‘On the couch’ with Jasminda

DEAR Jasminda,

I am aware that during meetings, staff members appearing via Zoom are more insightful and intellectually engaged. I don’t understand the disparity. When they appear in person, they seem very different. Should I move all meetings to Zoom?

Kevin P.

Hi Kevin,

I remember the good old days of staff meetings.

The whole purpose of the Monday morning meeting was to act as a two-hour transition between a weekend full of cheese platters and sparkling wine and languid hours in the outdoor spa, to the cold hard slap of 30 people in ill-fitting polyester, non-ergonomic chairs, hands fused to keyboards, and seven monitoring reports due by 5pm.

Back then, everyone knew where they stood in a staff meeting, and a CEO knew how to manage them.

Staff members included the socially-awkward IT guy who told inappropriate jokes, the bored 20-something who was nursing a hangover, the woman who carried the same piece of paper around for five years – with no one really knowing how she came to be in the office – the chain-smoking supervisor agitated by flickering fluorescent lights, and so on.

It was a given as to who was going to offer purposeful responses and who was going to vague out and draw plans for a new outdoor table on the back of their agenda sheet.

Hence, the meeting could take place in a constructive, yet predictable manner.

Now, with meetings largely online, nothing is as it seems.

Most of the types listed above will have Chat GPT or its equivalent open, and they will be able to multiskill, planning a trip to conquer the Camino de Santiago while throwing in the occasional insight that makes them appear ready for a promotion.

You’ll know though, Kevin, it isn’t that hard to work out.

If, for example, middle-management Roger has gone from saying things like “Get Mary to do it or I’m going on stress leave”, to “The current process is causing delays because approvals are duplicated across two teams. I think we should centralise sign-off to one manager. There is a significant degree of operational and psychological pressure associated with this matter,” then it is clear your staff members have transitioned to using AI for anything requiring a modicum of analysis.

There is only one way around this.

You either need to accept that the average workforce is soon going to resemble a crew of post-lobotomy Randle McMurphys (i.e. the guy from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest) or insist on in-person, device-free meetings, so workplaces recognise genuine strengths and diverse talents and reward real thoughts not fast fingers.

Carpe diem,

Jasminda.