The Cambridge Online Dictionary defines conversation as:
‘Talk between two or more people, in which thoughts, feelings and ideas are expressed, questions are asked and answered or news and information are exchanged’
So, how do we have a conversation? This may sound like a silly question. Of course everyone knows how to have a conversation…. don’t they? So how come people get into meetings and lose the art of conversation.
Many people declare an intention to make a meeting conversational and interactive, yet the reality is that it ends up EITHER being an excuse for being unprepared, with little thinking about purpose and outcomes, and likely to be a waste of time — OR death by Powerpoint, with a few questions thrown to the group, to ‘make it more conversational’.
So, I think I would like to lead the quest in bringing the art of conversation back into meetings. When it happens, the results can be phenomenal, way more than can ever be achieved by people ‘presenting at’ each other.