Podcast as the Meeting?

Submitted by Sean Latham
in
General Questions and Comments

Would like to get some feedback on the idea of having a weekly meetings where my team and I listen to a podcast, discuss and then develop action items out of that.

My thought is that the Podcasts wouldn't be treated much differently than a webinar.

Podcasts would be pre-selected from both manager tools or career tools, on some of the more general topics - Project management, Presentation skills, Workplace etiquette, etc.

My team is mainly made up of supervisors with junior level employees.

Thanks!

Submitted by Ken Williams on Thursday December 2nd, 2010 10:56 am

So, you and your managers are going to sit in a room and listen to something?  A 20 (or 40!) minute podcast/speech/monologue?
What an AWFUL way to spend time in a meeting!
Maybe I misunderstand your plan - but I've re-read your post a couple of times, and it really seems that you're going to be asking people to sit in a room together to listen to something.
You gave webinars as an example.  I caution you to think about webinars as a model - in my experience, they're not very effective, if you measure participants' knowledge retention or behavior change.  They're sort of...glorified conference calls.
I like you intent to use this material as a way to inform discussions and to develop action items.  But I suggest you do it in the most interactive way you can...

  • Assign reading, viewing, or listening ahead of time.
  • Make sure you're telling people why you think the assignment is relevant to their doing their jobs as effectively as possible.
  • Assign individuals to present, to teach, to summarize the materials.
  • Use the time in the meeting to interpret, to apply, to analyze the material: to make it "fit" your reality and your specific circumstances.
  • And always - ALWAYS - expect people to report back on progress (or plans will never become more than just plans!).

Your goal is to make the meetings more active, more engaging - and not to be spending a lot of time in passive acitivities like listening or viewing.

Submitted by stephenbooth_uk on Thursday December 2nd, 2010 11:46 am

 Get them to listen to the casts ahead of time then use the meeting as a forum to summarise and discuss the content. 
You said that you plan to listen as a group.  In the past people have suggested similar sessions, Mark and Mike have expressed a wish that they do not and that people download and listen to the cast individually.  Unless they've changed their position you would probably be going against the copyright holder's expressed views on how their material should be used.  Just because they distribute the casts for free does not mean that Mike and Mark has surrendered all rights as to how their material is used.
Point your directs to the site, tell them which cast they should listen to and when they should be ready to discuss them.  Maybe you summarise back the first couple to set the bar and then start assigning the task to individual directs.  It might also be useful to ask each direct to bring at least 3 key points from the cast with ideas as to how to implement the action and what outcome they would be looking to see and when.  In essence get them to set MT goals for themselves!
Stephen
 
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