How to end time-wasting meetings and start to enjoy them. A real-life tale from deep within a real working environment. This deck is focused on developers but the exact same principles and practices apply to every kind of meeting.

1. Lean Meetings
...or, How we learned to enjoy
and have productive meetings

2. Hello!
I am Nikos
Dimitrakopoulos
I am here because I’m a developer (at heart) who
does a lot of meetings.
You can find me as nikosd @ github and twitter

3. Place your screenshot here
How many
meetings?

4. Hello ^ 2!
I am Kyriakos
Kentzoglanakis
I am here because I want to be enjoying my lot of
meetings (instead of loathing them)
You can find me as kkentzo @ github and twitter

5. What is this
presentation about?
▪ Convince you that meetings can be productive and fun.
▪ Give some practical tips on how to run meetings.
▪ Give some practical tips on how to participate in meetings.
Now some trivia...

6. Why?
This is
what it
felt like in
e-Travel in
regards to
meetings.

7. Most challenging
areas
Topics from easiest to hardest:
1. Technical decisions inside a single team
2. Cross team technical decisions
3. Identification of affected areas & complexity (cross-dept)
4. Taking scope/feature decisions (cross-dept)

8. And?
After some intensive and open sessions with
▪ Spyros Adam
▪ George Drakopoulos
▪ Marilena Papageorgiou
▪ Ioannis Karadimas
▪ Vasilis Kalligas
▪ Tasos Latsas
▪ me and Kyriakos
we have prepared and put to use as a pilot inside the
company the material that we are going to discuss today.

9. And?

10. Common types of
meetings
▪ Scrum meetings
▪ Code reviews
▪ Technical meetings
▪ Cross departmental collaboration & syncing
▪ HR stuff

11. Common symptoms
of bad meetings
▪ No accomplishment
▪ Drifting
▪ Wrong level of abstraction
▪ Not enough time
▪ Multiple meetings for the same topic

12. FEAR NOT!It’s simple!

13. FEAR NOT!It’s simple!
… but not easy.

14. I.
The heart of a meeting

15. #1:
Start from the end
The single most important thing for a meeting is a clearly
defined and unambiguous goal.
● Two sentences top.
● Must answer the “why”.
● Must be realistic.
● Must be practical.
● Must explain what is enabled after the meeting.

16. #2:
Describe the outcomes
What will happen after the meeting?
● What written material will be produced?
● What should be handed to participants?

17. #3:
Imagine the how
How will the group achieve what’s needed?
● Start from the end (the goal) and go backwards.
● Ask yourself: Is the time sufficient?
● Ask yourself: Do we have all people needed?

18. #4:
Define the people needed
Who is needed in order to answer all the questions?
● Those requesting the goal/will benefit from it
● Those who are affected from the outcome of the
meeting
● Those who will carry out the work needed
As many people as needed but no more.

19. Summary of Part I
#1. Goal
Set a clearly defined and
unambiguous goal.
#2. Artifacts
Specify in advance what will
be enabled after the
meeting and what are the
artifacts of the meeting.
#3. Process
Define the tactics that will
be used in order to achieve
the goal. Ask the proper
questions in the right way.
#4. People
Think and invite those who
are needed in order to
answer the questions and
those who are affected from
the outcome.

20. Interlude /
takeaways
● Using the above you get about 50% of the overall
benefit.
● Preparations for a meeting can take from 15 minutes to
multiple hours (2 or 3 for a complex meeting).
● Don’t schedule or attend a meeting without the
previous well-defined and understood by you.

21. That’s it?
No
I: Preparations II: ??? III: ???

22. II.
The actual meeting

23. #5:
Eyes on the ball
How to keep people focused?
● State the goal & the artifacts upfront.
● Keep the goal & the artifacts visible at all times.
● When drifting, read aloud the goal.

24. #6:
Explicit constraints
How to prevent people from drifting?
● Collect constraints before the meeting.
● State them upfront.
● Keep them visible.
● Keep visible new ones.
● Use them to constraint the discussion.

25. #7:
Respect decisions
How to prevent people from doing loops?
● Collect decisions as they come.
● Keep them visible.
● Use them to constraint the discussion.

26. #8:
Don’t let the ball drop
● Collect action items as they come.
● Keep them visible.
● What/Who/When.

27. Summary of Part II
#5. Visible Goal
Keep the goal visible
throughout the meeting.
#6. Visible constraints
Keep (new and old)
constraints visible
throughout the meeting.
#7. Visible decisions
Keep (new and old) decisions
visible throughout the
meeting.
#8. Visible action items
Collect and keep action
items visible throughout the
meeting with clear
owner/deadline.

28. Interlude /
takeaways
● Using the above you get an additional 30% of the overall
benefit.
● Facilitation skills are built (practice makes perfect)
● Be visible, be explicit, be ruthless

29. That’s it?
No
I: Preparations II: Facilitation III: ???

30. III.
After the meeting

31. #9:
Closure & summary
Before breaking up the meeting:
● Review the whether the goal was achieved.
● Go through the artifacts (decisions, action items, etc).
● Give a big thank you to everyone.

32. How does
it look
like?

33. #10:
Share the artifacts
After breaking up:
● Debrief or take screenshots of the artifacts.
● Share them with everyone.

34. Interlude /
takeaways
● Using the above you get the last 20% of the overall
benefit.
● Should be the simplest one.
● Expect 15% time overhead for the facilitator.

35. Summary of Part III
#9. Closure & summary
Share the feeling of
achievement - you earned it!
#10. Share the artifacts
Make sure everyone has the
material generated.

36. That’s it?
Almost...
I: Preparations II: Facilitation III: Closure

37. What’s next?
● Advanced tools for the process
● Handling difficult topics
● Handling difficult people

38. What’s next?
Are you interested for more info? We are still working on it.
Get in touch.

39. Thanks!!
● Questions?
● Feedback?