Running Effective Meetings For Dummies

Chapter 6

Meeting with Global Participants

IN THIS CHAPTER

Considering differences in meetings across cultures

Recognizing and giving advice on how to manage meeting lateness

Helping avoid time zone issues

Some time ago, Joe was working with his favorite research collaborator in Germany, Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock, and they were discussing some recent data analyses comparing German and U.S. group meetings. The conversation went something like the following:

• Joe: “So, what do the results indicate?”
• Nale: “Looks like Germans spend more time talking about problems than Americans.”
• Joe: “Interesting. So they dwell on the problem a bit. Could be good for identifying the right solution.”
• Nale: “Yeah, and Americans tend to jump right to identifying solutions to problems, rather than talking through the problem. At least compared to Germans.”
• Joe: “Hmm … so, Americans are impatient?”
• Nale: “Looks that way. But, Germans appear to complain more.”
• Joe: “Never would’ve guessed that.” (dripping with sarcasm)
• Nale: “Yeah, we’ve sort of guessed this. But, now, if we publish this, we’ll never live it down.”

That’s right. Meeting research confirms what many had already suspected. In general, Americans ...