chapters (8)
The Loudest Person Sets the Frame
The moment. Someone states a position in the first two minutes. Everything after is a reaction to it. Three people who saw it differently never get there, and the room mistakes agreement for consensus.
What most rooms do
"So I think we should go with option A - thoughts?" …and then forty minutes of thoughts about option A.
Why it misfires. The first frame anchors the discussion, and once the group is arguing inside it, alternatives stop being generated. Woolley and colleagues found that a group's collective intelligence tracks the equality of turn-taking more than the intelligence of its members - rooms dominated by one voice reliably underperform the people in them.
The rewrite
"Before we debate - thirty seconds each, round the table: what's your read? Then we argue."
The move: round the table before you debate. Collect one short read from every person before anyone responds to anyone. It costs three minutes and it's the single highest-leverage thing you can do to a meeting, whether or not you're running it.
Your turn
"Can we do a quick round before we go deep? One line each, no responses yet."
Edge cases. In big meetings, round only the people who'll be affected by the decision - otherwise it becomes theatre.
This week. Ask for one round in a meeting you don't run.