This document provides advice on preparing for meetings and other everyday work activities. It emphasizes that leaders should prepare for meetings as if their professional legacy depends on it, even for trivial topics, as meetings are an important way to instill values. Meetings should excite attendees and increase bonding. Preparation is key for the beginning and ending to energize people. The document also notes that in work, as in basketball, the important parts are the small interactions that occupy most of the time, not just the main activities. Proper preparation is important for meetings, phone calls, emails and conversations to make the best use of regular interactions.

1. Marvin Sissey

2. Time keeping skills
Delegating
Managing meetings

4. How I spend my day
work
sleep
boring
fun
How I wished I spent my
day
work
sleep
boring
fun

5. URGENT
NOT IMPORTANT
Disruptions
IMPORTANT
URGENT
Critical
IMPORTANT
NOT URGENT
Important goals
NOT URGENT
NOT IMPORTANT
interruptions

6. Tasks
IMPORTANT
NOT URGENT
Important goals
Doing is better than perfect.
Facebook Company Motto

7. “Only plan for 4-5 hours of real work
every day !
David Heinemeier, 37 Signals

8. “Given 8 hours to cut a tree , I spent
the first 6 sharpening by axe!
Abraham Lincoln

9. Don’t

11. Organise meetings early in the day .
Time leading to an event if oft wasted.

12. Break the unreasonable into
reasonable chunks

13. Set reminders
Write down stuff

14. workflowy.com
Don’t make war …make lists

16. If whatever you want done can 80% be done by someone else ,
Delegate !

17. 1) Can your subordinates act fully in your absence if necessary ?
2) Is your work composed of tasks only you can do?
3) Are you frequently interrupted by people asking you for decisions
or guidance so that they can get on with their own work ?
6) Are you meeting your deadlines without having to do very long hour
4) If you were hospitalised tomorrow , would anyone on your team
pick up your work and get it done?
5) Do you often re-do tasks you had given to others ?

18. 7) Do people often ask you if you need any help or if there is anything they
can do for you?
8) Do you invest time training others ?
9) Do you ever do jobs that someone else could do more quickly and easily?
10) Do you do work that is junior or routine that someone else on a lower
salary handle ?
11) Do you spend a lot of time checking up on other people’s progress?
12) Are people happy to admit it to you when they have made a mistake ?
13) Do you find that people follow your instructions properly ?

19. Fears
Threatened
Loss of control Loss of quality
Fear of the unknown

20. +ves for you
Freedom
Less stress
Respected
“ Don’t keep a dog & bark yourself

21. +ves for him/her
Developed
Save time
Build self esteem

22. +ves for company
Better decisons
Inter-dependence
Continuity/succession
Money saved

24. Meeting: Every meeting that
does not stir the imagination
and curiosity of attendees
& increase bonding and co-
operation
& instill sense of worth and
motivate rapid action and
enhance enthusiasm is a
permanently lost opportunity.

25. Meeting = Theater

26. Meeting: “Theater of
inquiry and
persuasion and
motivation and
engagement and
enhanced
teamwork”

27. Prepare for a meeting/every
meeting as if your professional
life and legacy depended on it.
It does.

28. A meeting worth calling is a meeting worthy
of intensive preparation. Your aim should be
high—and strategic. Even when the topic is
“trivial.”
When it comes to modeling and underscoring
core values, there is no such thing as a
“minor” meeting.

29. FYI: This is … not
… a rant about
“conducting
better meetings.”

30. Most of the “meetings literature” is devoted
to “running better meetings,” “running shorter
meetings,” etc. Doubtless of value—but
dangerously missing the point.
If the meeting is the leader’s principal
platform for instilling values, etc., then the
objective is far far beyond “efficient
behaviors.”

31. on Meetings: If They Fail to Excite … It’s Your
Fault!
BEGINNINGS = THE BALLGAME.
Forget the "meat." (More or less.) Beginnings and
endings overwhelm middles!
Every meeting needs an energetic-exciting start and a
blow-out
ending which launches the “To dos" with vigor.
Never ever begin a meeting with "Let's get started."
Begin it with a plunge
not a tiptoe—e.g., some exciting-surprising nugget.

32. Preparation for
everyday Affairs:
Largely
Overlooked!

33. REPEAT: Prepare for a
meeting/every meeting as if
your professional life and
legacy depended on it.
It does.

34. REPEAT: A meeting worth calling is a meeting
worthy of intensive preparation. Your aim
should be high—and strategic. Even when the
topic is “trivial.”
When it comes to modeling and underscoring
core values, there is no such thing as a
“minor” meeting.

35. THE THREE MINUTE Rule*: So
what about the other 45?

36. A basketball coach remarked that most
practices focused on dribbling and shooting.
Yet the reality is, star or not, that a player
only has his or her hands on the ball for … 3
to 4 minutes a game. (Out of 48.)
And yet practice doesn’t focus on how you
play 94%of the time!
Business is the same way …

37. Prep! Prep! Prep! Prep! Prep!
Meetings.
Phone calls.
Emails.
Conversations.

38. The “94%” in business is … meetings, short
conversations, phone calls, etc.

39. Do you carefully
prepare for the 94%:
Meetings. Phone calls. Emails.
Conversations.