This week, we're talking about high-leverage practice number two: organize and facilitate effective meetings with professionals and families. And Ashley, in your roles, you have done a whole heck of a lot of this with students who are struggling in all kinds of different ways. So, for you in your practice, what does this look like?

Yes, I have had plenty of meetings that I've had to organize and facilitate. So, I am again going to go back to what I always usually fall back on, and that is the relationship building that is involved in really making anything work. I do believe that if you have some sort of relationship and you've built that relationship with the people that are going to be in attendance at the meeting, the meeting will go much better than if you do not have any sort of, you know, relationship with these people.

So, when it comes to organizing and facilitating these meetings, I would say always make sure that everybody is on time. Always do introductions, make sure that everybody knows- I always look at it from the parents' point of view. You know, for us who are in the school system, we do these meetings all the time, and it, you know, becomes pretty just. I don't want to say easy, but a common thing that we have to do, we seem to be constantly in meetings.

But when it comes to the parents or the guardians or any outsiders who are coming in, they need to feel welcomed, and they need to be appreciated right from the beginning. Make it known that we, you know, value their time. Start the meeting on time, listen to anything that they would like to bring up in regards to, you know, what we are discussing, and that level of respect that you can use as leverage with the parents to understand, so they know that they're not coming in and it's your team against them. It's everybody working together for a common goal, and that's to meet the best needs of the student, which is their child.

Yeah. And you've. You've had some successes with some pretty contentious conversations, definitely, where there's been opposing views at the table. How do you lead that? How do you walk through those really, like, tense conversations or those tense meetings in a way that is truly collaborative by the end of it?

That's a very good question. When you're sitting with an educational team, which includes the parent and the guardian, you know, a lot of times the educators, obviously, that are in the room, they put time and effort into what they want to tell the parent, you know, what they want to bring to the table. And I think it is important that, you know, we listen to what they have to say and we acknowledge that. But one of the biggest things is, and I'm going to go back to what I said before, is you know, making sure that that parent is comfortable.

There are plenty of meetings where the parent has come in and they are, you know, unhappy with us for some reason, they don't feel that we are doing our job with their child, whatever the case may be. And whether I am with a group of people or if I'm handling something individually, I always let that person really just let everything out. Like, tell us what you are feeling. Because if they feel heard and you respond to them appropriately, once they have gotten everything out and they feel like you have really heard them, and then I do believe that that comes to a, you know, a table where everybody is working together.

It is usually when I have seen in my past experiences that, you know, you have a group sitting at a table and you know, it's just educator, educator, educator. You know, it might be a SpEd director, it might be the principal, then speech. And it just feels like everybody is against this parent or this guardian or, you know, an advisor even that comes with them. So I do think it is extremely important to allow that parent to voice their opinion of what is going on, their struggles, take some notes, it's a serious thing. If they're bringing it to the table, it's definitely serious.

But really listen to them and then, you know, acknowledge, I have in the past too, and you know, I think once you start where you have that relationship that's built with the teachers also, or the people that are going to be, you know, in attendance with these meetings, that they understand that if I usually step in like that, that I'm doing it for a reason. Because we have built that trust within one another that, you know, I'm not going to let them leave them out, you know, to hang dry, you know, that I'm going to support them. But it might be in a very different approach than what, you know, would typically happen.

And it really, it's just then having that conversation, even with the teachers, then afterwards, that I understand you put a lot of time and effort into, you know, what you wanted to bring to the table. But we were not going to accomplish what we needed to accomplish unless this parent felt heard and respected and on board and appreciated. So sometimes, you know, we just have to take a little different approach with that.

But like I said, it’s all about relationship building, you know, whether it comes to parents, whether it comes to with your teachers, whether it comes, you know, with your students. If you can build those relationships, is amazing. What you can accomplish just by being mutually civil. 

So I'm wondering when you've got so many different people at the table, right? I mean, I'm thinking even just within the practitioners when it comes to topics around, you know, things that maybe our social workers are serving, some of the emotional, behavioral skills that the kids are developing, and they should be acting a certain way, but they're not there yet. Or they have some of these unseen, you know, maybe psychological health or internal challenges. And, you know, how that is coming out is maybe misunderstood or misrepresented by different people at the table.

And how do you walk with that team where they're all, you know, professionals and they have their own expertise in their own areas, and they are showing up in ways that are true for them? How do you get all of those different perspectives to align when you're at the table, right? You're having that meeting, you're having that conversation. How do you, you know, pull all of those, you know, potentially dissimilar or maybe even opposing views together on behalf of that kid?

So in the past, what I have done, when especially it's a particularly large meeting, a. I do think you need to pick and choose and limit the amount of people and really make sure that the people that are coming to the table have something worthy to say. You know, a lot of times we have teachers that, you know, especially if you're in a middle school setting or even, you know, high school setting or even a later elementary setting, you have a student who has multiple teachers.

There have been times when I have had teachers say, “Well, I really have something to say.” And then, you know, the math teacher, well, I really want to bring up this. And. Okay, well, so a couple of strategies that I've used in the past are having those teachers meet and having one representative. That way, then it's not four or five sitting at the table. It's just one. You can still. And, you know, they choose. They choose who they want to attend that meeting, and what they choose is important to them. Just to discuss.

The other thing that I have had to do too is, you know, sometimes every person that is within a building thinks that what they have to say is the utmost important, you know, over anybody else. And that does happen. And it. And I'm not saying that, you know, that math teacher, what they want to say is not important, but it might not be necessary at that particular time, and it might not be beneficial to bring up at that particular time.

So another strategy that I've used, especially when it is with a parent or a student, you know, that has a lot of outside needs other than just the basic educational classroom. When you're talking about social workers and therapists, and you know, you could have certain people from a SpEd team who are kind of putting together, almost like a side agenda, of this is the order that we are going in. And at this point, at this particular meeting, the social and emotional needs of the student are more important right now than what we are looking at, just how they are doing in the math classroom. And we do approach that, and we do discuss that because the teachers need to hear that, and the parents need to hear that also. But there are certain times that it is more than social and emotional need that needs to be discussed, you know, and so you kind of just put it in order of like what's most important.

You also. I do think it's extremely important to value everybody's time and make sure that if it's a 30-minute meeting, we're going to do our darndest to, you know, stick to that 30-minute meeting. If it's an hour meeting, the same thing. And so, you know, kind of put together in your head and let your team know that you are sitting down, you know, ahead of time, let them know that here's kind of the order that we're gonna speak because these are the needs that are most important right now.

So how do you bring the family into that? I know you've done a beautiful job here, just reiterating respect and rapport. Respect rapport, right. Like, you need to have a genuine respect for each other, even if you disagree with each other. And you need to have some kind of rapport that transcends that one conversation that you're having. And so if we're juggling all of this within our own teams, within a school, now we're bringing in the family, and you know, potentially other people that they're bringing with them as well.

Now, like now, what are some of those strategies that you've used to really make sure that everybody's together in this conversation?

When I talk about having on paper agenda or in my mind an agenda, you know, a lot of times it is the parent that is even calling this meeting because you know, the kid has gotten in trouble for this or you know, it could be academics, they're, you know, not up to par and they're seeing that their grades are slipping. I always try to have to keep the meeting very, you know, quaint and on on track with what the purpose of the meeting is, is have those couple of things, you know, whether I have them written down off to the side or in the back of my head, this is kind of why we are having this meeting.

There are times that you have to constantly, you know, re prompt like, hey, today our focus is, you know, these things. These are the things that we were trying to, you know, we can definitely, you know, talk about these other things at a different time or if we have time, you know, later. But really, this is kind of what the meeting, you know, the agenda for the meeting was, and really just keep bringing people back to the real reason that we are there.

And it probably is, you know, three, four things maybe that, you know, are going on that, you know, whether, like I said, the teacher is calling that meeting or the parent is calling that meeting, and just are times that you constantly have to, especially as that administrator or the lead of that meeting, bring them back to, well, this is the real reason that we are meeting. So let's keep our focus here.

Yeah, I think sometimes that's. That can be easier said than done because especially with these students, there is just a lot, like, there's a lot going on. There's typically a lot going on inside of them, around them, in their local area, in their social circles. Like, there's just so much. And so I agree with you. Sometimes it's just telling the team, Hey, we're not going to solve everything today.

Right? Like, our goal is to make progress, going to move in the right direction. We're going to make a few adjustments so that we can see if we can go a little further or faster in that better direction. But, yeah, we can't solve every single thing right now, nor could we even if we came up  with solutions for every single thing; could we actually implement them all simultaneously anyway? So, you know, how can we prioritize, you know, what is the big need right now?

And can we root that conversation in the moment as well?

Yeah, you know, and I'm just going to go back to the fact that too. I have always really prided myself on that relationship building. And so I think that when you have somebody who is leading a meeting that is sitting at the table, and no matter what role that person at the table is playing in that child's life, if you have that relationship and you build that trust, and it takes a lot of work. It takes a lot of work and a lot of, you know, just being very genuine and sitting down and really listening to people and, you know, getting to know people and letting them get to know you.

You know, it's always been something that is very special to me because I don't necessarily. It's not something that I've really planned for, but I've always been able to just have those relationships. And, you know, if a meeting is where it sounds like it's, you know, starting to go south, I'm able to usually bring people back to the table to really be like, hey, this is what we are here to do right now.

And because I have those relationships with the people that are at the table, and the majority of the time they're like, yes, you are right. Let's, let's, you know, refocus on why we're really here. But that wouldn't happen, you know, because I've seen the flip side and I've been part of the flip side, you know, as a teacher or as, you know, a department head or an assistant, where, you know, you don't have. That just makes it very difficult.

So that's why. Yeah, relationship building is one of my things that is top on my list in order to just make schools and children and everything that goes into their educational processes as solid as they can be by building those relationships.

Well, I think you keep saying building relationships, but there are so many strategies that go into actually forming that relationship. And I mean, like, for you, I know, like, you're constantly engaging people's thoughts, you're asking them their honest opinion, and you're honoring that. And so it's not just like, oh, sure, share your thoughts. And then I'm just going to move on and do whatever I was going to do anyway. It's like, no, you have an active voice here, and I want that voice, and I am going to act on that voice as it shows up. And if you do that enough times, then people are like, oh, like, she actually means what she says, right? It's not just lip service. And then that is what perpetuates the relationship, that rapport building.

I always tell people, like, if you're working on this high-leverage practice and all you're focused on is the meeting, you're missing the mark. Because there are so many other things that are happening around before and after. Gosh, if we're missing those things, it doesn't matter how great the meeting is. It will never be as good as what it could have been. If we did all of that legwork ahead of time, you've done such a beautiful job today at walking through and explaining.

Thank you so much for sharing your expertise. I know you are in charge of lots of different kinds of meetings and many of them fairly contentious, so thank you for sharing how you navigate some of those scenarios.

Yes, I appreciate it!