Meetings and hyper-connected audiences

A modern problem in meetings is lack of attention among attendees due to blackberries and portable computers (attendees checking email, the internet, and who-know-what-else!).


Much of this is due to bad meeting culture (i.e. meetings are too long, have too many people, should not be happening, or are poorly run). But if the meeting is important and the attendee list is correct, then full attention is needed.


I know of several ways to deal with this:


1) At Microsoft, I have heard there is a culture to sit-at-the-table if you're paying attention and sit-back-from-the-table if you are handling other urgent matters through email.


2) Some meeting managers can simply say "I'd like your full attention. If you want to use the internet to find out more about some of these topics great. But I ask that you to use it only for that purpose." (Some cultures would set up some kind of bounty - free drink if you catch someone on off-strategy.)


3) I have collected phones from participants and handed them to an assistant to check. The message is "I would like your full attention on this important topic. If you get an urgent call, my assistant will answer for you and pull you out of the meeting."

A culture of few, short meetings is the best of all solutions.

4 Attributes of Successful Leaders

I attended an interesting talk last night by Egon Zehnder executive Claudio Fernandez Araoz, author of "Great People Decisions." He suggests there are 4 attributes of a successful leader:

1) Genetics - health and IQ, to name but a few
2) Place/Era - if you are in China, things are good right now (if in sub-prime mortgage industry, not so much)
3) Career Choice - the quality of the companies that you keep
4) Ability to hire good people

His talk make good points that companies spend lots of time on certain activities (e.g. accounting, budgetting) but not nearly enough on the process of hiring people.

Work is important to life

Work offers people 3 important things: 1) a way to structure your time; 2) a sense of community; and 3) a sense of shared purpose.

Author John Trauch says that you need to recreate these conditions in retirement (also when between jobs, it would seem).

Another author, Alan Bernstein, says that even after a honeymoon period of travel/golf/etc, you need to take steps to build purpose into your life. Activity ideas from a 3rd author, Tamara Erickson, include philanthropy, volunteer work, going back to school, changing your career, teaching, or starting a business.

--- From New York Times "Career Couch"