Elevator, that space where you leave all that elevated discussion behind

The title of this column might lead you to believe I'm talking about technology fitted into office buildings. But the last time I asked Siri to 'Call dad,' it replied, 'Which dad would you like me to call?'

So first, I'm not qualified to talk about technology. And second, I'm incredibly grateful that my mother was not with me at the time. What I'm talking about is the intelligence in the room. Not the amount present, but the amount that finds its way into the conversation.

You see, every organisation has two meetings. The scheduled meeting takes place in the boardroom. The honest one usually starts in the elevator afterwards.


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Inside the boardroom, the meeting ends exactly as meetings have ended since PowerPoint was invented. 'Great discussion, everyone.'

Laptops snap shut with the urgency of people escaping a small fire. Someone spends longer winding up their laptop charger than they spent contributing to the meeting. Another suddenly remembers they have a 'hard stop', which is corporate terminology for 'I have suffered enough.'

Then everyone walks out. The elevator doors close. And almost on cue the honest meeting starts when somebody says, 'So what did you really think?'

It's one of the fastest personality transformations you'll ever witness. The executive who spent 2 hours nodding thoughtfully suddenly develops concerns. The person who volunteered to 'take ownership' begins explaining why this technically belongs to another department. And the person who said, 'Absolutely, let's do it,' reveals that by 'absolutely' they meant 'under no circumstances whatsoever.'

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Corporate life demands extraordinary acting ability. I've been a professional performer for over 20 years, and I've seen acting in boardrooms that would put Broadway to shame. If there were Oscars for office behaviour, the competition would be fierce.

Best Performance While Completely Disagreeing. Outstanding Achievement in Thoughtful Nodding. Best Supporting Smile. Best Original Excuse for Leaving Early. Best Visual Effects for Pretending to Take Notes While Actually Answering WhatsApp. And a Lifetime Achievement Award for Looking Fascinated During Slide 83.

Then there's the executive who begins every contribution with, 'Just to play devil's advocate...' Moments later, the devil mysteriously disappears, leaving only the advocate. I've always felt sorry for the devil. He gets blamed for an astonishing number of opinions that clearly belong to other people, and yet never seems to get invited to the meeting himself.

The most impressive performer of all, however, is the person who says absolutely nothing for 2 hours, and then, somewhere between the boardroom door and the parking lot, delivers the single-most insightful observation of the entire afternoon. It's extraordinary. Apparently, wisdom isn't allowed in the room. It has to wait outside until it's kryptonite, the projector, has been switched off.

I've seen versions of that moment all over the world. Different industries. Different cultures. Different languages. Exactly the same elevator.

The strange thing is that I don't think people are being dishonest in meetings. They're being careful. Nobody wants to ask the question that makes 20 pairs of eyes swivel instinctively towards the CEO before deciding whether it's safe to answer. It's democracy, but with one voter.

I've lost count of how many times I've heard the same corridor conversations all over the world. Only the accents change. 'He'd already decided before we walked in.' 'I still don't know what we actually agreed.' 'Wait, are we doing that?' 'I thought you were going to say something.' 'I thought YOU were going to say something.' Or my favourite, 'That'll never get through finance.'

It's amazing how much organisational clarity can fit inside an elevator. That's why I've stopped judging meetings by what gets said inside the room. I'm far more interested in what gets said on the way out. Because if the most useful conversation only begins after the meeting has ended, perhaps the smartest room in the building was never the boardroom in the first place. It was always the elevator.