People we meet on the road spend half their time on e-mail, half in meetings. Both, they tell us, are broken.

One reason is that all the blame is put on the person who runs the meeting or sends the e-mail, in much the same way that readers of employee publications put all the responsibility for the publication’s success on the editor.

But readers of e-mails and publications have a role to play, too. And so do people who attend meetings.

1. Come prepared. Read the information sent out in advance.
2. Talk to your team in advance: What do they want you to bring back from the meeting?
3. Clarify your role in the meeting with the meeting planner and sponsor.
4. Do some research. Raise the level of discourse.
5. Help the presenter. Listen actively: full attention, responsive body language and facial expression, clarifying questions.
6. Write. The person who writes hears twice.
7. No blackberry, cell phone or laptop, of course.
8. No sidebars. No interruptions. Don’t leave the room.
9. Participate. Change your mind. Encourage debate.
10. Ask for clarity on a decision, next steps and follow-up.
11. Leave prepared to tailor the information at the meeting to your team.
12. Report back to your team.

One of the categories I like most in the “Profiles” of professionals on our social networking site myragan.com is the topic: “Books I have read.” It’s a useful way to start a conversation, even a virtual one: “What are you reading?” Long since replaced, of course, by: “What movies have you seen lately?” And now: “What’s on your ipod?”

When I’m on the road consulting, I’m an unapologetic fan of business books, a sucker for the retired CEO’s advice, scribbling marginalia about any new process out of a leading business school.

One of my favorite business books is by the former CEO of furniture manufacturer Herman Miller, Max DePree: “Leadership Is an Art.” Great title. Leadership in business used to be thought of as a science: engineering and finance. Management by objective, the MBA. DePree’s editor, Clark Malcolm, was a classmate of mine in English at Michigan, and it’s nice to see at least one of us was able to bring the liberal arts to a business career.

Every rift is loded with ore in DePree’s book. As an example, I like the following passage on the role of leadership. How does your CEO measure up?

Here it is:

Leaders must take a role in developing, expressing, and defending civility and values. In a civilized institution or corporation, we see good manners, respect for persons, an understanding of "good goods," and an appreciation of the way in which we serve each other.

Civility has to do with identifying values as opposed to following fashions. Civility might be defined as an ability to distinguish between what is actually healthy and what merely appears to be living. A leader can tell the difference between living edges and dying ones.

To lose sight of the beauty of ideas and of hope and opportunity, and to frustrate the right to be needed, is to be at the dying edge.

To be a part of a throwaway mentality that discards goods and ideas, that discards principles and law, that discards persons and families, is to be at the dying edge.

To be at the leading edge of consumption, affluence, and instant gratification is to be at the dying edge.

To ignore the dignity of work and the elegance of simplicity, and the essential responsibility of serving each other, is to be at the dying edge.

Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes is reported to have said this about simplicity: "I would not give a fig for the simplicity this side of complexity, but I would give my life for the simplicity on the other side of complexity." To be at the living edge is to search out the "simplicity on the other side of complexity."

In a day when so much energy seems to be spent on maintenance and manuals, on bureaucracy and meaningless quantification, to be a leader is to enjoy the special privileges of complexity, of ambiguity, of diversity. But to be a leader means, especially, having the opportunity to make a meaningful difference in the lives of those who permit leaders to lead.

Just got back from Berlin, where my friend’s young daughter was feted at the Berlin Film Festival for her role in the upcoming film, Mammoth.

Very heady stuff for an 8-year-old, but true to form, what Sophie Nyweide couldn’t wait to do was hit the hotel pool, so her daddy and Uncle Jimmy could toss her around in the water.

Kids have their priorities straight.

In between the festivities, we toured that magnificent city. It was my first time in Berlin, and I wanted to see what was left of the Wall, Checkpoint Charlie and the spectacular Brandenburg Gate, where then-candidate Barack Obama spoke last year to an enormous and adoring crowd.

It was also the scene of President John F. Kennedy’s famous speech in 1963, just two years after the Soviets erected the cinder block and barbed wire that separated east from west.

In that most dramatic of moments, Kennedy told a rapt audience that he was one of them, that we were all Berliners.

What we all know now is that somebody screwed up the phonetics for the president and mistakenly added an extra article (ein) to his text.

So what came out was, “Ich bin ein Berliner,” which as any German speaker knows, means “I am a jelly donut.”

And you know what? It didn’t matter. At all. The leader of the free world can stand before hundreds of thousands of people and tell them he’s a jelly donut, and no one cared.

They got the message.

That’s a good lesson for our executives. They don’t have to know everything. They don’t have to be perfect.

Audiences, including employees, can be quite forgiving—of your style, grammar and just about anything else—as long as you are sincere, forthright and armed with good intentions.

In these difficult times (I’m really getting tired of writing that phrase), imperfect communication is far better than none at all.

Urge your executives to worry less about getting everything perfect, or waiting for the ideal conditions, before communicating.

There are no ideal conditions. There is no perfection. Instead: Talk often. Listen even more. Be available.

What’s the deal with communications and IT?

They have so much work to do together, especially these days, but their relationship is often awkward and strained.

They act like rivals when they should be allies. Each thinks the other a total bonehead.

I experienced this firsthand with one of our clients. We’re helping them design and create good content for their new Sharepoint intranet site.

Our first meeting included the head of IT and one of her main men, Tony. The two communication leads were there, along with two of their young staffers. And me.

The mood: Wary, suspicious. Circling each other like Sumo wrestlers, but with more clothing.

The air was thick with words unsaid. Rarely do people call each other jerks and a-holes in a business setting. The insults are subtle. People say things like, “What you don’t understand is . . .” (You have no idea what you’re doing, idiot!) and “Let me play the devil’s advocate.” (You are so wrong about this it makes me wonder how you stay employed!)

Everyone in the room seemed irritated. I glanced over at the two young communication staffers. They looked completely freaked. In fact, they never spoke a word throughout the two-hour meeting.

That’s when I did what I usually do in emotionally tense situations. I had a laughing attack. I can’t help it. Things strike me as funny at the worst possible times.

Then Tony the IT guy challenged me. How could I conclude that the content on the site was so poor. What did I know about the business these folks were in?

I told him I knew very little about the business but did know content: how to find out what employees need and deliver it to them in compelling, interesting and engaging ways.

Tony wouldn’t let it go. He seemed really worked up. Finally, I looked at him across the long table, leaned forward and asked that simple, time-honored question that men often pose to each other: “Tony,” I asked, “Why are you busting my balls?”

The room got very quiet. And then Tony laughed. I laughed. We all laughed. It was OK.

Tony said he had no desire to control content, but if he didn’t get the site up and working he’d be looking for another job.

The head of communications said didn’t know squat about the technical side of Sharepoint and needed IT’s help if she was to improve the way the organization communicated.

It wasn’t exactly Kumbaya. But it was enough.

So how did our second meeting go, a few weeks later? Two words: Love fest.

IT isn’t your enemy. Turf is the enemy. Politics and inertia are your enemies. Dumb barriers that shouldn’t even be there conspire against both sides. So what to do?

1. Start talking immediately. In my client’s case, IT had been charged with putting up Sharepoint, moving everything over from the old intranet and getting people trained as quickly as possible. Communications’ mission was to make the intranet interesting, useful, interactive and compelling.

But until that first meeting, the two sides had never really talked, at least not in any detail. Their two missions do not line up perfectly, but there’s a lot of overlap there.

2. Go through the pain, break through the tension. Just do it. It’s awkward, unpleasant and confrontational. Most people don’t like that. But the sooner you talk about the tough stuff, the better off you’ll be. And like most confrontations, the anticipation is far worse than the reality.

3. Reconcile your schedules and deadlines. Everyone wants it their way. IT has to hit certain marks, or they’ll hear about it. Same with Communications. Look at your calendars. Be realistic. Give a little. If you do, so will they.

4. Follow up. Keep talking. Check in. Show some common courtesy. Be willing to adjust. And try supporting each other when your executives demand to know from both of you what’s taking so damn long.

Will there be more conflicts to come with my clients? No doubt. But communications and IT know each other now, and they’re making progress. They’re talking.

And whenever Tony and I see each other, we bust each other’s balls. Only now just for the fun of it.