ALL WE NEED IS TED LASSO: Part 2 - How to Fire Up Those Ten Minute Meets
Last week, we talked Ted Lasso’s Biscuits with the Boss. At Read Write Think with Renee, we call that time: Ten Minute Meets. We’re continuing that convo this week with some quick tips on how to fire up that time together - and sustain it over time.
One of the benefits of a Ten Minute Meet is they’re brief. In fact, the KEY to their success is keeping them brief. Perhaps because they are brief, they are easier to commit to and maintain consistently throughout the year, whether that’s once a month or every other month. The point is – it’s more than once. In order to truly be thinking partners – you want to brainstorm, explore, dream, try things out, return with outcomes, recalibrate, reflect, try again. Google led the way and many organizations followed in disrupting the typical hour long staff meeting and shifting to brief, to the point, productive 20 minute meetings. So...if Google says if we can’t get it done in 20 minutes, it’s probably worth thinking about what we’re choosing to prioritize with our time.
Here are five of my favorite tips to maximizing that time together and sustaining those Ten Minute Meets.
1. Watch the Clock
Set a time for 7 minutes. When the timer goes off. Start to wrap up, “Okay, we’ve got 3 minute left, let’s make a plan of action items and confirm the date of our next meeting.”
2. Create Clear Action Items
What is a concrete next step that you can each take to try at least one idea that was discussed? Pick a date on the calendar for when the action item will be completed. When getting it started it might help to keep it within a two-week time frame.
3. Make and Take
Create or revise a tool that you agree to experiment with in your classroom. This might be a chart or a lesson idea – or whatever you’re mulling over at the time. When you leave each meeting with something to try there’s a real purpose in growing our teaching practices.
4. Contribute
Discuss the conditions you need in order to be productive in your professional study. Add what you can contribute to the community. What gifts and talents can you offer the partnership? Here are a couple of easy ways to start that convo:
“Something that supports my learning is…”
“I can contribute…”
5. Commit
Prioritize your professional learning life. School cultures are hectic. There will ALWAYS be something that could potentially prevent you from meeting monthly, or not trying the tool you created. “There’s never enough time,” you say. All we have is time. Perhaps the question we should ask is, “What are you choosing to prioritize with your time?” Commit to meeting regularly. Commit to trying one idea from each meeting. Commit to reflecting. Commit to evolving.
Try a Ten Minute Meet this week; and commit to one of these quick tips and see how they feel and flow with your conversation. If both parties are interested and excited about this time together, even better.
Or, as Ted Lasso would say:
"If you care about someone, and you got a little love in your heart, there ain't nothing you can't get through together.
