The aim of this exercise builds on the process you used in Team Inclusion Snapshot 1 to look at patterns in the way team members work together in team meetings.
The exercise
Like Snapshot 1, you ask one team member (or someone external to the meeting) to be an observer of one of your meetings. Their job is to make a note of who is talking - by jotting down their initials - at regular intervals (eg every 10 or 15 seconds) for a period of 15 minutes or longer. Make sure you are observing an open team discussion, rather than during a long presentation by a single person! The observer should be able to set a watch or phone to vibrate quietly (ie so that only they can hear it) after 15 seconds then press restart before noting down who was talking.
This time, in addition to noting the initials of who is talking when the timer buzzes, the observer will also mark the initials with:
- a dot if the person had interrupted someone else to speak
- a star if the person was asking a question, or
- a tick if they were saying something 'sociable' like a joke to relieve tension or "Should we break for coffee?"
You can add to this list other behaviours you want to observe and discuss, but beware - the observation task becomes complicated, which is why Snapshot 1 is an essential first step.
Before you discuss the results check with the team that this the discussion was a fair representation of normal discussions.
Reviewing the results will help the team see if there is a culture of interruptions in the team's discussions, and whether they follow a pattern that needs to be addressed (eg one person inadvertently interrupts more than others, or males tend to interrupt females). It will also help you to identify how often people ask questions rather than just battling out opinions (see From debate to problem-solving for why this is helpful), and who performs the essential function of providing a light sense of humour or relieving any tension.