The way you do anything is the way you do everything.
I can sit in and observe a senior leadership meeting and get a very clear picture of what’s going on in an organization.
Does the meeting start on time?
Has the agenda been circulated beforehand?
Have the leader members prepared themselves for the meeting, the decisions they intend to take and the problems they want to solve?
The senior leadership meeting is the DNA of your company culture. If you see things in your organization that make your stomach turn, I can show you how the “source of origin” starts or is tolerated in executive meetings. If your meetings don’t start on time; I will bet that you don’t deliver key projects on time. If your meetings don’t have reputation for decision making, problem solving and resource allocation where needed, you will most likely find no real sense of urgency in your organizational culture.
If your leadership meeting was a classroom, who goes to the blackboard most often?
Use leadership meetings to showcase best practices and identify blockages in cross functional collaboration. Let leaders use these meetings as a learning resource for their wicked problems. If your meetings aren’t addressing such topics, spend time in your next meeting working on how to create more impact in your executive meetings.
Does your executive meeting have to be the best meeting in the company? Maybe not, but it better be constantly under review by all it’s members as this executive meeting is the barometer for the performance culture in your organization. Make your meetings matter, because they do.