Bosses, Bullies, and Braggarts: How to Tame Meeting

Dominators
Youve been there before a meeting where the boss wants to forego analysis and make a
decision now; a co-worker who runs roughshod over quieter team members; or a subject
matter expert who never shuts up. Whatever their motivation, meeting dominators are a
leading cause of ineffective meetings.
Keeping dominators in check begins with your meeting design. It is possible to include
controlled participatory techniques such as a round-robin format (where everyone speaks
in turn) or a sub-grouping of individuals by particular attributes (i.e. function, crossfunctional, area of interest, a defined number of participants like pairs, triads, etc.). This
approach gives dominators a smaller field to try to manipulate. Additionally, continuity can
be maintained by ping-ponging ideas. Once an idea is stated the facilitator asks other
participants to paraphrase or elaborate only on the stated idea, never letting the
dominator hijack the agenda.
However, no matter how great your meeting process, it is still difficult to leverage
participant insight and experience when a few want to dominate the discussion. As a
result, the meeting facilitator must put extra effort into establishing a strict meeting
management approach. This includes setting norms or guidelines at the beginning of the
session. When there is the potential for an intimidating subject matter expert or senior
level participant to dominate, head them off before getting into meeting content. Ask the
group: what operating guidelines or norms do we want to follow today to ensure we hear
everyones thoughts? If no one comes up with a norm, examples you can mention
include:

Everyone speaks no longer than 30 seconds

No one revisits an decision made unless there is new crucial information
We paraphrase back or ask questions about what others said before critiquing ideas
During idea generation we will use yes, and... to build on the thoughts of others,
rather than yes, but... which may tear them down

By establishing norms, the power of the group can be used to stifle the dominators. Test
the norms for agreement to ensure everyone is willing to live with the guidelines during
the session. Then, seek permission to referee the norms, being very clear about how youll
respond to rule breakers. For example could you intervene when people break a norm like
JC, in light of time and our norm around everyone participates, Id like you to wrap up
so we can move on? Check this out with the group so there are no surprises when you
intervene.
However, even with norms in place, politics, culture, and/or personalities may lead to
meeting domination. Immediate action is required the minute you realize that doing
nothing will make matters worse. Remember, though, the goal is to increase group
participation, not to shut down the dominator. Redirect the inappropriate behaviour as
quickly and unobtrusively as possible by intervening. For example, if the dominator is
hogging time ask, Jason, can you sum it up in 1-2 points? Or, if youre close to a
scheduled break use the time to remind the dominator of the norms. Ask the dominator for
suggestions of how best to keep the meeting on course. Finally, if all else is failing, change
your meeting design. You can halt a dominator by shifting from an open discussion to a
more structured one that brings everyone back into the foreground. Dont be afraid to
impose a round-robin with a time limit for each person to speak.

Meeting dominators will always intrude but that doesnt mean you cant control them and
make your meetings productive and valuable. So in summary:
Equalize participation by using approaches like round-robin and sub-groups
Set and referee group norms
Redirect inappropriate behaviour as quickly as possible
Have you used a successful technique in the past to handle meeting dominators? Wed
love to hear about it in the comments section below!