THAT MOMENT WHEN YOU ASK

• “Any comments, guys? Questions?”

• “Any thoughts to share? Feedback?”

• “Anyone with ideas…please share!”

…you’re in the Good, Bad & Ugly of navigating how to ask for engagement and feedback at work meetings.

THINK // 3 insights from the field

😇 THE GOOD THING about asking “Any comments, questions, suggestions, ideas?” at the end of your meetings and presentations is that you are trying to engage and get feedback.

You are probably sincere in wanting people to have a space to include their voice, to participate in decision-making and share what’s brewing within them.

You might be making your most generous assumptions about people’s intentions for showing up at your presentation: surely they came to share their thoughts and feelings, right?

So why are you still getting cricket silence?

🤬 THE BAD THING about "Any comments? Any questions? Anyone?” is that it is too vague, broad and general. And like we learnt in last week’s newsletter on the problem with “How ya doing?”…

PROBLEM #1
VAGUE QUESTIONS ALWAYS GENERATE VAGUE ANSWERS

Whenever a question is framed by an Asker in a general, broad and vague way, a Receiver will always struggle to frame their answer. In this case, you might be getting cricket-silence to your “Any comments? Questions?” because people may be wondering all this and more:

• Ummmm….what exactly do you want me to comment on?

• Is now a good time for me to comment on your grammar? I’m not sure I agree with that terminology you used…

• Should I raise a question about this other idea I had but I don’t know if that’s relevant…”

• Gosh, I’m still trying to digest what Slide 2 was about….everybody seems to know what the heck she’s talking about…Would I look stupid to ask for her to go back to that slide…

“Comments”, especially, is an extremely vague word. Anything could pass for a comment. It is clearer and more helpful if you specify what you want in as much detail as possible, like:

• “I want just off the top of your head gut reactions - especially the un-PC thoughts you might have.”

• “I want to check in on how you are all feeling, emotion-wise, now that you heard me share about what’s coming next quarter.”

• “I want to hear your thoughts on what works or does not work".

• “I want to get a sense of what questions you are asking yourselves right now - especially to do with workload or worries on resources.”

PROBLEM #2
UNCLEARLY AIMED QUESTIONS CREATE UNCLEAR RESPONSES

Whenever a question does not contain a specific target audience, a Receiver will also struggle to see if they are really being invited to give a response. 

In this case, you might be getting cricket-silence to your “Any comments? Questions?” because people are still wondering if they are the most appropriate or relevant or desired person to say something in the moment:

• Who’s appropriate to comment? Who do you want to hear from first? Is it right for me to talk? I don’t wanna overstep anyone here…

• Who’s relevant to comment? I don’t know that much about this project…maybe only those who worked on the project should talk…I’m just making comments from the marketing side of things and this whole thing sounds pretty technical…

• Who’s desired to comment? Bosses only wanna hear from the heads of department…I doubt she wants to hear from us little small fries at the back taking notes….She barely looks at us in the peanut gallery anyway…The last time the intern tried to comment, they got shot down so fast.

😈 THE UGLY THING about what cricket-silence or unhelpful responses may expose is the level of psychological safety - or psychological threat - we are working with.

4 LEVELS OF PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY - AND THREAT

According to the work of Timothy Clark, people deal with 4 kinds of psychogical safety (framed as progressive stages by Clark)

1. Inclusion Safety – we feel safe from having a sense of belonging in the group. We feel included, wanted and appreciated.

2. Learner Safety – we feel safe to learn through asking questions. We can experiment, share mistakes and ask for help.

3. Contributor Safety – we feel safe to contribute our own ideas (even raw ones), without fear of embarrassment or ridicule.

4. Challenger Safety – we feel safe to question others’ (including those in authority) ideas or suggest significant changes to ideas, plans, or ways of working.

This implies that if there is silence, we should learn to ask ourselves if we could be dealing with a certain level of psychological threat.

People don’t like dealing with unknowns and uncertainties. This is why (even if it was not intentional) our vaguely asked, unclearly aimed questions might add a bit more psychological threat vs. safety into the space:

1. Inclusion Threat – we don’t feel belonging in the group. We don’t feel like our presence or our voice is being included, wanted and appreciated.

2. Learner Threat – we don’t feel it is safe to learn by asking questions, talking about mistakes or requesting for help.

3. Contributor Threat – we don’t feel safe to contribute our own ideas (especially raw ones) as we think we might be laughed at, doubted, scolded or ridiculed.

4. Challenger Threat – we don’t feel safe to question, challenge or change other people’s (especially authority figures) ideas, plans, or ways of working.

FEEL // 2 links to help you feel less alone

WATCH Academic Amy Edmonson define psychological safety, why it is not about “being nice” “being soft” or giving permission for people to “slack off” and how leaders can take small steps to create it.

READ  Organizational anthropologist Timothy Clark’s HBR article on how a CEO can create psychological safety for others in a meeting/presentation

DO // 1 strategy to try this week

NOTICE  the next time you ask "Any comments, questions, ideas, feedback etc?” at a meeting - and get cricket silence or unhelpful responses

FIRST, GET CURIOUS

Could there be a psychological safety/threat issue here - either created by me, someone else in the room or historical patterns? 

1. Do people feel safe to INCLUDE their voice? – do people in this room feel I might not be appreciating their presence or wanting to hear from them? are there people in the room who might not feel like they belong here?

2. Do people feel safe to LEARN? – do people in this room generally ask questions, talk about mistakes or request for help? Would they feel my asking about such things is weird or awkward?

3. Do people feel safe to CONTRIBUTE? – do people in this room doubt that I want to hear ideas (especially raw ones)? Do they think I/someone present might laugh, doubt, scold or ridicule them?

4. Do people feel safe to CHALLENGE? – do people in this room trust that I am actually cool with them questioning, challenging or changing the ideas, plans, or ways of working that I shared about?

THEN, PRACTICE SPECIFYING SAFETY ISSUE + SPECIFYING AUDIENCE + SPECIFYING YOUR REQUEST

❌ Unspecific request for engagement and feedback

• "I’m at my last slide. So, any comments? Questions? Feedback? Ideas? Anyone?”

✅ More specific request for engagement and feedback

• SPECIFY POTENTIAL SAFETY ISSUE 1: “I’m at my last slide. Now, I realise not everyone here may feel comfortable commenting on a project they did not work on.”

  • SPECIFY AUDIENCE 1: “I would actually really like to hear first from at least 3-4 people who are hearing about this project for the first time.”

  • SPECIFY REQUEST 1: “Can I hear what are some top-off-your-head reactions? Especially anything to do with how it might impact your work. No thought is too silly to share. I want to hear it as you think it through.”

• SPECIFY POTENTIAL SAFETY ISSUE 2: “Thanks for that. I also know it may be hard for some of you to offer criticisms especially to a boss like me. I assure you, I rather hear problems you see right now than tell me later when things go more south.”

  • SPECIFY AUDIENCE 2: “I’m keen to go one round at this table to hear from every one of you, whether you are a head or an intern. it’s a good way for all of us to learn here.”

  • SPECIFY REQUEST 2: “Can we each name one thing you think works well and one thing you think does not work well about this proposal?”

How can I get better at facilitating conversations?

If you want to shift the personal dynamics, professional situations or organisational cultures around you, I would love to help you.

I help my organisational clients strategise how to change what's working/not working in their culture. I design interventions, train leaders & their people in necessary skills and facilitate necessary conversations on their behalf. You can also look up our public training offerings at Common Ground Civic Centre such as this one:

Have a worthy weekend, workplace warriors.

Leading organisational cultural change is a good and meaningful thing. But it can be a battlefield through some bad things and ugly things. I'm here for you in the trenches.

Every Friday, you’ll get 3 insights + 2 links + 1 strategy to arm you for Monday.

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Meanwhile, get some rest this weekend. I'll see you next Friday,

❤️ 👊 🙌

Wishing you love, power & meaning,

Shiao