7. Productive Meetings
A lot of meetings don’t go well when they are organised too well.
Oh, yeah.
What is that about? Some meetings are awful.
It may sound extreme, but meetings are no good when someone has to say, “Alright, then...” in order to officially start it.
(laughs)
I think a pattern of good meetings is that someone attending the meeting can say, “I’m not so sure” to the proposal made there.
Ahh.
It’s no good if someone doesn’t at least once introduce some creative destruction, like, “I’m not so sure...” Something that is broken down and reassembled has greater reality.
That’s right.
What I often say is “That’s fine, but...” Things start going well with, “That’s fine, but...”
Oh...
Conversation that kicks off with, “That’s fine...” and “But...”
Right, right. I blurt out, “That’s fine, but...” when I myself don’t really know what it is I want to say! But I can’t pass it through the way it is, or I can, because it’s basically all right, but I’m like, “Isn’t it a little boring like that?” So what I say after “That’s fine, but...” is what reflects my values.
That’s right.
As in, “Isn’t that a little boring?” or “Aren’t you avoiding what you should really be doing?” Or, “Don’t you think the fans may not like that?”
Right. It’s important that the values of someone who says that - the values of a single person - rework the problem once. Then its get more real.
Even when something hasn’t come together yet, it gets much better if someone else’s values break it down once, like, “No, not like that...”
On the other hand, when it comes to everyone deciding together, it lacks sharpness or something like that.
Yeah. When a meeting yields results, you didn’t decide anything by consensus, but rather, somebody laid their opinion on the line.
Yes, I really believe that.
To go back a bit, during those sessions we have during lunch, I have these boisterous conversations with Iwata-san or Nakago-san while we eat, and when everyone returns to work, we divide into those who take the stairs up and those who go down.
Nakago-san is on B1, while Miyamoto-san is on 5 and I’m on 7.
Yeah, I climb up the stairs. And before we part, we stop and stand a bit around the handrails and briefly sum up, like, “So the gist of today’s conversations was...” I feel like a lot of times that is important.
Uh-huh...
You draw a conclusion.
In the end, that about sums it up. I say, “I’ll give it a shot,” and go up the stairs and think about it some more.
For a little while afterward, you each work as individuals. Then you gather again for lunch. If you think about it, it’s an unusual way of working.
Yeah. (laughs) I wonder about that.
But it shows good work relations.
(laughs)