How to easily understand people’s attitudes in a meeting and a retrospective?

Miroslav Czadek
2 days ago
6 min read

The first time I read the book ‘The Dilbert Principle’ by Scott Adams (p. 229), at first I laughed, then my smile faded, and now I’m laughing again. 😃

#projecoach #ESVP #retrospective #agile

Adams writes in his book: “If you are a newcomer to the world of business, you might mistakenly assume that meetings are a boring, sadistic hell, inhabited by idiots on a galactic scale,” and he continued… “I made the same erroneous observation when I entered the working world. I now understand that meetings are a kind of theatrical performance, in which each actor assumes one of the following demanding roles.” For your information, I summarize them here, and you will probably encounter these archetypes at some point as well…

Master of the Obvious: his secret lies in condescension combined with sincerity. He uses lines such as We want a solution that only wins or Training is the essence or You need customers in order to have revenue! etc.

Sadist with Good Intentions: This role is played through a combination of sincerity, dedication, and above all a socially pathological disregard for the lives of other people. He uses techniques such as extremely long meetings regardless of the topic, or meetings that have no clear purpose, or he schedules meetings on Friday afternoons or during lunchtime, etc.

Whining Martyr: he usually gets a lot of stage time, which is why there is strong competition for this role. He typically turns his lamentations into fairy tales that clarify his value and intelligence in comparison with the defiant dullards who surround him.

Scatterbrained Man: his role is to redirect every topic toward an unrelated event he once took part in. Women sometimes try for this role, but it always turns into chatter rather than true distraction.

Sleeper: essentially a piece of stage scenery. It is acceptable to nod slightly while others are speaking…

As companies gradually transform, such meetings and their archetypal compositions are fortunately becoming history. Today’s meetings take into account added value, willingness to manage time efficiently, and the engagement of participants in the meeting. In coaching or in the facilitation of meetings, there exists a whole range of methods that make meetings more enjoyable. One of them, for example, is ESVP (Explorer, Shopper, Vacationer, Prisoner).

Try the ESVP method

Monthly meetings, Retrospectives, setting the next Iteration, or Project meetings (lessons learned, etc.) can be much more effective if you focus on how the meeting is facilitated and want to understand people’s attitudes.

Essentially, each participant informs about their own attitude toward the meeting that is about to take place. This method is suitable to do right at the beginning.

For this method, you usually need around 15 minutes of facilitation. It depends on the number of people in the meeting.

Method description

Each participant anonymously states their attitude toward the Meeting/Retrospective as an Explorer, Shopper, Vacationer, or Prisoner (ESVP). The Meeting/Retrospective organizer collects the results and creates a histogram to display the data, and then facilitates a discussion about what the results mean for the group.

How to proceed?

1. Explain that you will conduct a survey to find out how people perceive their participation in the meeting, the retrospective.

2. Take a flipchart and define the terms (you will essentially create metaphors):

Researchers, Explorers long for discovering new ideas and insights. They want to learn everything about the iteration / release / project.

Customers will look through all available information and like to return home with some new useful idea.

Vacationers are not interested in working on the retrospective, but they are glad to be far from everyday drudgery. Sometimes they may pay attention to the topic, but mostly they are happy to be out of the office.

Prisoners feel that they were forced to attend and would rather be doing something else.

3. Hand out pieces of paper or small Post-it notes so that people can record their attitude toward today’s meeting or retrospective. Instruct people to fold their paper in half for privacy.

4. When people finish writing and folding the notes, collect them and shuffle them.

5. While reading the notes, ask one of the participants to make a tick mark on the histogram. After you read each note, put it into your pocket. When you have read all the notes, tear them up and throw them away. Be conspicuous while doing this so that people know no one will try to identify who answered what from the handwriting.

6. Ask the group: “What can we infer from this data?” Then have a short discussion about how the given attitudes in the room will affect the meeting or retrospective.

7. Have some fun with the group and ask: “How are these categories similar to our attitudes in everyday work?”

8. Appropriately close the given activity, for example by using ROTI (Return on Invested Time) on a scale from 1 to 5.

Excellent: A truly useful meeting that was worth attending. High value.
Above average: I got more than if I had spent the time elsewhere. Good value.
Average: I have enough information to justify the time spent here. It was not a waste of time. It has value.
Useful: It was not worth the time spent here. I consider it a waste of time.
Useless: It gave me nothing. I truly lost several hours. No value at all.

At the end, you can ask them whether they suggest anything to adjust or improve in the meeting or retrospective, and implement these ideas as soon as possible in the next meeting or retrospective.

Materials and preparation

Voting Post-it notes or index cards and pencils or pens. A flipchart should be prepared for the histogram.
If you have the option, try to do this variant electronically, for example via DirectPoll.com, where you provide people with a QR code / link that they can open, for example, on their mobile phone. You can present the results directly on the website. It requires quick preparation, approximately 3 minutes.

What to do with the results – examples

If most people in the room are made up of “Vacationers,” this is interesting information about how people feel in their work environment. You may need to make the given meeting the main topic of discussion for a meeting or a retrospective!
If most people in the room are made up of “Investigators, Explorers,” the group might benefit more from time devoted to searching for statistics and analyzing causes.
If most people in the room are made up of “Customers,” they might require more focus on finding solutions and generating SMART goals.
If you have Prisoners in the room, suggest that they can choose how they will spend their time … they can engage or not. If they choose not to engage, the group will be poorer for it.
If you have many Prisoners, you may decide to let them leave the room if they are not interested in the meeting or retrospective, or to make the next meeting or retrospective voluntary. As a facilitator, you can also ask the group whether there is something you can change to help them change the way they feel.
If, for example, you plan a break during the meeting or retrospective, indicate that if the Prisoners decide to return after the break, they have decided to engage in the meeting or retrospective and are no longer Prisoners.
If you have prepared yourself, you will not be surprised when you find a room full of Prisoners. As with many Vacationers, if most of the group feels like Prisoners, it is necessary to deal with it: you will not get anywhere in the meeting or retrospective if you do not.
The mere use of the ESVP method allows a relaxed atmosphere to be created.
Declaring oneself a Prisoner simply expresses an aversion to the idea of a meeting or retrospective. Such a declaration in itself is already a victory. Thanks to this simple method, you can learn much more than you expect.