How to take Care of Yourself in Meetings
Have you ever felt awkward in a meeting? A knot in your tummy, tensions rising … Sometimes groups get stuck. Groups may find themselves split, caught in an endless reciting of pro’s and cons concerning a specific decision. Sometimes tensions are almost tangible and make it impossible for the group to move forward. In this blog, I want to explore how using the concepts of dependency versus independency and Task I and Task II can help you to take care of yourself in a group setting and also get the group unstuck.
Dependency and independency
First, let’s take the example of the team one of my coachees is a part of. He is an expert amongst other experts in engineering and construction. The team is responsible for large public building projects in the city of Brussels. Their task is extremely technical on the one hand and also extremely sensitive in the sense that a lot of stakeholders are involved: politicians, civil servants, representatives of the public, etc.
My coachee explains his experience in many of the meetings. First of all, he says that he feels that being part of a team is a difficult affair in itself. He finds himself wanting to contribute to the group task and at the same time, he wants to claim a certain level of independence in stating his own opinions, based on his technical expertise and experience. As the others are also strongly opinionated and experts in their own right, tensions can sometimes rise. The group finds itself stuck in the endless defending of positions without reaching a satisfying common ground all can subscribe to.
Everyone will recognize the ambiguous feeling of wanting to be part of a group on the one hand and also wanting to be independent of that same group. The paradox of groups is that in order for any part of the system to be able to act independently, it must accept its dependency on the other parts together with which it makes up a whole (Berg & Smith, 1990). This is a tension we all must deal with. We find ourselves taking actions that draw ourselves deeper into the group at one time and the next, when we start feeling somewhat suffocated, we do things that move us towards the periphery again. This is perpetually ongoing and part of what goes on in any group.
Task I and Task II
To understand how a group can help itself to get unstuck, we must understand that whatever we do, Task I and Task II are ALWAYS present. Both need attention in every meeting.
Task I is whatever it is the group wants to achieve. In the case of my coachee: building a public housing project for example. Task II is staying attentive on how Task I is being done by the group.
How we approach group discussions, what we say and don’t say in meetings is a complex game of every individual’s past experiences, values, beliefs, personality etc. How we approach group discussions can be the source of both negative group dynamics like splitting, scapegoating, victim/perpetrator identification, projection, … but also the source of new emerging knowledge, collective intelligence, and co-creation.
In my experience, there is nothing wrong with giving a lot of attention to Task I. After all, it is the reason that a group or team is together. However, when the group gets stuck while doing Task I, a solution is often to be found in drawing the groups attention to Task II. Moreover, a group that manages to stay very attentive to Task II might find itself capable of doing extraordinary things.
How to draw attention to Task II
In essence, drawing the attention to Task II is doing process interventions. Not focusing on the content of Task I, but offering something to the group on a process level. As every member of the group must undergo group dynamics and can feel awkward because of it, any member of a group can do process interventions as a means of taking care of him or herself as a member of the group. Another effect of giving attention to Task II is helping the group forward on Task I.
Here are some tips:
Simple, but very effective when one person is dominating the conversation and draining your energy because of it: "May I suggest we give everyone a couple of minutes on the topic, so we can hear from everyone?"
When a group is split into two polarities and you get tired of hearing the same arguments back and forth: suggest making subgroups of both positions and have both subgroups listen to the other subgroup’s arguments without interrupting. Chances are an integrative statement will emerge from the group after both subgroups have explored each other’s reasons for favoring a position.
Avoid a person being out on a limb. When a person puts himself in a position of becoming isolated in a group, try to find someone who can identify at least partly with this person: "Is Sally really the only one who feels that we could do better in terms of applying ecological building material?"
Self-disclosure can be very powerful. "I feel quite anxious when we discuss the budget for the new public swimming pool. I am afraid we are not taking into account that we won’t be backed by public opinion".
Sometimes when tensions rise, it can be helpful to capture the underlying theme of a discussion: "We are discussing the content of what we are going to tell the mayor, but maybe what we really are discussing is the extent to which we feel comfortable as a team to defend a position that may be difficult politically?"
In conclusion, staying attentive to Task II while being occupied with Task I is not only taking care of yourself as an individual being part of a group, it is also beneficial in helping the group forward. In that respect, every member of a group can do process interventions, this is not only the chairman’s prerogative.
Reference: Berg, D. and Smith, K.Groups in context, Edited by Jonathan Gilette & Marion McCollum, Addison-Wesley Publ.co. 1990.