Managing the Meeting Hog

Ball Hogs & Meeting Hogs

Dave Berri over at Freakonomics recently came up with an interesting analogy between meetings and the NBA…yes the National Basketball Association. He argues that ball hogs and never-ending meetings suffer from the same problem: a combination of over confidence + under competence.

In basketball, ball hogs take too many of their team’s shots during a game even though they have a terrible true shooting percentage.

In meetings, meeting hogs have ideas for every solution and don’t stop talking, despite the fact that studies show their ideas aren’t always that good.

In both cases, people take the shotgun approach to success hoping that one of their shots/comments out of the dozen that miss will go in. In the process they bring down the effectiveness of the whole team.

But Ball Hogs Are Still the MVPs!

The problem isn’t just that these players end up missing a lot of shots they take. What’s dangerous is that these players are typically rewarded for this behavior with MVPs and promotions (same study).

What to do then? First, keep in mind it’s OK that our all star ball hogs take a lot of shots. This isn’t all bad - every team needs someone who’s not afraid to take that low probability shot at a chance of success.

Next, recognize the goal isn’t to stop the meeting hog’s ideas. Instead, think about ways to prevent them from bringing down the rest of the meeting. You know, by:

• Wandering off topic
• Monopolizing attention & blocking others’ ideas, and
• Dragging meetings out much longer than they should be

Don’t Stop the Talking, Manage It
What next? Well, it’s important to strike a balance. Let these folks continue to come up with their ideas. Again, you need someone who’s not afraid to suggest some crazy solution that only has a 25% chance of working - because it might actually be the winner.
BUT! You must also make sure the rest of the team can vet these ideas and also come up with their own. And the best way to do that isn’t to stop the talking, but to manage it.

6 Tips to Hush a Talkative Meeting Attendee

We’ve all been there. You’re trying to get through a meeting and Bob (let’s call him Bob) just will not stop talking. So how do you rein him in? When Jennifer Whitt posed this question to a LinkedIn project-management group, over 381 project managers weighed in. Here are the best tactics they suggested:

1) Distribute an agenda with time allotments. This came up over and over. Prepare an agenda with time boundaries, distribute it, and then adhere to it. The easiest way to move forward is to remind people of the item being discussed and the need to press on — in other words, use the clock as your scapegoat.

2) Have a visible parking lot. When things get off course, use a flip chart (or otherwise visible) parking lot to capture important topics you just don’t have time for. Make a habit of reviewing the list so people don’t feel like you’re just using it to shut them up.

3) Have a goal you’re trying to achieve. If everyone knows what needs to be completed by the end of the meeting, it’s much easier to cut off tangents and ask, “Is this helping us get to X?”

4) Set ground rules up front. Does everyone know what’s expected of them? Review what you intend to accomplish, how, and how you expect people to participate — raising hands, going around the room, whatever it is. The key is that everyone knows.

5) Summarize and repeat. Sometimes the talker just isn’t convinced anyone understands them, so they keep explaining. Try the old, “Let me summarize your point… is that what you’re saying?”

6) Listen to your attendees. This one’s tough to hear, but sometimes the talking happens because you’re not incorporating what people tell you. Acknowledge and use the information you’re getting — if you don’t, why invite them at all? Value their time, and they’ll be more likely to value yours.

The theme: provide structure and set expectations up front, then listen and adapt to what your attendees are telling you.

Oh, and if you want to make tips 1–3 easier, use Less Meeting :)