Running a Meeting

A concept Kyle threads through his notes on Gordon B. Hinckley — Go Forward With Faith to capture Hinckley’s distinctive meeting discipline. The pattern: meetings begin and end on time; leaders come prepared and “speak their mind”; Hinckley “grasps the essence of the matter quickly”; and once a decision is made, “he didn’t look back.” Rather than calling a follow-up meeting to gather missing information, he “calls those individuals on the phone, asks the questions, and makes decisions on the spot.” When colleagues tried to re-litigate settled questions, his stock reply was, “We have already covered that ground and given our word to others, now let us move forward.” Kyle files this alongside Operational Skills and efficiency as a decide-and-don’t-relitigate, phone-don’t-meet management style — Hinckley “held no more meetings than were absolutely essential.”

Where this appears

• Gordon B. Hinckley — Go Forward With Faith — tagged across several highlights illustrating Hinckley’s meeting discipline: start/end on time, decide quickly, don’t re-litigate, phone rather than convene another meeting.