The 3 things we miss out on when we don't 'make sense'

I’ve been writing about the power of sensemaking; the Institute for the Future identified it as a top skill for these times.

Information overload, busy schedules, more meetings than we’d like - and we get swamped with information we need to make sense of.

Sometimes this is information outside of our domain of expertise so there's learning we need to do too ... as well as the sensemaking.

Individually we read things, listen and make sense, alone.

But there’s also the practice of being able to make sense of information together, as a team or group; this is collective sensemaking.

Unfortunately we tend to default to dated ways of working. You know, meetings that follow old style formats of 18th Century Parliamentary procedures with agendas, minutes, attendance, apologies, general business, meeting closed, next meeting ... blah blah yawn!

The problem with this linear, archaic way of working is that

1️⃣ Ideas get overlooked

2️⃣ Decisions don't get made

3️⃣ Problems remain unsolved.

A status quo remains. Then we try again at the next meeting.

*groan

You CAN make a cultural shift using Collective Sensemaking.

7 reasons why Collective Sensemaking is needed in workplaces today

1. The need and drive for collaboration; we are better together, but how do we 'do' collaboration?

2. The work to be done. What is it exactly? Help the team make sense of it and then get out of their way.

3. Those collaborative spaces in many workplaces. How do we make the most of the people and the space?

4. The increasing need to engage, consult and genuinely co-create with customers, stakeholders and communities.

5. Engaging the growing diversity in our communities.

6. How we can be ‘thrown together’ to work with others on a project and we need to start performing together well... immediately.

7. To validate our initial ideas and decisions, prior to giving more time, money and resources to them.

When our meetings don't work, people are uncertain and change is ongoing, we need to help people make sense of what's going on... and quick.

What do you think? Where and when do we need to make more or better sense of what's going on... together? Love to hear your comments below.

Look at where you're looking

Teamwork takes longer than it needs to because we struggle as a group to make sense of what’s going on. No wonder! We’ve never been more distracted, looking at devices, laptops, watches & journals as relief from the boredom, complication and irrelevance of meetings.

Check the distractions here:

⬇️ The guy (left) is looking at a Spotify playlist

➡️ She’s mindful with her coffee

↘️ Sunglasses dude is checking spreadsheets, emails or Slack 

🔀 The two on the right are writing in a journal, one just checked her Fitbit or Apple watch 

There are 5 laptops, 6 devices, 4 note pads and a folder-thingy.

We're perpetually distracted by other visual points of interest, stealing our focus from the team's work.

One person might be going OK making sense, but another two or three people may have ‘lost the threads’ of what's really going on.

Look where people are looking. Unless and until you have what I call a ‘Common Visual Point of Context’, you’ll all be drawn to you own ‘Individual Points of Relief’ (or Distraction). 

About that meeting you were in that just didn't make sense...🤯

We're familiar with the dull meeting, droning on, not achieving anything. But just as frustrating is the meeting that's a messy, confusing and complicated sh*t storm. Things are tricky, frustrating, perhaps complex. All those different views and ideas!

How do you find your way out of it all towards a conclusion or outcome? This is the everyday struggle of the 'meeting that doesn’t make sense.' It’s grossly inefficient to all sit around a table and try to talk through everything on the agenda.

That's a big ask of words alone.

I’ve posted previously on 'sensemaking'; how we understand the deeper meaning of what’s going on. Well there’s 'Collective Sensemaking' too: how we work things out as a group, team, project ... together, collectively.

A team trying to work out what the heck is happening, planning for an uncertain future under changing conditions, would do well to know not just how to make sense individually, alone ... but how to make sense collectively, together.

There is power in 'collective sense'

There is power in 'collective sense'. This week I'm posting on sensemaking, the skill in understanding the deeper meaning of something.

How do you do it? Write some stuff down and write it in a layout that looks more like a map rather than a list. When you do this in a meeting and other people can see that map, you start to do ‘collective sensemaking’. Making sense of things together.

Collective sense is in contrast to lone voices and egos who dominate meetings, propose solutions prematurely, or shut people down. It’s in contrast to the loud speakers, the interrupters and the repeaters. Collective sensemaking makes better leaders, and it's a skill today's leaders need to sharpen up on.

I’ll leave you with these four templates from my book ‘Making Sense: A Handbook for the Future of Work’:

1. a simple line or continuum

2. a set of stairs (have you ever presented information about 'stepping up or improving'; this is an ideal shape and template)

3. a path or road with signs (journey, anyone?)

4. network diagram (from earlier this week). Give a like if you've learned something this week about sensemaking.

🤔 What are you trying to make sense of at work?