David Grady: How to save the world (or at least yourself) from bad meetings

翻译人员: Aimee Zhou 校对人员: Jenny Yang

Picture this:

想象一下：

It's Monday morning,

星期一的早晨

you're at the office,

你在办公室

you're settling in for the day at work,

准备开始一天的工作

and this guy that you sort of recognize from down the hall,

这时，坐在附近、你勉强认得的那个人

walks right into your cubicle

径直走到你的隔间

and he steals your chair.

把你的椅子拿走了

Doesn't say a word —

并且没有对此说一个字

just rolls away with it.

就直接把它推走了

Doesn't give you any information about why he took your chair

没告诉你为何那么多椅子摆在那

out of all the other chairs that are out there.

却偏偏拿走了你的

Doesn't acknowledge the fact that you might need your chair

不了解你或许需要这把椅子

to get some work done today.

来完成今天的工作

You wouldn't stand for it. You'd make a stink.

你不能容忍这样的事

You'd follow that guy back to his cubicle

你会跟着那人走到他的隔间

and you'd say, "Why my chair?"

然后质问：“为什么拿我的椅子？”

Okay, so now it's Tuesday morning and you're at the office,

现在是星期二的早晨，你在办公室

and a meeting invitation pops up in your calendar.

日历上突然跳出一个会议邀请

(Laughter)

（笑声）

And it's from this woman who you kind of know from down the hall,

来自于你在走廊里有点头之交的这位女士

and the subject line references some project that you heard a little bit about.

标题栏显示会议是有关一个你勉强听说过的项目

But there's no agenda.

但是没有议程

There's no information about why you were invited to the meeting.

没有任何信息告诉你被邀请到这个会议的原因

And yet you accept the meeting invitation, and you go.

但你接受了邀请并去参会

And when this highly unproductive session is over,

当这个毫无成果的会议结束

you go back to your desk,

你回到自己的办公桌

and you stand at your desk and you say,

你站在办公桌旁说

"Boy, I wish I had those two hours back,

“天，我希望拿回过去的两小时

like I wish I had my chair back."

就像我希望拿回我的椅子。”

(Laughter)

（笑声）

Every day, we allow our coworkers,

每一天

who are otherwise very, very nice people,

我们都在让好心的同事们

to steal from us.

从我们身上窃取

And I'm talking about something far more valuable than office furniture.

我说的是远比办公室家具更有价值的东西

I'm talking about time. Your time.

我说的是时间。你的时间

In fact, I believe that

事实上，我认为

we are in the middle of a global epidemic

我们正处在一种叫MAS的

of a terrible new illness known as MAS:

可怕的新型全球性疫病中

Mindless Accept Syndrome.

M（盲目）A（接受）S（综合症）

(Laughter)

（笑声）

The primary symptom of Mindless Accept Syndrome

盲目接受综合症的主要症状是

is just accepting a meeting invitation the minute it pops up in your calendar.

当会议邀请一出现在你的日历上时就接受它

(Laughter)

（笑声）

It's an involuntary reflex — ding, click, bing — it's in your calendar,

这是不自觉地反应——叮，点击，哔——把它加到你的日历上了

"Gotta go, I'm already late for a meeting." (Laughter)

“得走了。我开会已经迟到了” （笑声）

Meetings are important, right?

会议很重要，是吧？

And collaboration is key to the success of any enterprise.

合作是任何企业成功的关键

And a well-run meeting can yield really positive, actionable results.

一个进展良好的会议可以收获非常正向，可行性高的成果

But between globalization

但是在全球化

and pervasive information technology,

以及大型信息技术之间

the way that we work

我们工作的方式

has really changed dramatically over the last few years.

在过去几年里已发生了翻天覆地的变化

And we're miserable. (Laughter)

然后我们很痛苦 （笑声）

And we're miserable not because the other guy can't run a good meeting,

我们痛苦不是因为别人不能运作个好的会议

it's because of MAS, our Mindless Accept Syndrome,

而是因为MAS，我们的盲目接受综合症

which is a self-inflicted wound.

这个病状是我们自找的

Actually, I have evidence to prove that MAS is a global epidemic.

事实上，我能证明MAS是一种全球性的疫病

Let me tell you why.

我来告诉你为什么

A couple of years ago, I put a video on Youtube, and in the video,

几年前我在Youtube上传了一个视频

I acted out every terrible conference call you've ever been on.

在视频中我把所有你曾经历的最糟糕的会议情况展现出来

It goes on for about five minutes,

时长大约五分钟

and it has all the things that we hate about really bad meetings.

包含了一切有关令我们讨厌的会议

There's the moderator who has no idea how to run the meeting.

主持者完全不知道怎样运作会议

There are the participants who have no idea why they're there.

参会者完全不知道自己为什么参加

The whole thing kind of collapses into this collaborative train wreck.

整件事演变成一场集体脱轨

And everybody leaves very angry.

每个人离开时都很愤怒

It's kind of funny.

这仿佛挺可笑的

(Laughter)

（笑声）

Let's take a quick look.

我们来简单看一下

(Video) Our goal today is to come to an agreement on a very important proposal.

（视频）我们今天的目标是就一个非常重要的提议达成一个共识

As a group, we need to decide if —

作为一个团队，我们需要决定如果——

bloop bloop —

哔 哔——

Hi, who just joined?

嗨，谁刚刚加入了？

Hi, it's Joe. I'm working from home today.

嗨，我是乔。我今天在家办公

(Laughter)

（笑声）

Hi, Joe. Thanks for joining us today, great.

嗨，乔。谢谢你的加入，很好

I was just saying, we have a lot of people on the call we'd like to get through,

我刚提到说，我们此次会议有很多人参加

so let's skip the roll call

所以我们跳过点名

and I'm gonna dive right in.

我就直接开始了

Our goal today is to come to an agreement on a very important proposal.

我们今天的目标是就一个非常重要的提议达成一个共识

As a group, we need to decide if —

作为一个团队，我们需要决定如果——

bloop bloop —

哔 哔——

(Laughter)

（笑声）

Hi, who just joined?

嗨，谁刚刚加入了？

No? I thought I heard a beep. (Laughter)

没人？我以为我听到了哔声 （笑声）

Sound familiar?

听起来很熟悉吗？

Yeah, it sounds familiar to me, too.

这对我来说也非常熟悉

A couple of weeks after I put that online,

在我上传视频之后的几星期

500,000 people in dozens of countries,

来自数十个国家的50万人

I mean dozens of countries,

真的是数十个国家

watched this video.

观看了这个视频

And three years later, it's still getting thousands of views every month.

之后的三年，每个月依然有几千次观看

It's close to about a million right now.

到现在大约有一百万次了

And in fact, some of the biggest companies in the world,

事实上有一些全球大公司

companies that you've heard of but I won't name,

你肯定知道的公司，但我不会说出名字

have asked for my permission to use this video in their new-hire training

他们征求我的允许想将此视频用于上岗培训

to teach their new employees how not to run a meeting at their company.

来教导他们的新员工们怎样不要在公司里开这样的会议

And if the numbers —

如果

there are a million views and it's being used by all these companies —

几百万次的观看记录和已被大公司使用的事实

aren't enough proof that we have a global problem with meetings,

不足以证明开会已经是全球性问题

there are the many, many thousands

在视频被上传之后

of comments posted online

有成千上万条评论

after the video went up.

发布在网络上

Thousands of people wrote things like,

数千人写下这样的话

"OMG, that was my day today!"

“我的天，这就是我的今天”

"That was my day every day!"

“这是我的每一天！”

"This is my life."

“这是我的生活”

One guy wrote,

有个人写到

"It's funny because it's true.

“这很有趣，因为这就是事实

Eerily, sadly, depressingly true.

怪异、可悲、令人沮丧的事实

It made me laugh until I cried.

它让我笑到哭出来

And cried. And I cried some more."

然后我哭了，哭得更伤心了”

(Laughter)

（笑声）

This poor guy said,

这个可怜的人写到：

"My daily life until retirement or death, sigh."

“这是我直到退休或死亡的每一天，叹气”

These are real quotes

这些都是真实的评论

and it's real sad.

很令人伤感

A common theme running through all of these comments online

这些网上评论有一个共同点是

is this fundamental belief that we are powerless

已认定我们无能为力

to do anything other than go to meetings

来避免参加这些会议

and suffer through these poorly run meetings

避免忍受这些效率很差的会议

and live to meet another day.

避免日日如此

But the truth is, we're not powerless at all.

但其实我们绝不是无能为力

In fact, the cure for MAS is right here in our hands.

实际上盲目接受综合症的解药就在我们手里

It's right at our fingertips, literally.

真的就在我们指尖

It's something that I call ¡No MAS!

我称其为“拒绝MAS”

(Laughter)

（笑声）

Which, if I remember my high school Spanish,

我记得高中学过的西班牙语

means something like, "Enough already, make it stop!"

这句的意思大概是“已经够了，停止吧”

Here's how No MAS works. It's very simple.

拒绝MAS的做法很简单

First of all, the next time you get a meeting invitation

首先，下次你接到会议邀请时

that doesn't have a lot of information in it at all,

那种没有包含任何相关信息的会议邀请

click the tentative button!

点击“不确定”按钮！

It's okay, you're allowed, that's why it's there.

你是可以这么做的，所以才有这个按钮

It's right next to the accept button.

就在“接受”按钮旁边

Or the maybe button, or whatever button is there for you not to accept immediately.

或者是“或许”按钮，或者是别的什么按钮让你不用立刻同意接受

Then, get in touch with the person who asked you to the meeting.

接着，找到那个邀请你参加会议的人

Tell them you're very excited to support their work,

告诉他们你很高兴能支持他们的工作

ask them what the goal of the meeting is,

问他们会议的目的

and tell them you're interested in learning how you can help them achieve their goal.

告诉他们你愿意去学习怎样能帮他们打成目标

And if we do this often enough,

如果我们总是这样做

and we do it respectfully,

以尊重的态度这样做

people might start to be a little bit more thoughtful

人们会在邀请别人参加会议时

about the way they put together meeting invitations.

多动点脑筋

And you can make more thoughtful decisions about accepting it.

你在接受与否时做出更周全的决定

People might actually start sending out agendas. Imagine!

人们或许能真的开始列出议程， 想象一下

Or they might not have a conference call with 12 people to talk about a status

或者他们不会开一个12人参加的电话会议来讨论数据

when they could just do a quick email and get it done with.

而用简单电子邮件就把事情搞定的

People just might start to change their behavior because you changed yours.

人们的行为会因为你的改变而随之改变

And they just might bring your chair back, too. (Laughter)

他们也会把你的椅子还给你 （笑声）

No MAS!

拒绝盲目选择综合症！

Thank you.

谢谢

(Applause).

（鼓掌）