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July, 2004 |
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No laughing Matter |
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Meeting Secrets by Madan Lamsal Why do people avoid telephone calls and receiving visitors? Why don't they reply to e-mails, snail mails or faxes? Read on to find the secrets behind these: You need to talk to this client urgently, but he almost seems to know whenever you’re desperate to talk to him and does a vanishing act. The receptionist has the standard recorded voice, “He’s in a meeting.” Earlier days it used to be “Sorry, he’s not in his seat”. Still the message is the same. You cannot talk to the slippery guy. You have this overpowering urge to tell her “Why don’t you get off your seat and go find him. I know your office is only 300 square feet wide.” And you even toy with the idea of asking her “Did you look under his seat? Because he owes me money and knowing the coward, he must be hiding there.” But you just cannot say that. If it is a government office, it is rather worse as they speak in what sounds Greek to the ordinary mortals. You will get a reply that the person either has gone to the cafeteria for a meeting or has gone to the ministry. You ask when he is expected back and the suggestion comes: “Call two days later”, as if it takes two days to ‘recover’ from a visit to the ministry. You call after two days, and you will get a reply - ‘I will tell him you called’ (and the guy or girl on the other end hangs up without asking for your name. You must be more famous than you thought. The person knows you by your voice). But these are the unwritten rules of the workplaces. You know he or she is lying. Worse still, he/she knows that you know he/she is lying. To understand why that happens, you should know the two major kinds of work in modern organizations 1. Taking phone messages for people who are in meetings, and 2. Going to meetings. The ultimate in the careers of modern managers (in government or non-government organizations) depends on how effectively one attends the meetings. Because that’s where the prestige is. Unless you learn how to attend meetings, you are never going to get a position of power. There are two major kinds of meetings: First category includes those that are held for basically the same reason as the ‘Biralo Badhne’ ritual - namely, to observe the tradition. For example, a lot of managerial people like to meet on Friday, because it’s Friday and there is a tradition of holding meeting on Friday in the organization. You’ll get used to it. This type of meeting operates the way “Show and Tell” exercise does in a nursery school, with everyone getting to say something, the difference being that in nursery school, the kids actually have something to say. Second category of the meetings includes those where there is some pretext. In fact such a meeting never takes place. This is a kind of drama. You are actually sitting in your office, not at a meeting. Your secretary/telephone operator calls you to pass you the call. But your professional reply to your secretary is an instruction to either tell the guy on the other end of the phone that you are not there or you are in the other phone or you will call the person back. Therefore, next time you call somebody and get these standard replies try to find out which type of meeting it is - category one or two - and act accordingly. |
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Cover Story
| Editorial | Business News | Biztoon |
Political | No
Laughing Matters | SME Focus |
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