Attitudes certainly matter. That’s why many places tell you to leave the ego at the door. Attitudes can make a meeting enjoyable … or not.
Answers are pretty important to bring to the room, too. Most of the time, that’s why everyone has gathered – to either share an answer or discuss one.
The most important thing you can bring to the room, however, is a question.
Not 20 questions and not a question that has been answered in the project brief, but a meaningful question. A question that pushes on what’s possible, that factors in more empathy for the target, that challenges the status quo and that makes people feel.
It’s tough to come up with these kinds of questions. That’s why they’re most important.
Stay Positive & Prep For The Meeting Appropriately
There’s not much more debilitating than self criticism, the lizard brain, the little voice in your head that tries to rationalize all the reasons why you’re not good enough, won’t succeed and shouldn’t even try.
They key to overcoming it isn’t an external force, however.
It’s not more praise from others or a guarantee or reassurance.
The only way to drown self criticism … is to drown it … with positive speak.
Not fluff or hopes or overused mantras that may or may not be true.
Instead to drown it with another realistic story of your obligation and opportunity and the magic that always arrives when we do something that we’re initially self critical about.
While at a running event, lines were building for three porta potties.
People were frustrated, impatient, and quite frankly, really needed to go.
Pain narrows the mind, though. Being upset is like putting on peripheral visors. We miss a lot when we’re distressed.
Turns out a glance down the pathway from the porta potties, about 50 yards away, there were roughly 15 more porta potties with no line whatsoever.
We could take the frustration out on the organizer. Things could have been designed better. There could have been better signage.
But easier, and more likely of reaching a solution, is to cast a net around the possible. There’s often other opportunities nearby, sometimes as close as 50 yards.
It’s magic when someone experiences your brand and rushes to tell their friends.
Even more magical is when those friends tell all of their friends.
But, soon, the magic does more damage to your brand than wished-for.
The original group went there or bought your thing because it was personal, it was for them, it gave them something to talk to their friends about and elevate their status.
Now everyone is doing it.
(And unless you’re selling something that only gets better with more people like a dating apps or fax machines or wikipedia, you don’t want hypergrowth.)
Better to focus on your minimum viable audience and – when you begin to experience hypergrowth – create something else to moderate it.
It’s less about making your online store larger or replicating your west side venue on the east side.
Nor do you want to begin turning people down (especially those your original audience).
So what’s the solution?
There’s a restaurant group in town that each restaurant is outrageously successful. They could build more of the same poke restaurant across town, but if they are given the chance, they build something new.
It’s for another audience , which might pull from another one of their restaurants, but that’s how they prevent hypergrowth at any specific location, while still growing overall as a company.
If “more” means “something else” then you might be onto something.
Stay Positive & The Work Of Starting Another Is Always Worth It
Time spent letting your eyes glaze over and trying to hide it is time wasted.
Time spent asking a question that was answered during the presentation is time wasted.
Time spent sitting back, looking at the minutes to see when the talk is over is time wasted.
Time isn’t the only thing wasted. Credibility. Trust. Connection are, too.
If it’s worth listening to, do so actively. Interrupt to understand. Ask tough questions. Write what you can do in the near future with the information you’ve been provided.
And if it’s not worth listening to (which we can often tell within a few minutes of any presentation), excuse yourself or seek a way to elevate the experience for the speaker.
Chances are you’re not the only one struggling to maintain attention.
It’s our responsibility to remain active listeners – to ourselves, to each other and to the presenter.
