The Hidden Cost of How We Work Together with Mamie Kanfer Stewart

Speaker A: Who do you want to be as a leader? What are the blind spots you're missing? If you had a magic wand and you could change anything about your workplace, what would you do with it? These are the kinds of questions we explore on Inspirational Leadership. I'm your host, Kristen Harcourt. I'm, um, a keynote speaker, emotional intelligence coach and leadership trainer who partners with executives and emerging leaders who want to achieve extraordinary results for themselves and their organizations. You're in the right place if you're ready to cultivate the self awareness to be the leader you were born to be. Let's go on this journey together. Welcome to Inspirational Leadership. I'm your host, Kristen Harker and I'm excited for another fabulous guest. Today we're going to be speaking with Mamie Camphor Stewart, who is the founder of Meteor, leader of the One Goal Meeting movement and host of the top rated Modern Manager podcast. She helps managers and organizations build smarter, happier workplaces by creating high performing teams, fostering trust and transforming meetings into powerful drivers of collaboration and results. Through her coaching, speaking and innovative micro workshops, Mimi equips leaders with practical strategies to improve communication, teamwork and performance. With a unique blend of entrepreneurial spirit, creativity and business expertise. She's passionate about helping people do their best work while bringing out the best in the people around them. Welcome to the show, Mamie.

Speaker B: Thank you so much, Kristin. I'm so excited to be here today.

Speaker A: Um, I think we're both really, really passionate about this subject and I don't know about you, but I know that you're very passionate about this area because you talk about it a lot. But I feel like every day in my leadership coaching or training, there's someone talking about meetings and how ineffective meetings are. So I think people are going to be really excited for us to dive into how to make those more effective.

Speaker B: Yeah. It's surprising to me how we've known meetings have been a problem for a long time and yet we still haven't collectively figured out how to solve them. And it's one of the things I'm most passionate about because it's such an important part of our workday.

Speaker A: Yeah. And sometimes when we start to get a little bit more into this, it might even be that didn't actually need to be a meeting and where we're putting meetings and not putting meetings might start to shift.

Speaker B: Um, absolutely.

Speaker A: So before we get in there, I want everyone to get a chance to get to know you a little bit more beyond the bio and more of your story. So tell us a little Bit more about your story and what got you to this work you're doing in the world.

Speaker B: Sure. So I'll give you the highlights because it's like everyone's story. They're long and rich. So I went to art school because I thought I wanted to be an artist. And after four years of art school, decided I didn't want to be an artist. And I didn't really know what I wanted to do with my life. And so I started working in my family business business. And there I got exposed to all kinds of amazing collaborative practices. Everything from how do you plan a project to how do you run meetings, to how do you make decisions. And it was really, I think it was like magic because it was so fun and so engaging. And after a little while, I decided to go off into the real world and get a job elsewhere. And I joined, uh, an organization. And I was shocked, m, like, so appalled by the way that they were running their meetings. And I was like, hm, Is my family business the unicorn here? And everywhere else is terrible, or is this organization the odd one out that their meetings are terrible? But actually everyone else's meetings are really good? So I just started talking to people about meetings. And it could be somebody I met, a networking event, somebody met at a bar and discovered that actually, no meetings are a really big problem. And when you do the research, the number of hours wasted and you put dollars against that, it's a huge problem. And it still continues to be today. So I decided, like, I think I can do something about this. I think I have some tools in my toolbox on how to improve meetings, mostly from where I learned my family business. But then I did more research and more conversations and more learning.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And so I started Meteor with a focus on helping teams have, uh, productive meetings. And that was in 2014. And I've basically been harping on the same thing every since, really trying to help teams make meetings the best part of their day. Which, when I say that, some people look at me in bulk because they're like, how. How can meetings ever be the best part of my day? And I'm like, they can be. When you do them well, they truly can be.

Speaker A: I think that's such a great point because I think because people are so used to meetings being run in an ineffective way, or their days are so populated by meetings, it just feels like the entire day, multiple days in a row, are meetings that they start to feel overwhelmed and exhausted. So even when they maybe are being done somewhat effectively, there's too many meetings Right. So I'll be interested in your insights around how to make that more effective. It's funny, you're reminding me as you were talking about, like getting into it with your family business and just thinking, you know, when you graduate from school and then you get back and you get into the workplace, you just think for some of these things, oh, maybe I'm the odd one. Like, maybe I think these, I'm thinking, this is not how things should be run, but it's just normal. And I remember being on a board for a nonprofit organization and at that point I was probably maybe around 25, and I was like, I don't understand what's going on with these meetings. Like, everything about this feels so ineffective. It would be like two and a half, three hours. It would feel like we didn't really get to anywhere by the end of the meeting. We would go off onto all of these tangents and there would never be clear follow up and agendas and where we're going with all these things. But I also, I thought, well, maybe this is just me. Like, maybe this is, you know, as a 25 year old, you're still thinking like, I don't know everything. This is maybe just how meetings run. But yeah, I also quickly saw, oh, uh, the difference between, you know, I started to think, oh, I don't ever want to be on a board and be part of a nonprofit because you just think that this is how it's going to be. But then when you start to see the difference in the contrast, you realize, oh my gosh, in terms of productivity and optimizing and leaving the meeting feeling energized as opposed to leaving feeling so drained and deflated because nothing really happens.

Speaker B: Yes. And that is exactly a good meeting, gets work done, but also is engaging in the way that people leave the meeting feeling good about their contribution, feeling good about the conversations, even if they were hard conversations, they walk out in a positive space, not in that drain. Gosh, I just wish I could have used that time to do the 20 other things on my to do list. So it's both about the people and the work.

Speaker A: Okay, so, so let's first start. We'll probably like zoom out and then zoom in. You're starting to work with an organization and they're saying, yeah, you know, I think there's a problem with our culture when it comes to meetings. Where would you start? So right now there's going to be an HR leader that's like, yeah, I relate to this. We have a problem when it comes to meetings in our organization, but they're wondering where to start. So when we start to zoom out and then just even as a culture, try to uh, create a more effective way that everybody is doing meetings, where would you start with them?

Speaker B: So I think the place to start is with what meetings you are currently having in your organization. What are the different types of meetings, how frequently are people in meetings and just getting a lay of the land. And it could be different across different teams because that's one of the things that I see often is that there might be a department or a team that has pretty good meetings, but the things that they're doing to make them good are not being used by a team in a different department because there's not that consistency across the board. So really just understanding and doing an audit, uh, of what are all the different meetings, how much time are people spending in meetings and do they think that these meetings or which of these meetings are doing the job that they're supposed to do? Are they moving the work forward and engaging the people in the right ways? And you might start to see if you do this in a big kind of organizational survey style or through, um, little mini interviews, you might start to see that there are some bright spots. And while I can teach you all different kinds of meeting, uh, productivity and meeting effectiveness tips and tricks and techniques and I hope we'll get to some of those. Yeah, one of the best ways I've seen meeting practices scale is when it's already embedded in part of your organization and you're taking those good practices and sharing them out. So it's not a top down, it's a side to side kind of practice. So that's one way that you can start, is just understand what's going on currently and mine the good spots for, for practices that are working and start to share those more broadly. Yeah, I can keep going, but I want to.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, please keep going. Yes, keep going.

Speaker B: Okay, the second, and this is really getting into uh, the details here for a second, but the number one thing that you can do to make every meeting more productive is to define a desired outcome. Every meeting should know exactly what it is trying to accomplish. That is not a discussion, that is not a brainstorm, that is not a conversation, that is not a check in. Those are all great activities. You need to know what the meeting is going to achieve. It needs to be an outcome. So if you are going in to have a discussion, if you're going to have a discussion and there's lots of different, uh, opinions and complex information and you're trying to process all together, there's still an outcome you're driving for. And that outcome could be we need to have alignment on what all this information means, or we need to have a decision on how to move forward based on this information. Or we want to expand our thinking so we want to walk away with new ideas of possibility here. Whatever it is, if you know the outcome, everyone now can participate in a way that drives to the outcome. You can design the meeting and use the right activities to get you to that outcome. You can make sure the right people are in the room to achieve that outcome. And I can tell you, when I sometimes I tell clients this, they all, they reflect back and they say, you know what? We actually had that happen once where we had a meeting and then we realized, oh, the decision maker isn't here because they articulated that they actually needed a decision out of the conversation. So the desired outcome is the most important thing. And when everybody knows that desired outcome at the start of the meeting. Well, let me even take a step back. M. If you have to articulate as the meeting leader what your desired outcome is, you might realize that you don't need a meeting. And so that meeting then doesn't happen. And you use a different collaborative model, you might make that meeting that you thought needed to be 90 minutes could now be 60 minutes because you've clarified what it is you're driving towards. So even this simple one, behavior change of writing and desired outcome can eliminate meetings and transform the meetings you already have. And it is not a heavy lift to ask people to do.

Speaker A: I love that. So before. Because I know you're going to be sharing so many valuable stuff. I want to stop with this one for a second. So the desired outcome. So I'm just thinking of. People are listening. There's going to be some meetings where it's a long standing meeting and it's just something, you know, our team meets every week. Or it might be something where, um, certain teams are always meeting for a particular thing on a weekly basis or an individual. Uh, so I want the person who is running the meeting. So maybe they were the one that put the invite out, but they're not actually the one who is in charge of the meeting. So who should be thinking about this desired outcome? How should they go about approaching it? So for example, let's use the one where it's a. Ah, it's a weekly meeting. That always happens. I want to make this more real because then people. I think it's easier for you to be able to, like a case study. Right. So let's just say, um, I'm thinking of one of my manufacturing companies and they, the sales team meets on a weekly basis, let's say, just to see how sales are going, where things are moving, where there might be challenges, things like that. The person who originally created the meeting might not always even be in the meeting. So you know how there's lots of different people coming together who should own deciding on what that desired outcome is and make sure, uh, on a weekly basis that they're getting together that that's handled?

Speaker B: Yeah, I love this question so much because there are, I think, a couple of different ways you can approach it. So if you are a team that is meeting and it's a little bit of a shared ownership kind of thing, which is really the best, uh, the team should just have a meeting about its meetings and it should sit down together as a group. And as the team leader, you have to design the meeting. Right. Your outcome is to have could be three ways that we are going to change how we meet so that we can have more productive conversations and move work forward more effectively and engage our people more effectively. Right. That's your outcome for this meeting that you're designing about your meetings. Then what you're doing with your team is laying out for them and saying, okay, we've been doing this meeting for a long time. What, what do you think its purpose is? What are you getting out of this conversation? What do you. What would you wish we could get out of these meetings? What would be different for you if we talked about things differently, if we structured them differently, if we had a different outcome? So engage your team in that process and collectively, collectively decide what is the purpose of this meeting. And I actually don't use the word purpose very often. It's really what is the goal of this meeting? And you might find. And actually I worked with a team who did this M and what they discovered was that they did not need to have a weekly team meeting. They wanted a dashboard where everyone reported out their numbers. And then they had a once a month conversation together that was casual relationship building. That what they actually wanted out of these meetings was to know their colleagues, but not to report out on everything. They actually just wanted to see where they stood against their numbers. And they didn't need to do that in a round robin conversation. It was transformative. But they only got there because the group collectively said, this is what's important to me. This is what will actually help me do my job better. And a lot of times if you are the meeting leader and you're the team leader, you have one need and your team members have a different need. Which is why it's important to do it together. Because if you think, well, I need to know what's going on from everybody, and the best way for me to get that information is to sit in a room and hear it. But everyone else says that's not valuable. That's an important insight that you might miss if you aren't discussing this in collaboration with your team members.

Speaker A: That's a perfect example you've given. Because in this exact situation, that's what I had suggested as well. I think we need to take a step back and have a meeting around. Is this working well for everyone? Uh, just because this has been going on for the last two years, every week, doesn't mean that it's actually effective, that people are getting what they want out of it. And that's exactly what happens. They started to recognize, you know, not really. I just kind of show up. We've already talked about some of this stuff ahead of time anyway, so we're not really sure why we're in a meeting saying the same thing again. And then they realize, yeah, this is an opportunity to be more doing some relationship building instead, there might be this other way that we're continuing to track and see where things are going. So I think that is such a. I think for people listening, there are so many meetings where maybe where they first started a year ago or many years ago, um, looked very different than where they've gotten today. And maybe they were effective at some point, but over time they've merged into these different things. Or as the organization has shifted, as technology has shifted, as the demand has shifted, it's no longer serving the purpose, it's not serving the goal that you had originally intended. And I like what you said at the beginning too, around surveying and getting some data to see what do people actually think? Because you might be thinking everyone in that room is completely satisfied in getting what they want out of that meeting, but they're not. But if you don't have the data to support first of all, what's working and what's not working, you might actually find some people might have some iterations around. Yeah, this, I, uh, like this part. But could we do more of this? And same thing. When it's that, uh, smaller group coming together now all of a sudden you're co creating a better version of what you're really trying to get out of this with the goal. And I just think that the meeting about the meeting doesn't happen enough.

Speaker B: I agree. And I really recommend two other practices that teams do when it comes to really making their meetings strong and healthy. The first is an annual audit. So just because you had a meeting about your meetings today and you figured some things out and you're making some changes and you're experimenting with things, doesn't mean that you are now done until the next, you know. Mhm Eon comes. Right. You need to make this an annual practice where you sit with your team and say, let's look at all of our meetings. Let's figure out what's working, what's not working, what kinds of meetings can we get rid of, what kind of meetings that we need to add, what can we shift around, who needs to be in all of these meetings. Right. Make it an annual practice so that your meetings continue to serve you even as all of those changes around you are happening. The second thing that I uh, really, really encourage teams to do is to create a meeting portfolio. And organizations can do this too. And the more consistency there is, the stronger and easier workflows. So if you have a team meeting you, that's one type of meeting. You might also have a project kickoff or an after action review or a plus delta or a one on one or a individual, uh, check in. You have all these different kinds of meetings and the more that those can have a standardized template that says this is why this meeting exists, this is how we prepare for it, this is how the agenda typically flows, this is the kinds of people who are typically invited. And you use that then to take the weight off of having to plan every single meeting like it's a custom design. If you think about with a real estate developer, if you are an architect building a brand new house, everything is by design new. You are creating the whole thing from scratch. But if you're a developer and you're putting up a series of homes and they're following the exact same blueprint every single time, and you're just changing the finishes here and you're putting on a different color paint there, it's so much easier to move faster because you don't have to start with uh, figuring out what shape should the house be, how many stories should it be, how many people are going to be like, all of that's already figured out for you. And that just takes that mental cognitive load off so that you can actually focus on the most important parts of the meeting which are not the basics of the Agenda. It's really, how are we going to engage people to get the work done?

Speaker A: Yeah. Uh, I really, really appreciate what you said about making this an annual practice, because it's something that people naturally do. In terms of reflecting at the end of the year, that part happens. I can't think of anyone that I've ever heard with any of the leaders that I work with that say, at the end of the year, let's reflect on what we want our meetings to look like going into the next year. What worked really well with some of our meetings, what didn't work as well, how do we want to design these? Um, and continuously reevaluating that on an annual basis, because as things do evolve and where you might want to make course corrections and things like that as well. What I like about it, in terms of I'm, um, so much about habit stacking. It's something quite often happens. Anyways, right at the end of the year, you're doing that reflection, thinking about the next year. I just think many people who are listening to this podcast right now, you probably are not doing any reflections on the effectiveness of your meetings at the end of the year and thinking about what you want to do going into the next year. I think that would be a really, really great reflection to start to build in.

Speaker B: Totally agree. And we do it with lots of other things in general. So it's not a big crazy concept to say, yeah, if you're spending 30%, 40%, 50% of your time in meetings, if you can improve them even by a little bit, that will have a cascade of impact. And we know this from research, we know this from my clients. Right. It's not only that you get your time back so you can be more productive and putting that time towards other things, but you get your energy back. Right. Your morale goes up. All of these other kind of intangible benefits happen when people aren't wasting away in meetings.

Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. I want to pull us into the team dynamic, which I think meetings will still show up at it, but just want to look at it from this lens. One of the things I hear about in many organizations across industries is where we can have different teams working. Um, a little bit too siloed. Right. So we've heard this where, like tech and IT or whoever's doing their thing over there and sales and marketing are not talking to. To them or they're getting annoyed. Actually, I'm just thinking again of another client where it's, you know, operations is over here doing their thing. Sales and marketing is over here doing their things, operations getting frustrated because sales and marketing is sometimes doing their thing where they make the promises. And operations is over here. Like, no, I don't think we can do what you promised over there. And so there can sometimes be some conflict or it's not even just about conflict. There's just not enough sometimes. In many organizations, collaboration happening because we need all the different teams working together to get to those common goals. But they can be sometimes so super focused on what's happening in their world and their team and not necessarily collaborating as well with other teams. I'm sure meetings will enter into that. But I'm just curious on your end, just starting with that piece, what do you think organizations could be doing more effectively when it comes to collaboration from variety of teams within the organization?

Speaker B: Okay, I feel I have so much things to say here, so I'm gonna. I'm gonna give you a couple thoughts here. Um, so first is one of the things that I do with teams is create a team playbook where we identify what. Why does this team exist, What m are you trying to accomplish? Who are your stakeholders, how do you serve them? And then how do you work according to your values, how do you run your meetings, how do you make decisions, how do you, uh, communicate, how do you do all the things that you as a team need to do? Let's get on the same page ourselves first, and then let's share this with the teams that we collaborate. And I did this with an organization. It was really fascinating. Each of the teams had created their playbook, and then they each had a chance to present to each other. And then we put up on the wall some sticky notes and like, big sticky note paper. And I had them in their separate teams write down, what is it that we. The value that we give or what is it that we do for this other team? How do we serve them? And then what do they do for us? And each team wrote their two columns, and then we share those out. And it was fascinating to see, uh, team A say, like, this is how we can help you and team B be like, we had no idea that that's that, Ah, you can do that. And team B say something like, this is what we need from you. And team A say, we had no idea you wanted that from us. And it bridges those gaps between what we think we're doing and what the other people think we're doing. So that is kind of a high level. And it really helps to have that playbook that team mission and stakeholders analysis first because it helps each team just stay aligned and know what is it that we want to tell others about ourselves? What is it that we want to say we can offer and who we are and why we're here, you know, to exist. So that's the first part. The second is then when you are working collaboratively, even if it's ongoing work, have a meeting about how you want to work together. Because we all come to conversations with totally different mindsets. One of my favorite activities to do with the team is to ask everybody if your boss or if a colleague says, can you get this to me by Friday?

Speaker A: Mhm.

Speaker B: When will you have it? I'm not in my imagination, like in the ideal world I have it to them. But like realistically, if you're just, you know, in the hallway passing somebody or you're on a zoom call and they say, oh, that'd be so helpful, get that to me on Friday. And you say yes. Are you going to have it to them Thursday night? Are you going to have it to them by 10am Friday morning? Are you going to have it to them by end of day Friday at 5pm the work day? Are you going to have to them by midnight? Or are you that person who's like, well, they're really not even going to look at it on Friday, so I'll just get to them by 8am Monday morning and that's fine. Right? And you would be surprised that people have such different ideas of what Friday means. So that, and that is just a tiny, tiny example of what happens for all of the ways that we work across teams, within teams and across teams. So when you bring people together who have to collaborate in these ways and just talk through these are the places that we have some friction. Can we just get aligned on what good looks like for both of us and let's see if we can figure out what the expectations should be so that when you are doing X, I know what to expect on Y. And then you know, the other thing is once you have clarity and expectations and they're written down and shared, you can hold people accountable to them. It's really hard to hold people accountable to something they haven't agreed to.

Speaker A: Oh, that is brilliant. I think so many things come off for what you just said. I think first of all, how many assumptions are made? Right. So that example you gave on the Friday is, I mean, I of course was like, oh, Friday means anytime Friday either maybe morning, afternoon or end of day. But I do know some people when they say Friday are like, ooh, I have to over deliver. When I say Friday, I'm going to be Thursday night. And so they operate like that, that if someone, my boss, is asking for something by Friday, well, I'm 100% going to get it by Thursday night. So they're over delivering. They're also thinking, oh, everyone else has the same operating system. They're going to over deliver. Right. Whereas again, someone else sees Friday, like Friday's loose. Like Friday, it's just before the weekend. Anyways, what are you going to do with that? I'll do it first thing Monday. So I think that is such a great. Right. And it's not, it's not a right or wrong right. Like, it's so funny, I was doing a session yesterday on emotional intelligence and talking about there's no one size fits all. And especially when it comes to operating systems as well. It's not like there's a good operating system and a bad. We just have all these different operating systems. So until you get the clarity to get like, okay, so help me understand what is your operating system. Okay, I got it now. So I know when you say this you mean that. So now that leader knows, maybe they start to get into the habit, oh, I'm going to say Thursday, knowing it's going to be end of day Friday. Right. Because they start to be able to do some of that adapting. Um, and I also thought it was, um, fabulous, the example that you gave around, first of all, the team being really clear around whether those principles and then being able to then ask others. Because going back to the assumptions again, I think so often they're like, oh, yeah, like this is what we do for you. And then they don't realize, oh, no, like if you could do this thing, it would be incredible. And they're like, oh, we didn't even think that was something that would be useful to you. Like, there's just so much miscommunication, I think, or misunderstandings that happen throughout in organizations that if we don't create this structure where there is this consistent communication, I think with the course correcting and making sure we're on the same page. And of course, different team members come, people come and go. And so that changes when those different individuals are showing up. That's why we can't just have, okay, we do this one practice once a year. Well, no, because the teams are constantly shifting and so those dialogues are important to be ongoing. Not only is that shifting, but what's going on out in the world and how quickly things are moving is constantly changing. As well.

Speaker B: Yeah. This reminds me of an example. I worked with a legal, uh, department inside of a larger organization and we went through this process of building their team playbook and they were really annoyed at the senior business leaders. They were like, they all come in and they look at us like we are the no people that ah, we are here to identify all the problems and all the risks. And we basically just tell them, no, you can't do this. No, this could be really risky. No, no, no, no, no. And they're like, we aren't no people. We are a, uh, creative problem solver. We look at the law and we help figure out how can we make this vision happen within the legal boundaries that we have to work within or within the risk boundaries. And when they presented this out to a couple of the different teams, including some senior leaders, it was like a light bulb went off for those other folks to say, oh, maybe instead of. And they, and they actually were very explicit about this. Maybe instead of bringing legal in as the last step in the process to like sign off, we're not going to do anything wrong here. We bring them in early in the process, uh, so they can actually be helping us think through creatively how do we avoid designing for potential problems in the future. And, and that kind of difference in how you collaborate reduces so much friction. And if we see it across teams, Right. Between sales and marketing and operations. Right. That's a prime place where if you're working in this kind of, we have the ball, we ping pong it to you, you ping pong it back and we can shift to, we' all on the same team here and we can work in ways together that help us remove those frictions from the first place and optimize for something even greater. Both in the work, but also in our relationships. That's where you see like the real value.

Speaker A: Yeah. And you're more set up for success. Right. Because it always feels like, oh, here we go, we're at the end and now legal's gonna come in and tell us all the things we can't do. Well, they're not trying. They're not like, oh, I can't wait to make your life difficult. But if they can come in a little bit earlier, like, hey, how can we co create and be aware of how these are some of those limitations? And then through that, um, it just feels like so much more. I always go come back to the word curiosity and understanding each other's situation a little bit better. And how can you. Because everyone ultimately is trying to get to that finish line and be set up for success. But being able to make some changes, allow you to do it more effectively and realizing when you bring Legal in at the end, you're not setting it up in the same way for that to be as much of a possibility.

Speaker B: Exactly, exactly.

Speaker A: Where do you think, um, this show is called Inspirational Leadership. So I talk a lot about those behaviors and how leaders can be showing up to create a culture, to create teams that are built in order to be able to be working more effectively together. So where do you, where would you like to see leaders come into, um, having more effective meeting cultures, having teams working more effectively together. How do you think they could be guides and mentors and coaches, um, to be able to do that more effectively?

Speaker B: Well, the place I want to start is that being a manager is a really tough job. You have so, so, so much weighing on you. And in my experience most managers really want to do well. They ah, just like we talked about, Legal doesn't want to be the know people. Ah, most managers aren't trying to create a bad culture. They're not trying to suffocate their team, they're not trying to micromanage and, and deflate everything. They are doing the best that they can and they often know that there is more that they could or should be doing. They just don't have the capacity either. They don't have the time because they're in back to back meetings all day long. They have a team that's really, that needs them and it's really big and they haven't built the infrastructure around their team or they don't have the skill yet. They, they know they should give feedback but it's really uncomfortable and they haven't figured out how do I do this in a way that allows me to actually deliver it. So I'm going to play the AI card here because I actually think that AI can make a manager's job significantly easier. And if you think about it, even with planning a meeting, it is tough to sit down with a blank sheet of paper and try to figure out what am I supposed to do at this time and what are we trying to accomplish and who needs to be here. And I can be an amazing thought, ah, partner to managers and helping us do some of this work significantly faster. It doesn't just have to be a document creator or a researcher. It can actually be our thought partner so that when you need to give feedback, you can sit down with your AI and say here's what's going on. I need to share some feedback with this person. Here's what I'm worried about. Last time I gave them feedback it went like this. Help me create a plan that I can take and uh, use to actually go in and have a 20 minute conversation or a 30 minute feedback conversation with someone that is going to get my message across while making them feel like they were seen and valued and supported. And that just takes off something that was a two hour stressful thing that you were trying to prepare for and turned it into a 15 minute activity. And it's not going to be perfect. We know that. But that's what humans are for. We are there to be the official deciders of what are we going to put in front of our colleagues, what are we going to share. But it can at least get you off the starting point and get you to second base significantly faster. So that's the first piece is really thinking about how AI can be your thought partner, not just an activity doer for you.

Speaker A: Yeah, I think um, there's so many ways to be able to leverage AI and uh, that's how I've described it over the last 18 months as I've been working with. It is it really does feel like it's a partner and we're co creating things together and it just helps you to be able to. It's such a beautiful tool in terms of making things happen quicker and optimizing. Where you said you'd have to spend so much time and you can give it direction and all of a sudden it's like, oh, you create something beautiful together to be able to have an effective conversation. And I was smiling as you were talking because it's something I say a lot when I'm talking about emotional intelligence and leadership. Most people don't wake up in the morning. I say and say to um, themselves like, I can't wait to go into work today and be the biggest jerk ever to everybody I talk to most people, that's not their intention. Right. Um, they just, they're not necessarily going about things the right way. And I do think I. Even when you start to question like hey, I'm having this challenge, I need to go talk to somebody about it. This is, this is my natural inclination around how do I want to, how I want to approach it. Do you have any suggestions? Like do you think that's a good approach? And I might say, well, you know, and it's quite kind, it'll say, you know, I like that you're giving some thought to it. You might want to Consider this, this, and this. And then it just helps you to build the muscle. And like you were saying as well, ultimately, and this is where I think people get so fearful of AI. AI is not being the human. You're the one that's still having the conversation. And guess what? The very first time, if you're not used to saying it, like, it's going to feel weird, and, uh, um, you're not going to have all of the perfect language. And I'm such a fan of its, um, progress, not perfection. But the more you practice it, the better you get at it, the more you build that muscle. And I want to acknowledge, and I think you did, um, Mamie. Such a beautiful way of doing this. Just, uh, really acknowledging. Because I think any manager, any leader, anyone who has direct reports, I just want to say I think. See you. Because I think sometimes people aren't just telling you, yeah, it can be really difficult because you do feel like you're being pulled in so many directions while you're managing the people. But you also have business outcomes that you are expected to be able to achieve. And then you also have these lots of different personalities. So it's not like I think kids are such a great example of this as well. You feel like you learned it with the first kid. You, you have the playbook, and all of a sudden you're like, oh, everything I did with the first kid does not work with the second kid. And, um, I think it's the same thing. In organizations, what works really well for one person could be exactly kryptonite to somebody else. And so you're constantly, um, shifting and learning and growing. And so I just want this to also be the permission slip to managers. This isn't about getting it, uh, perfect. It's about taking baby steps and practicing. And the more you practice, play and practice, the more you will find your own, um, your own kind of secret sauce and your own way of doing it. Um, but I think sometimes we believe if we see a manager that does this really well, like, oh, they just have it. They're just someone who is really good at it. No, that person, they did the hours. We don't just get to mastery. Right. It takes a lot of practice. And the more you practice, the better you get at this. But allowing yourself to. To be the student that is practicing and going to fumble it sometimes. But that's okay. You learn through the fumbling.

Speaker B: Exactly. And I say two things. One, which is it's all about the reps. Right? You can't learn about Going to the gym and then be fit. Right. You have to go and put in the time. And it does get easier as, as you go, you do get stronger and more capable. So that's, you know, that's metaphor just works the same way when it comes to delegating or giving feedback or running meetings or anything else. The other part of it, and this is where again, I, I think AI can really elevate our ability to be better humans. Not to replace the human mark. Yeah. But if you have, if you have a, a Claude folder for each of your team members. Right. And you, you know, be very careful what you put in. Right. All the caveats, don't put in private information and personal identifiers and all those things, but if you use one and you say like this, I had a conversation with this person, this is how they reacted. I'm just going to drop in little tidbits over time of my experience with this person. What I think they did really well, where I think they could grow more, where I saw them really stretch and succeed and all of those little tidbits. Then when it comes time to do a review, I don't have to remember everything that happened over the past quarter, six months, year. I can actually help me reduce bias because it's not what just happened last week. They can help me see patterns because I'm again, I'm not just remembering the past few weeks. I'm actually seeing over the course of the year what changed in this person, how did they actually grow? And now I can go and give them better feedback, better coaching, better opportunities. So AI can help us do our human parts of our job better than our own brain can sometimes.

Speaker A: Yeah, I agree. I agree completely. And especially the patterns like it. I've loved it for even just my own and doing rewiring when it has 18 months of data. Right. And keeps on watching it reflect the patterns, but also in a positive way, also saying like, look how much you've grown and how you've evolved in this particular pattern. I'm like, yes, yay me. Right. So it's also really nice in being able to um, be able to have something that's showing how you as the manager, as you as a leader are learning and growing and making, making those changes and reflect that back to you. Which is nice. Right? We need to hear that. Yes.

Speaker B: Because. Yes. We're not always getting that from our boss.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So it's helpful if we can get that too. And we don't always see ourselves clearly. So again, any ways that we can help understand ourselves better so that we can help serve our team members better. It's always a good thing.

Speaker A: Yeah, Mami, this has been such a great discussion and I, I think we could continue to go in so many directions. But I'm going to make sure I, I get everyone checking out your website and learning more and being able to go deeper on all of these topics that you've spoken about today. But I always like to give my guests an opportunity to leave a final thought, whatever is feeling most front and center for you right now.

Speaker B: All right, well, just because I love meetings is where we started. I want to go back and I, I want to just double down on this, write a desired outcome. Just try it. Try writing a statement that says at the end of this meeting, we will have and then fill in the blank and see how it goes. And if you are not the meeting leader, because we've mostly been talking to leaders here, but I know sometimes you're in other people's meetings too. So if you're not the meeting leader before the meeting starts, you know, by email or at the start of a meeting, you can just ask, hey, Mimi, really excited for this conversation today. Just love to know what do you want to achieve by the end of this meeting? And they will tell you. And they might look a little like, um, I got to think about that second. But they'll usually know in the back of their minds what they're trying to achieve. And once they say it out loud, now everyone knows what we're trying to achieve and it will totally transform how your conversations flow.

Speaker A: Yes. Such such good insight and advice. Where can people learn more about you and the work that you're doing.

Speaker B: Bemodernmanager.com is the best place to go where you can find my podcast and a bunch of my cohort programs. Um, you can also go to meteor.comm e e t e o r. That's where I have more of my meeting focused activities and support work and programs, uh, for companies. So thank you so much.

Speaker A: I will have all of those in the show notes. Thank you so much for being here and for this really, really rich conversation.

Speaker B: Thank you so much, Kristin. I love this conversation so much. You're such a fun, fun host to talk to.

Speaker A: Um, too bad you didn't live closer. I think we would go for nice walks talking about, talking about these topics.

Speaker B: Absolutely.

Speaker A: Um, for everyone. Uh, if you would like to learn more about the work that I do as well, please check my website, Kristin Harcourt.com you can learn more about the ways I work with leaders when it comes to one on one coaching, leadership training and transformational keynotes wherever you are. Tuning in, tuning in from today. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening. We are sending tons of love. Bye bye.