Liven up those boring meetings!

Now this is a bit complicated, fellas, so pay attention:

Meeting Scorecard

Instructions: Make a scorecard with 25 boxes, arranged in five rows of five. In each box place one of the following words or phrases:-

Synergy; Strategic fit; Core competencies; best practice; Bottom line; Revisit; Roll-out; 24/7; The reality is; Benchmark; Value-added; Proactive; Win-win; Think outside the box; Fast track; Result-driven; Empower (or empowerment); Knowledge base; At the end of the day: Touch base; Mindset; Client focus(ed); Paradigm; Game plan; Leverage.

Take the scorecard with you to a meeting. Each time you hear one of the words or phrases in the table below, place a tick in the appropriate box. When you have at least one tick in each box, take the first opportunity to inject into the discussion the phrase “There is something in what you say”. (See note below for a clear explanation of this valuable phrase).

Important: for this to work effectively, at least two people in the group must have the scorecard and understand the rules. It is vastly preferable that a majority of members of the group do not know that this is happening.

For relatively short meetings (say one hour or less), the winner is the first person to complete the scorecard and successfully use the phrase (elapsed time from start of meeting to be recorded).

For longer meetings or conferences lasting more than one day, the winner is the individual who completes the greatest number of scorecards and successfully uses the phrase the greatest number of times.

Note:

A useful device.

Here’s a useful device for those situations when you are faced with an opinionated idiot who feels that he has to share his views with you. You can’t prevent him from giving you the full benefit of his intellect (all 10 bits of his IQ) but you can’t be bothered contradicting him because you know that logical argument is beyond his comprehension and anyway, what the hell, it’s all too tiring . . yawn . . stretch . . scratch . . Eh? Where was I?

Oh yes. Here’s the useful device:-

After waiting for a suitable pause in the non-stop stream of unconsciousness, you adopt a thoughtful expression and you say:-

“There is something in what you say.”

This apparently considered response will persuade the opinionated one that you consider his diatribe to be weighty and full of meaning, instead of shallow, unintelligent, prejudiced and just plain dumb.

Now you’re thinking: What’s so useful about this? Why should anything I say encourage this moron to believe his opinions are worth a light?

Here’s the deal. While you are saying: “There is something in what you say” you are conjuring up a mental image of the “something”.

It’s a tall, conical, steaming pile of freshly-produced horse dung, gleaming softly in the sunlight. Keep this image in your mind.