You have talented people and clear organizational goals. So why does getting two departments to work together feel like pulling teeth?
It’s usually not a competence issue. It’s an information gap disguised as a personality conflict.
Marketing thinks Sales is ignoring their leads. Engineering thinks Product is making impossible demands. In the absence of real understanding, we fill in the blanks with assumptions. We tell ourselves, "They don't get it," or "They're just difficult."
Here’s the hard truth: You cannot be helpful to someone if you don’t understand what they are trying to achieve.
Most meetings are designed for telling: Here is what I need you to do. Here is my status update. Here is why you are wrong.
Very few meetings are designed for learning.
The Meet to Learn tool is a structural interrupt to the "inward mindset"—the natural tendency to focus on our own goals and see others as mere obstacles or vehicles to get there.
It is a specific type of meeting with a singular purpose: Radical curiosity.
You aren't there to correct them. You aren't there to sell your idea. You aren't even there to solve a problem (yet). You are there to understand their world so you can eventually help them succeed.
Who should you meet with?
The tool provides a structured template to guide the conversation so it doesn't devolve into small talk or venting.
Step 1: The Curiosity Mindset (No Agenda Allowed)
Before you schedule the meeting, you have to check your mindset. If you go in thinking, "I'm going to ask these questions so I can fix them," you've already failed.
Your only objective is to learn. You must be genuinely curious about their reality.
Step 2: The Interview
Sit down with the person (or group) and interview them. Your job is to listen and take notes. Ask about:
Step 3: The Pivot to Action
Once you truly understand their burden, the question changes. You stop asking, "How do I get them to do what I want?" and start asking, "Given what I now know, how can I be more helpful?".
This is where the magic happens. When you adjust your work to help them achieve their objectives, you build the kind of trust that makes "silos" disappear.
When leaders use Meet to Learn consistently, the tone of the organization changes.
Q: Can I use this with someone I currently have a conflict with?
A: Yes, but be careful. If the tension is high, you must be sure you are in an "outward" mindset (calm, curious, not blaming) before you start. If you use this tool to gather ammunition for an argument, it will backfire. Frame it humbly: "I feel like we've been misaligned, and I realized I don't fully understand the pressure you're under. Can we sit down just so I can listen and learn?"
Q: How long should this meeting be?
A: Schedule at least 30 to 45 minutes. You want enough time to get past the surface-level answers and dig into the real headaches and challenges.
Q: Do I have to fix every problem they tell me about?
A: No. "Meet to Learn" is about understanding, not necessarily solving everything immediately. Sometimes, simply knowing their constraints allows you to adjust your own timelines or requests in a way that helps them—without you doing "extra work."
Q: Can I do this with a whole team?
A: Absolutely. You can interview a group to understand their collective function, or have team members interview each other in a round-robin format to build team cohesion.