Most Meetings Shouldn't Happen with Evan Unger

Feb 3, 2026

45:42

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On this episode of Quality Time with MoreSteam, Evan Unger joins the show. Evan is the Managing Partner at Schwartz + Associates. He's spent over 30 years helping organizations work together. Evan's held leadership roles at Merck and CommonSpirit Health. One time, he even facilitated the meeting where his own position got eliminated. It's exactly as awkward and fascinating as it sounds.

Here's Evan's brutal assessment: most meetings are 30 to 40 percent effective. Maybe. That's a staggering waste. Evan has spent decades figuring out why it happens and how to fix it. He shares a dead simple technique for virtual meetings. It stops the same three people from dominating every conversation. He also explains how to handle the "hippo effect." That's when the highest paid person's opinion shuts down everyone else in the room. This includes the people who actually know what's going on.

The conversation covers Evan's career from the GE Workout days to his pandemic pivot. After losing all his work in 2020, Evan spent weeks depressed on his couch. His wife told him to get it together. What happened next involved meditation, mural boards, and a complete business transformation. You'll also hear how Evan signed up for a ten-day silent meditation retreat and what he learned there. Plus, why facilitators create meetings that shouldn't exist and what manila envelopes have to do with continuous improvement.

What's the plane flight metaphor for running a kaizen event? Why do leaders get promoted for expertise but fail at collaboration? How do you hold space for the quiet people when the VP is in the room? Find out in this episode. And yes, you'll probably laugh a few times, too.

In this episode, you will hear about:

2:28 - Meet Evan Unger

4:46 - A playoff football cliffhanger!

6:01 - Transformation in big, complex organizations

7:19 - When Evan facilitated his own departure

9:18 - Facilitation as a style of leadership

11:35 - Pivoting from in-person to online

15:59 - Using chat to make online meetings better

18:12 - HIPPO: The Highest Paid Person's Opinion

19:54 - Dealing with the "HIPPO Effect"

22:28 - Humility in leadership

25:13 - Collaboration before everybody was online