Picture this: It's Monday morning, you're at the office, you're settling in for the day at work, and this guy that you sort of recognize from down the hall, walks right into your cubicle and he steals your chair. Doesn't say a word — just rolls away with it. Doesn't give you any information about why he took your chair out of all the other chairs that are out there. Doesn't acknowledge the fact that you might need your chair to get some work done today. You wouldn't stand for it. You'd make a stink. You'd follow that guy back to his cubicle and you'd say, "Why my chair?"
Okay, so now it's Tuesday morning and you're at the office, and a meeting invitation pops up in your calendar. (Laughter) And it's from this woman who you kind of know from down the hall, and the subject line references some project that you heard a little bit about. But there's no agenda. There's no information about why you were invited to the meeting. And yet you accept the meeting invitation, and you go. And when this highly unproductive session is over, you go back to your desk, and you stand at your desk and you say, "Boy, I wish I had those two hours back, like I wish I had my chair back." (Laughter)
Every day, we allow our coworkers, who are otherwise very, very nice people, to steal from us. And I'm talking about something far more valuable than office furniture. I'm talking about time. Your time. In fact, I believe that we are in the middle of a global epidemic of a terrible new illness known as MAS: Mindless Accept Syndrome. (Laughter) The primary symptom of Mindless Accept Syndrome is just accepting a meeting invitation the minute it pops up in your calendar. (Laughter) It's an involuntary reflex — ding, click, bing — it's in your calendar, "Gotta go, I'm already late for a meeting." (Laughter)
Meetings are important, right? And collaboration is key to the success of any enterprise. And a well-run meeting can yield really positive, actionable results. But between globalization and pervasive information technology, the way that we work has really changed dramatically over the last few years. And we're miserable. (Laughter) And we're miserable not because the other guy can't run a good meeting, it's because of MAS, our Mindless Accept Syndrome, which is a self-inflicted wound.
Actually, I have evidence to prove that MAS is a global epidemic. Let me tell you why. A couple of years ago, I put a video on Youtube, and in the video, I acted out every terrible conference call you've ever been on. It goes on for about five minutes, and it has all the things that we hate about really bad meetings. There's the moderator who has no idea how to run the meeting. There are the participants who have no idea why they're there. The whole thing kind of collapses into this collaborative train wreck. And everybody leaves very angry. It's kind of funny. (Laughter) Let's take a quick look. (Video) Our goal today is to come to an agreement on a very important proposal. As a group, we need to decide if — bloop bloop — Hi, who just joined? Hi, it's Joe. I'm working from home today. (Laughter) Hi, Joe. Thanks for joining us today, great. I was just saying, we have a lot of people on the call we'd like to get through, so let's skip the roll call and I'm gonna dive right in. Our goal today is to come to an agreement on a very important proposal. As a group, we need to decide if — bloop bloop — (Laughter) Hi, who just joined? No? I thought I heard a beep. (Laughter)
Sound familiar? Yeah, it sounds familiar to me, too. A couple of weeks after I put that online, 500,000 people in dozens of countries, I mean dozens of countries, watched this video. And three years later, it's still getting thousands of views every month. It's close to about a million right now. And in fact, some of the biggest companies in the world, companies that you've heard of but I won't name, have asked for my permission to use this video in their new-hire training to teach their new employees how not to run a meeting at their company. And if the numbers — there are a million views and it's being used by all these companies — aren't enough proof that we have a global problem with meetings, there are the many, many thousands of comments posted online after the video went up. Thousands of people wrote things like, "OMG, that was my day today!" "That was my day every day!" "This is my life." One guy wrote, "It's funny because it's true. Eerily, sadly, depressingly true. It made me laugh until I cried. And cried. And I cried some more." (Laughter) This poor guy said, "My daily life until retirement or death, sigh." These are real quotes and it's real sad
A common theme running through all of these comments online is this fundamental belief that we are powerless to do anything other than go to meetings and suffer through these poorly run meetings and live to meet another day. But the truth is, we're not powerless at all. In fact, the cure for MAS is right here in our hands. It's right at our fingertips, literally. It's something that I call ¡No MAS! (Laughter) Which, if I remember my high school Spanish, means something like, "Enough already, make it stop!"
Here's how No MAS works. It's very simple. First of all, the next time you get a meeting invitation that doesn't have a lot of information in it at all, click the tentative button! It's okay, you're allowed, that's why it's there. It's right next to the accept button. Or the maybe button, or whatever button is there for you not to accept immediately. Then, get in touch with the person who asked you to the meeting. Tell them you're very excited to support their work, ask them what the goal of the meeting is, and tell them you're interested in learning how you can help them achieve their goal. And if we do this often enough, and we do it respectfully, people might start to be a little bit more thoughtful about the way they put together meeting invitations. And you can make more thoughtful decisions about accepting it. People might actually start sending out agendas. Imagine! Or they might not have a conference call with 12 people to talk about a status when they could just do a quick email and get it done with. People just might start to change their behavior because you changed yours. And they just might bring your chair back, too. (Laughter) No MAS! Thank you. (Applause).
想象一下： 星期一的早晨 你在辦公室 準(zhǔn)備開(kāi)始一天的工作 這時(shí)，坐在附近、你勉強(qiáng)認(rèn)得的那個(gè)人 徑直走到你的隔間 把你的椅子拿走了 并且沒(méi)有對(duì)此說(shuō)一個(gè)字 就直接把它推走了 沒(méi)告訴你為何那么多椅子擺在那 卻偏偏拿走了你的 不了解你或許需要這把椅子 來(lái)完成今天的工作 你不能容忍這樣的事 你會(huì)跟著那人走到他的隔間 然后質(zhì)問(wèn)：“為什么拿我的椅子?”
現(xiàn)在是星期二的早晨，你在辦公室 日歷上突然跳出一個(gè)會(huì)議邀請(qǐng) (笑聲) 來(lái)自于你在走廊里有點(diǎn)頭之交的這位女士 標(biāo)題欄顯示會(huì)議是有關(guān)一個(gè)你勉強(qiáng)聽(tīng)說(shuō)過(guò)的項(xiàng)目 但是沒(méi)有議程 沒(méi)有任何信息告訴你被邀請(qǐng)到這個(gè)會(huì)議的原因 但你接受了邀請(qǐng)并去參會(huì) 當(dāng)這個(gè)毫無(wú)成果的會(huì)議結(jié)束 你回到自己的辦公桌 你站在辦公桌旁說(shuō) “天，我希望拿回過(guò)去的兩小時(shí) 就像我希望拿回我的椅子。” (笑聲)
每一天 我們都在讓好心的同事們 從我們身上竊取 我說(shuō)的是遠(yuǎn)比辦公室家具更有價(jià)值的東西 我說(shuō)的是時(shí)間。你的時(shí)間 事實(shí)上，我認(rèn)為 我們正處在一種叫MAS的 可怕的新型全球性疫病中 M(盲目)A(接受)S(綜合癥) (笑聲) 盲目接受綜合癥的主要癥狀是 當(dāng)會(huì)議邀請(qǐng)一出現(xiàn)在你的日歷上時(shí)就接受它 (笑聲) 這是不自覺(jué)地反應(yīng)——叮，點(diǎn)擊，嗶——把它加到你的日歷上了 “得走了。我開(kāi)會(huì)已經(jīng)遲到了” (笑聲)
會(huì)議很重要，是吧? 合作是任何企業(yè)成功的關(guān)鍵 一個(gè)進(jìn)展良好的會(huì)議可以收獲非常正向，可行性高的成果 但是在全球化 以及大型信息技術(shù)之間 我們工作的方式 在過(guò)去幾年里已發(fā)生了翻天覆地的變化 然后我們很痛苦 (笑聲) 我們痛苦不是因?yàn)閯e人不能運(yùn)作個(gè)好的會(huì)議 而是因?yàn)镸AS，我們的盲目接受綜合癥 這個(gè)病狀是我們自找的
事實(shí)上，我能證明MAS是一種全球性的疫病 我來(lái)告訴你為什么 幾年前我在Youtube上傳了一個(gè)視頻 在視頻中我把所有你曾經(jīng)歷的最糟糕的會(huì)議情況展現(xiàn)出來(lái) 時(shí)長(zhǎng)大約五分鐘 包含了一切有關(guān)令我們討厭的會(huì)議 主持者完全不知道怎樣運(yùn)作會(huì)議 參會(huì)者完全不知道自己為什么參加 整件事演變成一場(chǎng)集體脫軌 每個(gè)人離開(kāi)時(shí)都很憤怒 這仿佛挺可笑的 (笑聲) 我們來(lái)簡(jiǎn)單看一下 (視頻)我們今天的目標(biāo)是就一個(gè)非常重要的提議達(dá)成一個(gè)共識(shí) 作為一個(gè)團(tuán)隊(duì)，我們需要決定如果—— 嗶 嗶—— 嗨，誰(shuí)剛剛加入了? 嗨，我是喬。我今天在家辦公 (笑聲) 嗨，喬。謝謝你的加入，很好 我剛提到說(shuō)，我們此次會(huì)議有很多人參加 所以我們跳過(guò)點(diǎn)名 我就直接開(kāi)始了 我們今天的目標(biāo)是就一個(gè)非常重要的提議達(dá)成一個(gè)共識(shí) 作為一個(gè)團(tuán)隊(duì)，我們需要決定如果—— 嗶 嗶—— (笑聲) 嗨，誰(shuí)剛剛加入了? 沒(méi)人?我以為我聽(tīng)到了嗶聲 (笑聲)
聽(tīng)起來(lái)很熟悉嗎? 這對(duì)我來(lái)說(shuō)也非常熟悉 在我上傳視頻之后的幾星期 來(lái)自數(shù)十個(gè)國(guó)家的50萬(wàn)人 真的是數(shù)十個(gè)國(guó)家 觀(guān)看了這個(gè)視頻 之后的三年，每個(gè)月依然有幾千次觀(guān)看 到現(xiàn)在大約有一百萬(wàn)次了 事實(shí)上有一些全球大公司 你肯定知道的公司，但我不會(huì)說(shuō)出名字 他們征求我的允許想將此視頻用于上崗培訓(xùn) 來(lái)教導(dǎo)他們的新員工們?cè)鯓硬灰诠纠镩_(kāi)這樣的會(huì)議 如果 幾百萬(wàn)次的觀(guān)看記錄和已被大公司使用的事實(shí) 不足以證明開(kāi)會(huì)已經(jīng)是全球性問(wèn)題 在視頻被上傳之后 有成千上萬(wàn)條評(píng)論 發(fā)布在網(wǎng)絡(luò)上 數(shù)千人寫(xiě)下這樣的話(huà) “我的天，這就是我的今天” “這是我的每一天!” “這是我的生活” 有個(gè)人寫(xiě)到 “這很有趣，因?yàn)檫@就是事實(shí) 怪異、可悲、令人沮喪的事實(shí) 它讓我笑到哭出來(lái) 然后我哭了，哭得更傷心了” (笑聲) 這個(gè)可憐的人寫(xiě)到： “這是我直到退休或死亡的每一天，嘆氣” 這些都是真實(shí)的評(píng)論 很令人傷感
這些網(wǎng)上評(píng)論有一個(gè)共同點(diǎn)是 已認(rèn)定我們無(wú)能為力 來(lái)避免參加這些會(huì)議 避免忍受這些效率很差的會(huì)議 避免日日如此 但其實(shí)我們絕不是無(wú)能為力 實(shí)際上盲目接受綜合癥的解藥就在我們手里 真的就在我們指尖 我稱(chēng)其為“拒絕MAS” (笑聲) 我記得高中學(xué)過(guò)的西班牙語(yǔ) 這句的意思大概是“已經(jīng)夠了，停止吧”
拒絕MAS的做法很簡(jiǎn)單 首先，下次你接到會(huì)議邀請(qǐng)時(shí) 那種沒(méi)有包含任何相關(guān)信息的會(huì)議邀請(qǐng) 點(diǎn)擊“不確定”按鈕! 你是可以這么做的，所以才有這個(gè)按鈕 就在“接受”按鈕旁邊 或者是“或許”按鈕，或者是別的什么按鈕讓你不用立刻同意接受 接著，找到那個(gè)邀請(qǐng)你參加會(huì)議的人 告訴他們你很高興能支持他們的工作 問(wèn)他們會(huì)議的目的 告訴他們你愿意去學(xué)習(xí)怎樣能幫他們打成目標(biāo) 如果我們總是這樣做 以尊重的態(tài)度這樣做 人們會(huì)在邀請(qǐng)別人參加會(huì)議時(shí) 多動(dòng)點(diǎn)腦筋 你在接受與否時(shí)做出更周全的決定 人們或許能真的開(kāi)始列出議程， 想象一下 或者他們不會(huì)開(kāi)一個(gè)12人參加的電話(huà)會(huì)議來(lái)討論數(shù)據(jù) 而用簡(jiǎn)單電子郵件就把事情搞定的 人們的行為會(huì)因?yàn)槟愕母淖兌S之改變 他們也會(huì)把你的椅子還給你 (笑聲) 拒絕盲目選擇綜合癥! 謝謝 (鼓掌)
「標(biāo)簽: ted演講稿」
