Too much talking, going round in circles, conflict under the surface - all common meeting problems.

 

A scaffold is a simple meeting structure or technique that helps to solve common meeting problems e.g.

✅  equalising voices

✅  speeding up contribution

✅  getting to the heart of what matters

 

Everyone who leads meetings should have a list of scaffolds like this in their back pocket.

Here are my thirteen must trusted, tested and well-worn.

 

13 scaffolds - when, why, how



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Purpose: open a meeting with a contribution from everyone - one that gives a window into their world...

Use it when:

There’s an imbalance of power in the room and you want all voices to be heard

You want to encourage diversity of thought 

How to:

1. Ask everyone to answer a question in turn. Specify an order.

2. The question could come from the Connecting, Updating or Disclosing space

3. No one speaks twice until everyone has spoken once

4. Use 1, 2 or even 3 questions in turn.

5. You could also use the chat box or post it notes to capture responses

 

IDEAS FOR QUESTIONS

The Connecting space

- Tell me what you do without telling me your job title 

- Explain your week (or weekend) in a giphy / emoji

- Most over-rated sandwich?

 

The Updating space

- What's your X (e.g. sales, attendees, countdown to a milestone, whatever...) number for this week?

- What's changed or moved on since we last met?

 

The Disclosing space 

- What's your biggest win so far this week?

- What's your workload temperature?

- Tell us how you are joining this meeting with an emoji

 



👍 Comment bar

Purpose: allow people to share thoughts, questions and comments without slowing the main conversation down.

 

Use it when:

- you want contribution from everyone 

- you want to collect a lot of data in a lot of areas quickly

- you want people to feel they have been consulted

 

How to:

1. As someone is presenting or sharing insights, provide a place where others can make notes in a 'comment bar'.

2. Ask people for a specific contribution which could be:

     💡 What they like

     💡 What they don't like

     💡 Clarifying questions

     💡 Where they can help

     💡 Insights or references related to what they're hearing

     💡 Ideas


3. Face to face, ask people to write comments on post it notes and then add them to a whiteboard or flip chart divided into sections.

4. On a video call, you could ask people to respond with comments in categories, or react with a set of emojis. You could ask people to upvote comments they agree with using the 👍. 

5. Gather together the contributions at the end and thank people for the data.

Tip: don't get into a conversation about the feedback in the meeting. Take it away and absorb it all before responding.

 


❇️ Green room

Purpose: help people feel clear and comfortable as they transition into the meeting.

 

Use it to:

- encourage equal contribution

- create focus

- handle latecomers

 

How to:

1. Create a simple poster or slide that welcomes people and sets the scene as they arrive in the meeting.

2. The slide gives people an activity to do e.g. a question to reflect and make notes on. 

 


 

🧠 Brain writing

Purpose: gather lots of diverse ideas or perspectives

 

Use it when:

- you want more / better ideas

- you want true diversity of thinking

- you want to be neuro-inclusive (which is always, right?!)

 

How to:

1. Ask everyone to brainstorm ideas (or insights, or pros/cons) on their own, writing each one on a separate post it

2. Provide a question as a provocation - and a time limit.

2. Then ask people to share the ideas they’ve written and post them up on the wall or on an online board.

3. Group together similar ideas into categories or clusters and then give each cluster a name.

4. Discuss the clusters, exploring their merits, crossovers and gaps, making sure you truly understand each idea on the wall.

 

 

🟡 Dot Voting (and Way Beyond)

Purpose: vote on options, giving everyone time to consider and an equal voice.

Use it when:

- you want a structured way to make a decision as a group

- you want to understand people's perspectives as clearly as possible before you make a decision

How to:

1. Put a set of options on a whiteboard - real or virtual (these could be clusters developed from brainwriting)

2. Give everyone an allocation of ‘dots’ e.g. they have three dots to place on their favourite options.

3. Once all dots are up, discuss the results

4. If needed, discard the least popular options and ask everyone to vote again on the remaining choices

And beyond - adding more data beyond the dot

* Add a pound, euro or dollar sign to the option they think is the most commercial

* Ask people to add a 'heart' vote to the one they personally feel most passionate about and committed to

* Add a t-shirt size to indicate scale of effort and/or scale of value

 

 

🗣️ Real voices and 'lightning talk'

Purpose: build empathy and attention around the real people and issues under discussion

Use it when:

- you want to understand the heart of an issue

- you want to create a shared understanding across a group (group brain)

 

How to:

1. Wherever possible, use audio recordings, videos of real people or invite them physically into the room to share their experiences and insights - instead of abstracting their experiences and putting them on slides

2. You might invite people meaningfully affected by something and/or people with expertise in an area

3. Consider the ‘lightning talk’ format where an individual talks for 3-4 minutes (timed) without preparing or filtering

 

⏳ Third party timer

Purpose: use technology to inform the group when the time allocated is up

Use it when:

- you want the group to feel they are in control (rather than being controlled by you)

 

How to:

1. Decide on the time box for a particular stage of a meeting

2. Set a mobile phone timer, sand timer or stopwatch to go off once this time is up

3. The third party timer tells the group when the time is up

4.  ... and the group can decide whether to move on or to allow more time.

 



🖼️  Gallery session

Purpose: allow people to consume project updates or ideas at their own pace and the discuss only the most valuable issues together

Use it when:

- you have a lot of different projects or ideas to look at, not all of which are equally interesting to everyone

How to:

1. Ask all those sharing updates to create a very simple poster with key info in columns

2. Example: Key Numbers, Completed, Next Priority, Blockers and Concerns

3. Face to face: The posters are displayed around the wall and everyone walks around, reading the info, post it noting questions and talking to the poster owners.

4. Online: The posters are on screen e.g. on a trello board, padlet or similar. 

5. Follow with a group discussion - focused solely on the questions and issues raised on the post its.

6. Consider breakouts allowing people to connect with the issues or projects they are most interested in.

 



🥏 On the fly agenda

Purpose: quickly create an agenda for a meeting at the start of the meeting so you only discuss what is most important to the group.

Use it when:

- you have a wide range of topics you could cover and you want to decide together what matters today

- you want to show the group that what matters to them, is what matters today

How to:

1. Ask everyone what is most important to talk about as a group - framed as questions

2. Put each question on a post it or card

3. Dot vote on cards, if there are lots of people and questions

4. Arrange cards in the order you’ll cover them

5. Start the meeting, using your new agenda

BONUS: add a S (small), M (medium) or L (large) to indicate the size of each question

 



🔃 Rounds

Purpose: speed up the process of everyone sharing information or responding to a question.

Use it when:

- you want to hear everyone's update or opinion

- you need people to be concise

How to:

1. Brief everyone on each round e.g. Just Done & Next Priority, Blockers, Heads Up.

2. Ask people to respond in turn, giving an indication of brevity e.g. ‘please share your top priorities in 20 seconds’ or 'tell us ONE thing you..."

3. There’s no discussion but clarifying questions can be asked at the end of a round.

4. Move round the group smoothly and quickly.

5. Consider a few rounds as a way to open a longer meeting, or as a way to get speed up turn taking during a meeting.

 



↔️ 10-30-10 buffer

Purpose: plan in time for people to prepare, discuss and then embed the outcomes of a meeting *during* the meeting itself.

Use it when:

- you just know they're not gonna prepare! 

- you want to make it easier for very busy people to contribute their best

How to:

1. Use the first 10 minutes to sit together in silence and read/make notes on the information you’re working on.

2. The group discussion takes place for 30 minutes.

3. The group meeting officially ends and the final 10 minutes is reserved for writing up notes, completing simple next actions, embedding actions into projects plans and having follow up 1:1 conversations while everyone is still in the room



💯  Rate this meeting

Purpose: Ask everyone to add some feedback data as they leave the room that will help everyone improve next time.

Use it when:

- you want to make the best use of everyone's time

- you want to improve this meeting for another time/group

How to:

1. Ask people to leave feedback before they leave the 'room'.

2. Face to face: set up a board before the session and ask people to rate/comment as they leave e.g.

- Leave a whiteboard/flipchart with ‘Most Useful’ on one side and ‘Improve For Next Time’ on the other and ask people to add a post it before they leave

- Ask people to put a cross on a 1-10 rating scale on a board on their way out, based on how valuable a use of their time they feel the meeting was.

3. Online: Give people three questions to answer in the chat (you'll need to allow at least 3 minutes at the end for this)

- Out of 10, how value was this session?

- Most useful thing that happened?

- One thing to improve for next time.



😡 Constructive rant

Purpose: hear valuable and unfiltered insights

Use it when:

- you know there is something in the room that needs to be heard!

How to:

1. Brief everyone that this is an open invitation for one person to share their unfiltered views within a time box (3-4mins is ideal) and that the rest of the group will listen. The group can ask clarifying questions at the end but they cannot comment or 'come back' on the content of the rant. The rant is sacred.

2. The group can then ask "What is needed next?" and provide a second 3-4 minute timebox for the person to provide another stream of consciousness on what should happen next.

3. Only THEN can the rest of the group discuss how they can contribute to the solution.

4. The rant is sacred! Alternatives and next actions are checked with the person who ranted.

Tip: this is best done in a small group. 

Bonus tip: give an excellent briefing on this - explain why you are doing this, the format and the rules. Make sure people understand what they are hearing.