Ever jump straight into a meeting without actually checking in with your team? Same. That's exactly why we started The Buzz In... it's the first 15 minutes of our real weekly team meeting, unscripted and unpolished, where we practice starting with the human before the work.

This week's check-in question: What do you need, or need to leave at the door, to be fully present in our meeting today?

Turns out this one hit harder than expected. We talk through what came up for each of us, why this particular check-in requires trust and psychological safety to actually work, and how you'd adapt it for different team dynamics.

What you'll hear in this episode:

• Why we rate this check-in as "advanced" (not one for brand-new teams)
• How to use energy-level or emotion-based check-ins (sad, glad, mad) when naming feelings feels too vulnerable
• The idea of time-boxing a team venting session before diving into work
• Why putting the check-in question in the agenda ahead of time matters, especially for people who need time to prepare
• Letting your team vote on the check-in format (A, B, or C in Slack) so they have ownership

We want to hear from you. If you have a human check-in technique your team uses, drop it in the comments. We'll try it out live in a future episode and retrospect on how it went.

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