How do you think in meetings

13 May 2026 · 2 min

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1:38

In this brief talk, the speaker examines two dominant mental models that shape how people behave in meetings. The "windscreen" mindset looks forward, focusing on upcoming tasks, next steps, and project‑manager style planning. The "rearview mirror" mindset dwells on past events, storytelling, and recounting what has already happened. While both perspectives have value, the speaker argues that meetings become unproductive when participants linger on past narratives, especially when they are entertaining but do not move the discussion toward action. The core recommendation is to adopt a windscreen‑thinking approach: ask what needs to be done next, keep the conversation forward‑looking, and treat meetings as a vehicle for progress rather than a venue for reminiscence.

Chapters

Have you ever stopped to think about how you think or how your team thinks? Meetings tend to fall into a pattern of how people think, and there's 2 very broad patterns. The first is people look through the windscreen and they look forward to see where they're going and where they need to go. They think like a project manager. And the other type of thinking is the people who look in the rearview mirror and they look at where they've been. Both types of thinking are necessary at certain times, but you need to be more focused on the future and where you're going. People get frustrated in meetings when you talk about where you've been. The problem is some people have fabulous storytellers and raconteurs in their membership, and they tell wonderful stories. Oh, you should have been there. You should have seen what he said and the look on his face. And it's interesting. People want to hear it, but it doesn't actually progress the meeting forward. So you need to be a windscreen thinker. You need to be thinking forward. You need to think like a project manager. You need to think this: what do we need to do next to progress this particular project or task or whatever it is you're talking about or working on? Be a windscreen thinker, not a rearview mirror thinker.