In Meetings, Raise Hands Before Reading

I spent five and a half years at AWS before moving (back) to Microsoft, where I work today. At Amazon, many meetings began with silent reading. Instead of presenting a document, the author gave everyone time to read it before the discussion started. There was a small facilitation trick that made this work surprisingly well: when reading began, everyone raised a hand. When someone finished, they lowered it. The meeting started with all hands up and counted down to zero. At Microsoft, I found the inverse practice: everyone began with their hands down and raised one when they finished. At the time of writing this, you’ll find me hard at work changing the culture of raised hands at Microsoft, one meeting at a time. Raise your hand as you start reading, lower it when you are done. Both approaches appear to communicate the same information. They do not. Counting down is better than counting up. TL;DR: A raised hand shows who still needs time, which is the information the facilitator needs.…