Some call it bluffing others an essential management skill but nobody reads all those reports and everyone wants people to think they have. Managers spend a very large part of the working day in meetings and meetings are always accompanied by “Papers”. Most meetings have too many agenda items and too many papers or reports to support the topics for discussions. Often there is simply not enough time before a meeting to have read all the reports beforehand and it doesn’t help that reports are often hard to read written by professionals with the aim of reinforcing their reputation for technical expertise.
It helps if each report has a one page executive summary. Of course most people will only read this. However, since most people are only going to skim read the reports anyway then a short summary written in plain English is likely to focus the discussion and get the result the author is seeking.
Some managers will be reading the executive summary as the author is introducing the report either to remind themselves of its content or because this is the first time they have looked at it.
There is a lot of bluffing goes on at senior management team meetings this is because senior managers are totally unreasonably expected to know everything about their part of the business. Clearly they don’t. As budget cuts lead to management restructuring and broader spans of control senior managers know less about individual bits of their part of the business. If asked a direct question about something very specific or technical they can get away with saying they will find out and let people know. This rarely happens as senior managers don’t do this to each other with a couple of exceptions. The finance director in frustration at the unwillingness of colleagues to get to grips with budget cuts or the boss who wants to make someone feel uncomfortable.
Being an effective bluffer is not the same as being evasive or just making something up. The aim of bluffing is to retain your credibility and buy enough time to get to grips with the issue under discussion. Basically you are giving the impression you are in a position to contribute to the debate whilst in fact you are skimming the report, listening to the comments of others and working out the implications for your part of the business. Which is of course why some people don’t say anything until well into the debate and then burst in with a number of concerns.
In an ideal world everyone would be properly prepared for meetings, agendas would be short and papers would be easy to read but it’s not an ideal world so bluffing is a legitimate management skill.
Blair McPherson is a former Director in a large local authority and author of Equipping Managers for an Uncertain Future published by www.russellhouse.co.uk