Death by Meeting: A Leadership Fable about Solving the Most Painful Problem in Business Author: | Language: English | ISBN:
B0001ZYZLO | Format: PDF
Death by Meeting: A Leadership Fable about Solving the Most Painful Problem in Business Description
In his latest engrossing work of business fiction, best-selling author Patrick Lencioni provides a cure for the most painful yet underestimated problem of modern business: bad meetings. And what he suggests is both simple and revolutionary.
Reknowned for turning fables into practical advice, Lencioni makes his groundbreaking model applicable to the real world. Death by Meeting is nothing short of a blueprint for leaders who want to eliminate frustration among their teams and create environments of engagement and passion.
- Audible Audio Edition
- Listening Length: 4 hours and 25 minutes
- Program Type: Audiobook
- Version: Unabridged
- Publisher: Macmillan Audio
- Audible.com Release Date: March 25, 2004
- Whispersync for Voice: Ready
- Language: English
- ASIN: B0001ZYZLO
The title is provocative and will probably sell books. The parable of a software game firm in Monterey struggling with ineffective meetings makes for a reasonably readable, well-scripted (except for "our data is inconclusive." p. 184) and intriguing story. "Death" has the air of "Disclosure" without the sex, as Yip Software allows itself to be taken over (cashing in -- a decision that probably warrants more attention than do the other matters in the book) and then scrutinized by a bigger firm. There is a late twist in the seemingly diabolic machinations of the larger firm and the catalyst to the correction in team decision making is imbued with a needless obsessive-compulsive, Tourette-like malady that allows him to have a psychological excuse -- when he is off his meds - to speak up at the meetings.
The parable reads well enough and early on reminded me of John Cleese's marvelous training film, "Meetings, bloody meetings." The original video was so good when it was made almost thirty years ago that Video Arts updated it -- with almost the exact same script and several of the same actors-- ten years ago. "Death" is more current. But Cleese in both versions got it right, better, and funnier than Lencioni. He viewed team meetings as akin to a court proceeding or a trial. The analogy worked.
Effective meetings need critical thinking, not groupthink. The Senate report on the CIA is only the most recent example of no one taking a critical stance as partial information and unreliable data accumulate. But conflict does not seem to be the appropriate remedy for premature or inappropriate consensus. Lencioni is right: Real consensus is difficult if not impossible. But constructive critical thinking is better than conflict (or obsessives off their meds) to make a meeting effective and "interesting".
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