Designing Productive meetings Anuja Agarwal, Dr. S. Gondhalekar, Prof. Dr. Uday Salunkhe ABSTRACT The Research paper introduces a new method of conducting efficient and productive meetings using the elements of Design thinking. A research was conducted on 118 participants, who were given a task that required them to conduct meetings in groups and to come up with the solutions of the problem stated. The productivity of the meetings was measured in terms of the number of ideas generated by each group. The statistical analysis of the results showed that using the elements of Design Thinking in the process, greatly improved the number of solution ideas generated and helped in making the meetings more productive. The current study is a strong indicator towards the tangible benefits of using Design Thinking approach in Management functions and paves way further research on the impact of using this new approach in Management. Keywords: Design thinking, meetings, Snow-ball method, meetings, group discussion.
creativity, designing
productive productive
Introduction : Why is it important to make meetings more „productive‟ The Decision making process is no longer the forte of the elite top management but has trickled down to the wider levels in the organization. All employees are entrusted with some decision-making at various levels and are held accountable for the same. This has made it necessary for the management to develop „Decision making‟ as a democratic process within their organizations to empower the decision makers at various levels. Holding effective meetings is a necessary part of the democratic framework of decision making process. With the business moving faster than ever, meetings are how we stay informed. Meetings provide a democratic and collaborative way of realizing a shared goal. It is a platform for sharing of ideas coming out of people with varied experiences. As a result today's professionals are attending more meetings than ever done in the past. The case is not only so in India but in other countries as well.
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According to a survey data, Managers spend more than 30 per cent of their time in meetings. During an average meeting, agenda items are covered in only 53% of the scheduled time, with the remaining time “unproductive.” In the “do more with less time” climate that we are in today, it is important to maximize the effectiveness of meetings. A typical busy professional attends nearly 60 meetings a month, of which more than 10 per cent involve travel out of town 2. A study of salaries and benefits from unproductive meetings involving 16 members of a company‟s information technology department over a year resulted that unproductive meetings were costing the company $1.6 million per year3. Measure of productivity of meetings The productivity of meetings is often judged by different parameters depending on the „Type of meeting‟ being held. In a meeting where the outcome is to find multiple possible solutions to a defined problem, the more the ideas get generated for solutions, the more is the chance of getting good quality ideas. This happens because as the ideas begin to flow, there arises an opportunity to build upon each other‟s ideas and keep refining the quality of ideas till the point of satisfaction. Thus the best parameter to judge the productivity of the meeting is the number of ideas (for solutions) generated in the meeting [1]. In turn, the number of ideas generated is a function of the „Creative thinking‟ abilities of the members of the group [2]. If we look closely at the context of a corporate meeting, usually the participants are corporate executives who have come through a form of management education that enables them to assess the situation analytically, looking at the facts rather than possibilities. The analytical approach has it‟s own advantages of slicing the problem into smaller and more manageable data and task driven activities in silos. This kind of left brain thinking can become a constraint in certain situations. On the other hand, the Design Thinking approach is very well suited for nurturing right brain -Creative thinking in the corporate executives. In fact, in today‟s world based on Creative economy where „Design‟ is the key differentiator for a company‟s success, Creativity is emerging as one of the most important competencies of the future managers. Design Thinking – A new approach in Management education Design Thinking is a discipline that uses designer‟s methods to understand the users‟ needs, match them with the technological feasibility and translate into viable business strategy. It provides a new approach in management education that bases itself on the need of looking at the Management education from a humane and holistic perspective rather than creating the silos of functional specialization and resource utilization. 1
Ref: Des Moines Business Record; 5/16/2005, Vol. 23 Issue 20, Special Section p22-22, 1/2p Research commissioned by MCI WorldCom Conferencing and carried out by the Research Business International 3 Mississippi Business Journal, September 4-10, 2006 Page 7 2
The elements of „Design Thinking‟ that further strengthen the architecture of Management education are: a. b. c. d. e. f. g. h. i.
Creative thinking Human perspective Multisensory „Observation‟ Multidisciplinary inputs from other fields, like Design, Technology, Social Sciences, Psychology, Anthropology etc. Integrating Management functions as opposed to the silos created through specializations. Formulate problems and Visualize innovative/ Breakthrough solutions. Visual Communication Nurture „Questioning mind‟ Project based learning & Prototyping
Designing productive meetings using the elements of design thinking: Using the elements of Design Thinking, we designed a new method of conducting meetings which enhances their effectiveness. We coined a new term for this method as the „Snow-ball Method‟. Usually the meetings are conducted in a group discussion mode, which inherently does not follow any set rules of speaking or listening. In this method, more emphasis is laid on first sharing the observations and pain-points related to the issue being discussed, listening to each other‟s ideas for plausible solutions and then either build on them or add your own new ideas. Thus, the ideas „snow-ball‟ into bigger and better ones. The ‘Snow-ball Method’: The „Snow-ball Method‟ of conducting the meetings is most effective when the meeting is about coming up with solutions for a problem experienced by all the members of the group. This method comprises of the following steps to be taken by the members of the meeting to solve the problem stated to them at the beginning of the meeting. 1. The members select a facilitator from amongst themselves. 2. The facilitator writes the objective set by the group, on the board provided. 3. The members must begin by voicing the observations and any pain-points relevant to the topic given, within their group while the others listen. The facilitator notes these observations and pain-points of each member on the board visible to all. This is to
ensure that everyone in the group has seen the issue from each other‟s perspective and also looked at the positive as well as the pain-points surrounding the situation. 4. Once the issue has been looked at holistically, and thoughts about the same shared with each other, the process of ideation for the solution begins as per the following steps. 5. Each member, including the facilitator, gives ideas for the solution of the problem, one by one moving in the clockwise direction. These ideas are written on the board by the facilitator. 6. Every group member is invited to build on each other‟s ideas. 7. While the ideas are being generated no member of the group should comment or discuss on each other‟s idea, the focus should be on generating the solutions and not evaluating them. 8. We recommend at least two rounds of idea generation within the given time period post which all the ideas have to be re-looked at for suggesting a recommended course of action. 9. The solutions generated as well the recommended course of action should be submitted on separate sheets of paper.
The method described above uses subtle interventions of some of the elements of Design Thinking. For instance when the members of the group are asked to identify the painpoints related to the problem stated, it is a reminder to them to think from a human perspective and bring their multisensory observation skills to the fore. Observation itself is a very powerful tool used by designers to generate information in a non-obtrusive manner. Therefore the members of the group are encouraged to observe the situation around the issue and bring forth their experiences during the observation exercise. Observations bring out the positives as well as the pain-points related to the given context/issue. Recording of the ideas on the board provides the visual communication among the members as they all can see each other‟s ideas and build upon them if required. Prompting each member to contribute two ideas in each round and setting the rule of „no-evaluation of ideas‟ in this round, nudges them to come up with new ideas without the fear of being judged upon too early, nurtures their creativity and motivates the members to contribute more ideas freely. The more the number of ideas generated, the more is their creativity quotient [2]. Normally the meetings are conducted in a group discussion mode, where people present their views and there are arguments and counter arguments to the points. In the end the strongest ideas who survive the test of argument, wins. The snow-ball method is different because it helps to build upon the ideas of each other. It has some similarities with the brainstorming method of generating solutions to the problem stated [5]; but the Snow-ball
method ensures definite enhancements over the latter in the situations where the problem whose solution is sought has been experienced by the participants. 1. The participants are encouraged to share their Observations and Pain points surrounding the problem stated, before they can start ideating for the solutions. The participants spent 40% time in sharing observations and pain points, 40% in ideation for finding solutions and 20% to compile their recommendations. 2. These Observations are listed down on the board by the facilitator. Listing their on the board is a confirmation of „having-been-heard‟ and the mind is then free to move to think about the next step of solution ideation. The Experimental Design: We made an experimental design to see whether this „Snow-ball Method‟ actually makes the meetings more productive or not, which led us to formulate the following Hypothesis: The Hypothesis: H0: The Snow-ball method is not significantly different from Group discussion. H1: The Snow-ball method is superior to the normal Group discussion. We decided to test the hypothesis experimentally by having a group conduct the meeting by each of the two methods. Thus the „treatment‟ was the snow-ball method and the „control‟ was the Group Discussion. The result of the experiment was measured in terms of the number of ideas generated during the meeting since this was the appropriate measure (as explained earlier) .We envisaged that the composition of the group may impact the results, so we took the group composition as the „blocking‟ or „noise‟ factor. We had two variables, „Method of discussion‟ and „Composition of group‟. Each one varied at two levels. Level 1Group Discussion Method of discussion Level 2Snow-ball Level 1-
Single Disciplinary group
Level 2-
Multi Disciplinary group
Group Composition The full factorial design consisted of four experiments (22 variables). We used the full factorial design of 4 experiments. Each experiment was replicated 8 times.
We made two types of groups on the basis of their previous qualifications. We took 16 groups, 8 groups comprised of participants from similar academic qualifications, for example : „only engineers‟, ‟only science graduates‟, „only commerce graduates‟ etc. The other 8 groups comprised of mix of participants from various academic qualifications.
Table 1: Number of groups participating in the experiment
Method Group Discussion
Snow-ball
Single disciplinary
8
8
Multidisciplinary
8
8
Group composition
Each group was given the „treatment‟ and „control‟. We also envisaged that the sequence of Group Discussion or Snow-ball will have an effect on the results, so we had half the groups do the Group Discussion first and Snow-ball later; and the other half groups do the process in reverse order. We selected topics where the participants had already experienced the issue. The assignment of the group was done by randomization. The participants receiving the „treatment‟ were explained the snow-ball method and were asked to use the same while coming up with the solutions. The necessary tools like the white board and flip chart, typically used in a design thinking approach used for problem solving were made available to them. In the „control‟ group no instructions were given on the process to be followed, in effect they were left free to carry out Group Discussion to complete the task. The whole procedure of decision making and the way in which the meetings were conducted, were video recorded by the volunteers. This experimental design which consisted of 2 variables at 2 levels enabled us to estimate the main effects and interaction effects. Analysis and Interpretation of results: Table 2: Data table
Method used
Group Composition
Number of ideas generated by the 8 groups
GroupSingleDiscussion(GD)/ disciplinary(S)/ Snow-ball(SN) Multidisciplinary(M) GD GD SN SN
S M S M
9 18 16 16
8 9 16 16
15 15 25 18
9 15 20 18
6 10 13 7
2 4 16 9
13 10 18 15
8 8 18 7
Analysis using 2 way ANOVA: Table 3: The ANOVA table
Source
df
SS
Method of discussion 1 253.125 Group composition 1 8.000 Interaction 1 91.125 Error 28 523.750 Total 31 876.000 (Standard ANOVA notation has been used)
MS
F
p
253.125 8.000 91.125 18.705
13.53 0.43 4.87
0.001 0.518 0.036
1. As the ANOVA table shows, we can safely reject H0 at 0.1% level of significance. Concluding that, „there is a significant difference between the two methods‟. 2. The group composition has no significant effect on the results. If we were to claim that group comp has significant effect, the probability of our being wrong would be as high as 51.8%. 3. The interaction is significant at 3.6% level of significance. We investigated further by calculating the values of main effect and interaction effect and checking their significance by plotting them on normal probability plot.
Table 4: Main interaction and effects table
A
B
Method used
Group composition
GD GD SN SN
S M S M
A=1
A=2
B=1
B=2
A×B =1
A×B =2
Avg. no. of ideas generated 8.75 11.13 17.75 12.88
8.75 11.13
Total= N= Avg= Effect=
8.75
8.75
11.13 11.13 17.75 17.75 17.75 12.88 12.88 12.88
19.88 30.63 26.50 24.00 28.88 21.63 2.00 2.00 2.00 2.00 2.00 2.00 9.94 15.31 13.25 12.00 14.44 10.81 5.38
-1.25
GD= Group Discussion, SN= Snow-ball, S= Single disciplinary, M= Multidisciplinary Where 1 indicates the variable at low value and 2 indicates the variable at high value
-3.63
As we can see that the main effect of the method used (Group Discussion or Snow-ball) is 5.38 and the main effect of Group composition (Single disciplinary or Multidisciplinary) is small. Interaction effect is 3.63.
Probability Plot of Effects Normal - 95% CI
99
Mean StDev N AD P-Value
95 90
0.1667 4.669 3 0.268 0.359
Percent
80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 5
1
-20
-10
0 Effects
10
20
Figure 1: Probability Plot of Effects
When we plotted these three effects on the normal probability plot, we found the „interaction effects‟ to be on the straight line, where as the „main effects‟ were away from the line. The „main effect‟ of the method used was to the right of the line. Since the point falling on the line could be due to random effects, we cannot accept the „interaction effect‟ as meaningful. Thus the 2 tests applied, i.e. ANOVA and Normal probability plot, strongly indicate that only the method used in the process has a significant effect on the outcome.
Applying Signal to Noise ration on the Effects: We wanted to check the Robustness of the Snow-ball Method used for conducting meetings, so we calculated the signal to noise ratio for the Larger-the-better case: S/N ratio = -10 log(∑(1/y2 )/n) Where y is the number of ideas and S is the number of groups and the S/N ratio is the Signal to Noise ratio.
Considering the S/N ratios, the main effect of the method used (GD or Snow-ball) is 6.56, the main effect of the Group composition (Single disciplinary or Multi-disciplinary ) is 0.14, and the interaction effect is -4.35.
Table 5: Main interaction and effects table using the S/N Ratio
A
B
A=1
Method used
Group composition
GD GD SN SN
S M S M
A=2
B=1
B=2
A×B =1
18.15
18.15 24.57
A×B =2
Signal to Noise ratio (S/N) 13.66 18.15
13.66 18.15 24.57 20.36
31.82 2.00 15.91 6.56
Total= N= Avg= Effect=
13.66 24.57 20.36
24.57
44.94 2.00 22.47
38.24 2.00 19.12 0.14
13.66
20.36 38.51 2.00 19.26
20.36 42.72 2.00 21.36 -4.35
34.03 2.00 17.01
GD= Group Discussion, SN= Snow-ball, S= Single disciplinary, M= Multidisciplinary Where 1 indicates the variable at low value and 2 indicates the variable at high value Probability Plot of S/NEffects Normal - 95% CI
99
Mean StDev N AD P-Value
95 90
0.7833 5.483 3 0.201 0.578
Percent
80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 5
1
-30
-20
-10
0 S/NEffects
10
20
30
Figure 2: Probability plot of Signal to Noise Ratio effects
The probability plot of the main and interaction effects of S/N ratios shows that the interaction effect is practically on the normal probability curve and hence cannot be treated as meaningful, even though its 'p' value in ANOVA is 4.6% (below 5%). The same is true of the main effect of Group composition (Single disciplinary or Multidisciplinary). The main effect of Method (GD or Snow-ball) is on the right of the normal probability line, indicating that it could be significant. We also applied ANOVA by converting each response to Signal to Noise ratio using the formula : S/N ratio = -10 log(∑(1/y2 )/n) Where y is the number of ideas and S is the number of groups and the S/N ratio is the Signal to Noise ratio.
Table 6: 2 way ANOVA table for S/N Ratio
Source Method of discussion Group composition Interaction Error Total
df 1 1 1 28 31
SS
MS
147.424 1.153 64.391 423.418 636.386
147.424 1.153 64.391 15.122
F 9.75 0.08 4.26
p 0.004 0.784 0.048
The ANOVA table shows the method to be significant at 0.4% level of significance, while the group composition is not. We can safely accept that Snow-ball is indeed a ROBUST4 method for conducting Productive meetings aimed at generating solutions. Conclusion and further scope: We conclude at 99% level of confidence that: 1) Snow-ball method is significantly superior to the Group Discussion in the task of finding solution to the problem stated. 2) Group composition does not matter. 3) Snow-ball is a “robust” method. By robust, we mean that it is not sensitive to variation in the noise parameters, such as group composition. We have provided a research framework for conducting meetings, which could be used for different output and input variables. We have used this method to test the number of creative ideas generated during meetings, it could be used to test the „Decision making skills‟ or the „consensus building skills‟ in meetings. Similarly the measuring parameters could change to „type of ideas‟ instead of „quality of ideas‟. With this research we have introduced a new process of conducting productive meetings using one of the elements of „Design Thinking‟. More such examples of using other elements of „Design thinking‟ to improve various management related functions could be developed and tested upon to give a conclusive evidence that using „Design Thinking‟ approach in Management provides an innovative perspective to more effective and efficient management functions.
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Taguchi's formula for Robustness: Lochner, R.H., and Matar J.E., Designing for Quality, Chapman & Hall, 1990, pp 134-137.
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