Meetings as culture, Part 3:

At a large nonprofit, the team’s schedules were packed—weekly staff meetings were one of the few times they could connect and align on big priorities. Having just gotten Board approval of an ambitious strategic plan, the leadership team saw this as a high-leverage moment and made bold changes to improve the structure: clear purposes, defined outcomes, and assigned ownership. 

But after a high-stakes budget conversation fell flat, it became clear that structure wasn’t enough. The behavior in the room—who spoke, who listened, how decisions were made—mattered just as much. 

Every habit embedded in the nonprofit’s culture—good and bad—was showing up somewhere in their meetings. Rather than ignore it, the team used it. They turned meetings into a mirror (and a tool) for culture change. 

This is the third post in our Meetings as Culture series. Part 1 explores how meetings reflect your organization’s culture. Part 2 offers practical solutions to five common meeting pitfalls. Now, in Part 3, we focus on the five individual and team behaviors that drive lasting culture change—one meeting at a time. 

Meetings as the crucible of culture  

Meetings are where your company culture plays out in real time—where it’s tested, transformed, and forged under pressure. The more senior you are, the more meetings you attend. Your behavior in these meetings—whether you’re leading or participating—affects the culture of your organization. Each company has a unique approach to meetings that reflects their culture.  

At BTS, we believe meetings are more than just structures—they’re part of your organization’s social fabric. The way people interact, pay attention, and respect each other’s time in meetings reflects your company’s values and mindsets. In short, a single meeting is the culture in concentrated form. 

As simple as it sounds, there are five fundamental meeting behaviors: 

1. Listening
2. Participating 
3. Efficiency 
4. Accountability 
5. Focus 

These five meeting behaviors – defined in observable terms to ‘see’ what works – can be developed by individuals, teams, and organizations to transform your meeting culture. Individual behavior informs team dynamics, which aggregate to become organizational behaviors. To shift your culture, you need to progressively develop meeting behaviors with individuals, teams, and the organization.  

Develop the five meeting behaviors—as individuals, teams, and organizations 

Start by looking in the mirror. Individuals have a major impact on meeting productivity and inclusiveness. It starts with you—your actions shape the meeting environment, whether you are leading it or not.  

Considering your last meeting, ask yourself: How many times did I reschedule this meeting? Was I on time? How well did I listen? Did I ask questions for clarity, or did I talk over others? Did I come to the meeting having done what I said I would do? Did I leave knowing and committing aloud what I will do next? The fixes are all simple, but not always easy. 

• Quick tip: A BTS client aiming to improve their meetings found that reminding individuals of the power of asking more probing questions helped foster better listening, which helped with their strategic goal of building a culture of stronger collaboration. A probing question is one that opens up the conversation, clarifies the discussion for everyone, and increases ideas generation.  

Once individuals are aware of and start improving their behaviors, look at how the team works. Here, you will start to notice that individual behaviors seep into team patterns: Are the same voices always leading the conversation? Does everyone feel free to speak up? Do we reward diverse perspectives and debate? How many conversations do we have at the same time? Do the triggers that often derail us have discernable tells? 

• Quick tip: Consider how you allocate time during meetings. One team made a rule to save the last five minutes of any important topic for quieter members to speak, sending a strong message: everyone’s voice matters. It’s often easier to change meeting structures (like the agenda) than it is to change behaviors. So, use structures to support the team behaviors you want.

Cumulatively, meetings have a huge organizational impact. If you look closely, you can see how meetings reflect and shape company-wide cultural values. Are your meetings aligned with the strategic priorities of the business and the values you want to see across the organization? 

• Quick tip: When the meeting invite and materials you send in advance overtly connect the meeting’s purpose and outcomes to broader business goals, people are more aligned and productive. As a side benefit, people should question any meeting that cannot be tied to a broader business goal—it is the litmus test of a meeting agenda.  

Assess your meeting effectiveness   

If you’re not paying attention to how you and your team behave during meetings, you won’t have a sense of how effective your meetings are, and they won’t improve.  

At the nonprofit in our earlier example, leaders tracked their progress with a simple anonymous post-meeting poll. After each meeting, participants gave a thumbs up if the meeting hit the five fundamental observable behaviors or a thumbs down if it didn’t. This quick feedback helped them stay on track.  

Reflect on your most recent meeting using the framework below. 

How to do it: 

Start with assessing your most recent meeting at Level 1 on the chart below. If you can’t answer “yes” to the fundamental meeting behaviors at Level 1, then this is an area to practice intentionally next meeting. To level up to Level 2 and 3, answer “yes” for all five meeting behaviors for three meetings in a row (to ensure it’s not a fluke). 

Level 1:

Download the worksheet below to see Levels 2 and 3.