Feb 27, 2020
Beth Porter is CEO and Co-Founder of Riff Analytics. Riff offers AI-enabled tools that provide powerful insights about individual behaviors and team dynamics, which improves remote working teams’ results. Beth explains the effect of different types of meeting interactions and how Riff nudges people to form better meeting habits so they can develop trust, all share their thoughts and feel heard improving collaboration and outcomes.
Key Takeaways:
[01:36] We are often not set up for success in our meetings.
[02:11] Behavioral science identifies turn-taking as critical for productive meetings
[03:44] The two parts of the Future of Work: more complex, non-routine work using different skills and more remote working.
[06:16] Relationships are becoming more important as we become more distant physically.
[07:23] A shift from incentivizing individual work to teamwork.
[09:08] The pros and cons of remote versus office working.
[09:59] Community building is important to build trust for people working from home.
[11:41] Beth’s early career as a math teacher emphasizing team-based work.
[15:44] What is computational social science?
[17:33] How is Riff Analytics using artificial intelligence?
[20:00] What the dynamics of conversations tell us.
[21:06] The impact of unspoken signals during meetings.
[22:01] Engagement is measured and feedback is given in real-time about who is dominating the conversation.
[22:39] The effect of interrupting during meetings.
[23:51] Feedback raises awareness in all meeting attendees.
[24:01] Visualization of each person’s meeting participation.
[25:12] Riff is a tool for promoting and practicing productive meeting habits.
[25:53] Post-meeting surveys capture each attendee’s experience.
[27:53] Original goal was to help online course learning where trust levels are low.
[30:21] Riff increases social presence feeling as though you are meeting in person.
[31:48] The relevance of trust and taking turns in conversation.
[34:12] Successful patterns of different meeting interactions.
[36:36] Riff nudges people to adopt better collaboration habits.
[41:26] Immediate Action Tip: Understand that time is a collective responsibility—respecting and optimizing other people’s time as well as your own.
Resources:
Quotes:
“Research shows 71% of people find meetings unproductive and inefficient.”
“Everyone has something to share and it requires you to trust that if you give up your speaking time to others that something valuable is going to happen on the other end.”
“Optimizing time is a collective responsibility, not an individual responsibility alone. If you’re in a meeting with other people, it’s not just your time.”