Making Effective Suggestions at Team Meetings

Teams are powerful. People work together to accomplish shared goals. Team members are encouraged to think outside the box and come up with solutions to current problems. However, even if you have a great idea, sometimes it can be difficult for others to see it from your point of view. Before sharing your latest idea at your next meeting, think about the answers to 3 questions:

1. Is it repeatable?
If you want people to remember your suggestion, they have to be able to repeat it. Many times suggestions are too complex for people to recall. In one sentence, what is your idea? Make sure it is succinct and to the point. If your suggestion can’t be repeated, then no one will want to put it into action.

2. Is there a story behind your suggestion?
Many people make suggestions but forget to tell the story on how they arrived at that idea. If I’m going to see it from your point of view, I need to know what you were going through to think change was necessary. Stories help us create emotional connections with worlds that we aren’t currently in. A quick way to make people care about something they aren’t currently dealing with, is to tell them a story about it.

3. How will things improve?
Whenever you make a suggestion, be sure to end on how things will improve. Give people an image of how life will be better because of this new idea. It can be easy to slip into why things are hard or how you are struggling. Instead, end on a positive note. You want people to know that, even if your suggestion might be a bit of effort, things will be better once your idea is put in place. You want people associating this idea with positive emotions rather than negative ones.

When you present an idea, you want make sure it has an impact. The best way to do that is to make your suggestion repeatable, tell a story on how you arrived at that idea, and end on a positive note.

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