Why Meetings Fail - and How Speaking Up Changes Everything

Language is a beautiful gift, so make sure every word spoken has value, or shut your trap and keep your empty words to yourself.

The Problem with Most Meetings

It’s 2 PM and you are sitting in a room full of unknown people. You are here because it concerns a feature you worked on for the last five months.

It is the first time for you, so you are more of a support character than someone who plans to take an active role. Time goes by, and it is already 4 PM. You are still sitting in the same room with the same people.
Temperature is high, there isn’t much oxygen, but there are a lot of repeating arguments.

(Josh (Analyst)): So I’m concerned, if new redesign of this page will not break the functionality of the new popup and vice versa.

(Alisha (Team lead - popup team)): It shouldn’t, we knew it would overlap, and we prepared it as requested, considering the redesign.

(Mike - team lead - redesign): Yep, that sounds correct, they also worked with the new style we prepared, so everything should be fine.

(Josh): So when can we see and test both of those features together?

(Mike): We can merge it at the end of the week, then next week we can start testing, is that OK, Johny?

(Johny - team lead tester): Should be OK with us, test cases are ready.

(Josh): And can we release popup without redesign if something goes wrong?

(Alisha): Not really, but there isn’t much, what could go wrong. We need to merge it and just make sure, nothing breaks.

(Katrin - product owner): Popup has to go out — there is a campaign connected to it.

(Josh): So we definitely need both features, what’s the plan?

(Alisha): If Mike’s team doesn’t break our feature, everything will be fine.

(Mike): So we are the problem here?

(Alisha): I’m just saying that…

(Mike): So you think that…

(Josh): Can we get back to…

Why Meetings Get Stuck

This is the moment when finding a solution quietly stops being the goal.

The problems I see are:

• People who can, but don’t want to make a decision (take responsibility for it)
• Unnecessary arguing - which doesn’t bring anything to the table
• Not enough information - this is a specific case; it is hard to make a decision without information, but it shouldn’t jail people in the room
• “People without power” - who are not able or willing to share information

We have 2 team leads who started going after each other, even though at first everything looked fine.
We have our doubter, who didn’t help.
There is tension caused by the business people.
And let’s say there are other people and 2 developers, who just sit quietly — didn’t say anything - yet.

People Who Hold The Power

People who can and should move the whole meeting forward are our two team leads.
They got too passionate and lost the sight of the goal. Instead of trying to solve the problem, they started arguing.
Making decisions and taking responsibility is hard. Some decisions are more difficult than others, but making them always moves things forward - even though we might regret them sometimes.

We could put our doubter - the organizer of the whole meeting - into this category as well.
He is supposed to be the guide. He holds the power to call the shots and move the conversation in the right direction.
Instead of dropping his voice and just asking, he could stop their conversation. They could complain later, but now the arguing duo would look foolish if they continued. He could even direct a specific question to the developers and let the rest cool down.

Not Enough Information to Decide

What if there is not enough information on the table to decide anything?
Sometimes life gets hard - terrible previous meetings, problems at home, people forget.
Wouldn’t asking someone else sound incompetent?
Do you trust someone who babbles and argues - or someone who confidently says, “I don’t know - let me ask”?
Always acknowledge other people and show confidence in yourself.

Why are You in The Room?

Many people struggle with speaking up in meetings -but what about you?
You are in the room as well.
But the room feels heavy, and this could be quite scary.
However, this is your time to shine.
Stand up. Everyone goes quiet. Start speaking - be confident - you know the most important facts.

I already consulted this with Susan. There is no real overlap in the features.
We can put them together after the meeting. Then we can deploy them on the testing environment.
Testers can start tomorrow. Is xyz testing environment OK, Johny?… (silence)

At this moment, you have done everything necessary.

Your team lead cools down. Now he remembers, what you told him. The meeting can continue as it should, and people leave satisfied.

What you did - standing up - you gave an important signal, that you have something to say.
This is something people usually understand instinctively, no matter how lost they are. This is only one form of body language - and it always plays a big role.

Speak If You Have Something Important to Say

What should you take from this?
Live and feel your conversations and interactions, don’t just speak. Be humble, but confident.
Listen to great speakers and learn from them.
Sometimes, a few words have more power than lengthy explanations. \

That’s something I’m still working on and trying to understand. This isn’t just workplace thing, there are plenty of every day interactions, work on them.

Last but not least, don’t rely only on your words.
Silence, body language, voice - don’t be afraid to use them. Sometimes we are up, sometimes down, but we are learning, getting better… growing.