach tangible goals, but only start to develop ideas and a follow-up structure. Different people act in different ways in such settings, thus adapting speed and making sure that the individual gains are shared is essential. More often than not I get so carried away in such a process that I need to remind myself to regularly check if the other people are still with me. Similarly is it important to clearly indicate if your are lost, or feel disconnected. Brainstorming sessions are about trust and joint identity. A whiteboard is often the key tool, or maybe working in a shared document. I spent a lot of trial and error until I got my brainstorming session to work best for me, and this seems to be a reoccurring challenge among many people. Building experience to this end demands patience.
3) Emergency calls can be a lifeline when people are at their wits' end. Within a team, establishing such safety nets that help people that are stuck in their mind can most rewarding, as it catches people when they are most desperate. Asking for help is - sadly - still difficult in our society, yet all the while so important. Often, it already helps to just get it all out to clarify your thought process. Within such situations, a healthy peer-network can be a lifesaver, and often builds on informal structures. Within a team, great care should be thus taken to leave no one behind, and to consciously seek out whether people are stuck or shifting into crisis. Remember that any team is only as strong as its weakest link.
4) The last meeting type are informal meetings. The corona crisis exemplified how much we miss the casual exchange in the hall or at a coffee place, often without any goal whatsoever, where suddenly ideas begin to develop. Our team has informal games nights that are often gold for the team spirit at least for some people, and a recent barbecue after a long corona hiatus showed how much a joint evening can do for the team. If there is one part where we still have to learn the most, it is tacit knowledge. There are all sorts of informal meetings, and these are at the heart of institutional knowledge. I consider informal meetings to be most relevant of all, often the most fun, yet hardest to tame and just get right. We all know how it is to be in an informal meeting where do not want to be. Honesty and clear communication goes a long way to this end.
I recognise within our team a great effort to make meetings worth our while. We often differentiate in our meetings how we worked regarding research, teaching and management. These are the three elements that allow us to have a more clear structure in our meetings. Also, I recognise that we have a strong set of norms where new people that join the team are introduced to. Over the last years, a lot of informal knowledge and experience accumulated, which made the meetings continuously better. We have weekly team meetings, project meetings, smaller meetings, informal exchanges, meetings with individual PhDs or Postdocs, mentoring sessions, writing day meetings, and so much more. I believe that what defines us humans the most is our interconnectedness, and how we want to explore this. The 21st century will be most focused on making a difference to this end, and I look forward to a future where the connections between us will be way more important than the differences that define our individual identities. I invite you to reconsider the way you meet people, and to try out new ways to facilitate meetings. I hope in a not too far future we will all be more versatile to this end, at least this is what I am thriving for. --- The author of this entry is Henrik von Wehrden.
