As chairman of any meeting you know: never mind the meeting, it's the outcome that counts; and the only outcome that really counts is your outcome. Critical factors are: (1) the way the meeting evolved under your guidance, (2) the way you perform your dissappearing act and (3) your final line of text before leaving the room.

For example, you want your proposal to be the one sent to the Board of Directors:

(1) Let the meeting get completely out of hand, your contribution consisting only in repeatedly saying: "Oh, my God, what shall we do? I'm meeting the Board right after this meeting, I've got to tell them something or else...Oh, my God...". (2) Then, already 10 minutes late, stand up, straighten your tie and say at a random point in the discussion: "Oke, well, that's settled then!". (3) Hurried, you leave the room, mumbling: "Oh my God; oh, my God.", your proposal safely in your briefcase. Reconstruction afterwards will be like putting the feathers back into the fried chicken.

or, you have some really bad news to tell them but don't want to sit through the endless discussion about it:

(1) Be as charming as you can be, hand out loads of compliments, go along with every stupid suggestion they make and settle some historical disputes with your sworn enemies without discussion (save some for later, it takes time to build a handy supply of disputes). (2) Then let somebody call you away from the meeting urgently and hand over the chairmanship to one of your sworn enemies, passing him the text of your bad news, hidden amongst a few other papers. (3) With one foot out the door, wink at the freshly appionted chairman, saying aloud, so that everybody can hear you: "I have full confidence in you, think of this as a testcase...". Leave while humming for his ears only: "Burn, baby, burn, disco infernoooooo".

 

(Jacco Mokveld)