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Fiona answers your project related questions submitted via our contact form.

 

We’re bogged down by day to day work…
Every year our team goes away for an offsite meeting. Every year we resolve to make proper time for ‘strategic discussions’. Every year we come away having struggled through an over-stuffed agenda, mainly consisting of operational items, and we go away with about 20 actions each that none of us have any time to implement. These meetings are a total drag. Any suggestions about what we can do?

Ok, so where’s the burning platform? If this is something you do year after year, then either you have very good reasons not to be strategic, or you are unusually isolated from the business realities most senior teams deal with – competition, changing markets, new technology, strategic people issues – whatever it is your people are expecting you to anticipate and deal with so that they can get on with delivering the work. Frankly, I doubt if you can justify your existence as a leadership team if you are unwilling or unable to deal with strategic issues. So why isn’t it happening? Some or all of these factors could be at play:

1. You have a supremely competent leader who does all the strategic thinking on the team’s behalf, and the rest of you are sitting back
2. You and your colleagues can’t, or don’t want to, delegate operational responsibilities to give yourselves time to think strategically.
3. The team operates as a collection of individuals who take independent decisions and don’t see the value of each others’ perspectives
4. You have some touchy areas, or problem relationships in the team which stop you having the kinds of discussions at offsites that would move you forward – so the overstuffed agenda is about avoidance
5. You do not know how to put together a good agenda and stick to it. Your meetings lack discipline and focus.

Do you recognize any of these? If your colleagues don’t see the value of dealing with strategic issues, you need to help them understand the cost of not doing so. Get some input from employees, customers or senior sponsors and use their feedback to identify the main ‘cross-cutting’ issues that you need to address as a team. Call a meeting, however long or short to deal ONLY with this feedback – ban all other operational items and see if this is enough to kick start a different approach to your offsites.

If your problem runs deeper and is more about team dynamics and behaviours, or your relationship with the boss – invest in some outside help. Get someone who can help you put together an agenda to address your business issues, AND ask them to help you look at the way your team works on these issues in ‘real time’. If this is done well, I guarantee you will not find your meeting ‘a total drag’. This is powerful stuff, and can generate a lot of learning in a short space of time.

Ultimately, this about how much you take yourselves, your team and your role seriously. What’s it worth to you to earn the respect of people who NEED you to deal effectively with strategic issues? How is your organization going to move forward if you don’t? Stop seeing your offsites as an optional extra and stop complaining about navel gazing or fluffy stuff. Iinvest in the time and resources you need to get these meetings right.