Last week, I outlined a small business/practice meeting structure that included five different types of meetings to support your growth and the realization of your long-term vision. But, I forgot to mention two others that are equally important: Growth Conferences and Courageous Conversations.
Both of these meetings are focused on developing your people, but they have two big distinctions. Courageous Conversations are necessary meetings with a person or small group when you require a different behavior, attitude, or outcome. They are direct and well-structured. I’ve written quite a bit about our 4-step framework and the strong emotional mindset shifts in previous MMS’s, but we’d love to share our Courageous Conversations Support Sheet which can be used as an easy guide for ensuring success with these critical conversations. The second distinction is that Courageous Conversations happen as needed, in the moment, or as a timely response to a behavior that needs changing. These relatively spontaneous meetings develop people by clarifying expectations and creating or reaffirming team agreements.
Growth Conferences on the other hand are similar to a traditional employee review but are more focused on coaching for long-term professional growth versus disciplinary or supervisory meetings and are not used to discuss financial compensation issues. If your values include continuous professional growth, these meetings are the way it actually happens. Though the minimum recommended frequency is annually, the actual frequency of these meetings varies by employee, and even for the same employee over time, depending on the specific skills being developed and the speed at which an employee incorporates the growth into their regular routine. Unlike Courageous Conversations, Growth Conferences are a pre-scheduled coaching conversation that allows and encourages the employee to determine: 1) what their next most important area of professional development is to help the business achieve the vision as well as the employee’s own personal goals, 2) the resources or steps to achieving that improvement, and 3) how and when the progress will be measured.
Over the next few Monday Morning Stretches, we will break each one of these seven meetings down and give you specific ways you can make sure that each one is engaging, highly effective, and worth every minute you invest in them because they move the marker forward on achieving goals and the levels of excellence you desire.
For now, it’s important to know that all of these meetings are strategically connected for one purpose. They are a carefully designed web of meetings that build upon each other and ultimately assure the business actually hits the target of its long-term vision while fully living into its values along the way.
To download a free copy of our Courageous Conversations Support Sheet, click here.
The magic to a great meeting is all the work that’s done beforehand.
~ Bill Russell
