Issue No. 84 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting is about the Meetings Bucket and the Crisis Bucket. John Maxwell writes, “Most people are down on what they’re not up on.” He has a solution—so read on. And this reminder: to review the 80+ books I’ve recommended in back issues, visit the archives here. Plus, take a sneak peek at my new Management Buckets website—ready for the public later in April. The list of 80 books is posted there under “The Book Bucket.”
The Meeting Before the Meeting
Bucket #20 in my book is the Meetings Bucket, so I was excited to read the chapter, “The Secret to a Good Meeting Is the Meeting Before the Meeting," in John Maxwell’s new book. He credits his meeting management wisdom to Olan Hendrix, one of his mentors. That blessed me because Olan’s mentoring saved my leadership! (See page 17 in my book.)
In 10 quick-reading pages, Maxwell builds the case for turning routine meetings into productive action-oriented gatherings. Following the counsel of Hendrix, he writes that the meeting before the meeting: 1) helps you receive buy-in, 2) helps followers to gain perspective, 3) increases your influence, 4) helps you develop trust, and 5) avoids your being blindsided.
The “no surprises” rule is critical for the key people in each meeting—and typically, that means you must meet with them in advance. Maxwell preaches: “If you can’t have the meeting before the meeting, don’t have the meeting. If you do have the meeting before the meeting, but it doesn’t go well, don’t have the meeting. If you have the meeting before the meeting and it goes as well as you hoped, then have the meeting!”
Click on the title to order John Maxwell’s hot-off-the-press book from Amazon: Leadership Gold: Lessons I’ve Learned from a Lifetime of Leading. (P.S. to Olan Hendrix: John Maxwell and John Pearson are grateful!)
Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1. How many hours per week are you in meetings? How much training (books, audio or workshops) have you had in the art of leading or attending meetings?
2. What might happen if those who lead meetings had the “meeting before the meeting?”
Bucket #13 of 20: The Crisis Bucket - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit
Over a 20-week period, I’m featuring one of the 20 buckets (core competencies) each week from my new book, Mastering the Management Buckets (now available). Here’s the core competency in Bucket #13: The Crisis Bucket:
“We are prepared for most crises. We have plans in place and a crisis facilitator trained, and we drill our team members frequently and spontaneously. Yet we trust in God, who is our Protector, Comforter and Sustainer.”
It’s not if you’ll have a crisis, but when. Peter Drucker said, “Fortunately or unfortunately, the one predictable thing in any organization is the crisis. That always comes. That’s when you do depend on the leader.” He said that the job of the leader is to build an organization that is “battle-ready, that has high morale, that knows how to behave, that trusts itself, and where people trust one another.”
When your Katrina hits, or when a Ted Haggard-type crisis touches your organization, are you battle-ready? Whether your company or ministry experiences ugly terminations (are there any other kind?), moral failure of key people, unfavorable media reports, financial improprieties or just erroneous gossip, it will likely not be the first time nor the last.
Effective leaders and managers plan for their next crises because they are inevitable. You can mitigate some of the disasters, but others (such as 9/11) will shock you, upset you and call upon all of your strengths—and potentially put you out of business. But there’s help. Read Chapter 13 in my book and visit the Management Buckets website. Download Worksheet #13.1: "Plan Now for Your Next Crisis." Then fill in the blanks to create crisis cards (a best practice) for every team member.
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