Make Meetings Fun

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Make Meetings Fun

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Andy Warren

Posted Sunday, March 25, 2012 6:39 AM

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Comments posted to this topic are about the item Make Meetings Fun

Andy
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Post #1272341

Jeff Moden

Posted Sunday, March 25, 2012 10:16 AM

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I’m curious what things you do to make meetings fun, to make the long march more tolerable?

You've correctly identified the problem with most meetings that I've seen. They're "long marches".

If you want to make a meeting "fun", make sure it's well controlled. Keep people "on the point". Make "status" meetings more like "scrums". "What did you do yesterday? What are you doing today? Have you run into any showstoppers or things that will cause a delay and what are they? Who can you talk to to change that? NEXT!"

Side conversations and long winded discussions on possible solutions should not be included in status meetings. Those should be separate because not everyone has a stake in such detail.

People are busy. Make daily status meetings short and sweet and they'll be "fun" automatically.

--Jeff Moden

"RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for "Row-By-Agonizing-Row".

First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
Stop thinking about what you want to do to a row... think, instead, of what you want to do to a column."

For better, quicker answers on T-SQL questions, click on the following...
http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Best+Practices/61537/

For better answers on performance questions, click on the following...
http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/SQLServerCentral/66909/

Post #1272356

Michael Lysons

Posted Monday, March 26, 2012 1:52 AM

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Jeff Moden (3/25/2012)

I’m curious what things you do to make meetings fun, to make the long march more tolerable?

Best thing you've written.

Post #1272477

Ralph Hightower

Posted Monday, March 26, 2012 6:17 AM

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A music suggestion for a Friday meeting:
Loverboy "Working for the Weekend: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zL8G5pBZ5CI

I also agree with Jeff on keeping the meeting "on point and on topic".

Post #1272578

rmechaber

Posted Monday, March 26, 2012 6:42 AM

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I put my hands up in the air sometimes
Saying Ayyyyy-Oh
Too much I/O.

I gotta troubleshoot this query now:
Lines of code are
Full of RBAR.

With apologies to Taio Cruz....
Rich

Post #1272606

Ivanova

Posted Monday, March 26, 2012 1:40 PM

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I like the idea of music - way less fattening than pastries Tongue

Post #1272947

Revenant

Posted Monday, March 26, 2012 2:31 PM

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Ralph Hightower (3/26/2012)

A music suggestion for a Friday meeting:
Loverboy "Working for the Weekend: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zL8G5pBZ5CI
. . .

That is a good one!

Post #1273007

Mike B in AK

Posted Tuesday, March 27, 2012 10:31 AM

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I agree with Jeff on the status meetings. They should be brief and to the point.

For longer meetings, it depends on the topic(s). Long planning meetings where the topic does not, or barely changes, are murder. Frequent get up off your butt moments are a must. Also, make sure to involve the entire group, either by requesting viewpoints or even rotating the lead in the meeting.

For a long meeting with a variety of topics, vary the order of the speakers and subject matter.

In either case for long meetings, I like to inject items to completely change the focus. Something in the team building or just entertaining realm. I find this frees folks from stupor. It also does a reset on the thinking patterns and can often lead to a more robust result.

Post #1273680

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