Steve Jobs Says Your Meetings Need This
When you feel like you're having the same conversation over and over again
Hey there 👋
My name is Conor. I’m helping shape how teams work together at Hugo, bringing your meetings, notes, and tasks all in one place.
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😭 When meetings don’t get the job done
If you feel that you’re having the same conversations over and over again, or that nothing gets done as a result of meetings, you and your team may not be reaching closure on each topic.
Closure comes from determining and communicating the next steps. It can be achieved by sending out a summary of the meeting within an hour of attending — or at least before the end of the day.
🚀 Jobs’ solution to better meetings: the DRI
The key element to closure, which Jobs keenly uncovered, is responsibility. In Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs, he tells the story of Apple’s struggle to foster a culture of accountability within teams. Many people felt their success or failure was caused by external forces, and especially by other people.
Jobs wanted to instill a sense of personal responsibility; he didn’t want to hear excuses, especially from other leaders in his organization. So when it came to meetings, he set up a policy that made sure there wouldn’t be any excuses available. His solution was the Directly Responsible Individual, also known as a DRI.
Isaacson writes:
“Steve had a habit of making sure someone was responsible for each item on any meeting agenda, so everybody knew who is responsible . . . An effective meeting at Apple will have an action list . . . Next to each action item will be the DRI.”
When we combine the idea of a DRI with the need for closure on discussion topics, we find the solution to two of the three biggest problems with meetings. When meetings are a waste of time, it is because nothing gets done.
Setting clear action items, then explicitly confirming that a single person is responsible, is the solution.
🤝 Why assigning DRIs works so well
At first, declaring that someone is directly responsible for every task or project may feel like it adds too much bureaucracy or micromanagement to your workflow. Is it really necessary? Can’t people just work the way they want to work?
The truth is that this tiny upfront investment yields disproportionate returns. In fact, appointing a DRI removes much other time- consuming activities from work. That allows employees to do their best work on what they should be working on — and nothing else. Rather than sapping productivity, assigning a DRI enables it.
Here are four reasons why:
DRIs encourage autonomy. When you’re a responsible individual, you are not dependent on a manager to tell you what to do. This makes teams and leaders more self-reliant. It also allows people to automatically organize around the DRI without having to first traffic-cop their way through company bureaucracy.
DRIs permit teamwork. When it’s unclear what should be happening, everyone can trust that the DRI is in the driver’s seat. If the DRI is quiet, what needs to get done must be getting done.
DRIs enable efficiency. Because each issue has only a single person worrying about it, the mental resources of your organization can be spread much more widely.
DRIs require specificity. While assigning someone to be responsible, you must be clear about what they are responsible for. Specificity on projects, tasks, and action items brings the necessary focus to team activities.
⏰ When to establish a DRI
To speed up decision-making and heighten accountability, assign the DRI early on. Here are two important times to do so:
When working on a new or complex problem where the owner is not yet known.
At the end of meetings, when leaving with action items or next steps.
Even if the DRI is implied, verbally confirm it out loud. For example, “Rob will put together the product launch plan this week, and I’ll follow up with our PR agency.”
If you’re in a meeting, write the DRI’s name next to every action item in your notes. Better still put those actions in your project management software and assign them to the DRI (at Hugo, we use Asana and Trello for this).
📚 Reads of the Week
Product Management Templates
I recommend checking out Lenny Rachitsky’s newsletter on business and growth, especially his latest post linked here. Tons of great meeting templates and frameworks to plug into your workflow.
The Cheetah Software Engineer
While the title of this post refers to software engineers, the idea here is more widely applicable. How do you manage those that are curious, fast, and effective to the best of your ability?
Why Some Things Seem Simple
I like this heuristic for discovering your preferences. When you’re about to perform a task, how strenuous or complex does it seem to you?
Thanks for reading Future of Teamwork this week! Did anything stand out? I’d love to hear about it. Reply to this email or tweet at me and let’s chat 😁
Until next time,
Conor