Slowly this behavior of feigning humility has turned into actual humility. Kind of a Pascal’s wager of “you might as well act humble because it costs little and can have huge negative consequences” turned into what he (and the Muslims & Jews) actually espouse: act in the proper way, and the belief will come.

Alas, this isn’t a direct response to your quotes.

if you look at all the meetings we have, we can boil them down to two types…

- decision making meetings
- informational status or disseminate

In a decision making meeting, especially in design, you need to have key stakeholders who will be impacted by the decision in that meeting to share ideas and actively discuss alternatives in a constructive manner. In the end, the choices/decisions have to be owned and defended by the group (thus the book suggestion), regardless of the individual preferences – make the decision and stick with it – no backstabbing – we made this decision. Having too many people in decision making meetings, the risk of dumbing down increases and honest exchange may be limited or clouded with too many suggestions by non-key stakeholders.

Informational meetings (status and dissemination) need to be contexted as such. We’re giving out information here, not making decisions, your feedback can be submitted after the fact.

For the person that argues for too many meetings, far too often, with too many people, I would recommend a book called “Death by Meeting”, and after absorbing the lessons, challenge the meeting participants for their effectiveness.

Too many people sit in meetings offering no or minimal opinion or alternative thought. Those are the people who do not need to be there.

Cheers

JC