Three rules for productive meeting

Active participationLanguage made us human beings, as human beings made language. Our languages are designed for “command-and-control“. “Mind you!”, “Do that!”, “How are you?”. Communication as one-way traffic.

In principle, a message is understood as intended by the sender. This is called the Helsinki-principle, made at a conference on computers Helsinki. A — C –> B . (With C, I mean Communication). It is generally applied in our meetings and conferences. After the presentations you’ll understand. One-way traffic.

Message not understood? Make it more clear. Go to a seminar on presentation technique. Or take a larger screen, use illustrations or a movie. Not wrong, it just misses another elementary principle: communicating means sharing information. Less sending, more sharing, A <--> B = C .
In the article Dr Ravn clearly explains how we should share information through involvement into actionable results.

In meetings,
(1) autonomous people must digest information from presentations through
(2) sharing (in small groups) their understanding
(3) aimed at achievable goals.

Meetings must transform (1) information delivered in presentations, through (2) knowledge sharing into (3) action that creates results.

So, also professionals need to learn to facilitate meetings. Capice

From one-way communication to active involvement, White paper published by by Ib Ravn, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Aarhus University, 2015