In our ward parents often stay seated with their families until it is time to speak (even if their spouse is at church if there is a baby).
We never have only one speaker.
Over the years I have heard many a bishopric member say that they try to cut off speakers but they sometimes don’t take the hint.

jks–yeah, but I figured it wasn’t a great idea to have my 6, 4, and 2 year olds sit in the pew by themselves, which is the situation I have. And there was NO attempt to cut off the first speaker.

That’s horrible behavior by both the Primary President and the Bishopric.

I just moved. My new chapel is horribly hot, and no one with the power to turn the AC on seems to care. My wife and I spoke last Sunday (neither of us sitting on the stand because we have a young child) and I made a joke about sweating from nervousness as soon as I entered the chapel and then looking around and realizing everyone else was sweating too (makeshift fans, etc.) and that I wasn’t sweating because I was nervous–I was sweating because it was very warm. I got a few laughs. I’m still not sure if that was the best way to handle it, and I’m not sure it will fix the problem, but…

Maybe you should ask the Primary President to watch your kids when you talk in two weeks. Poetic justice, and all that.

I once had to squeeze a talk into the last 5 minutes, but the guilty party was my wife, who tends to ramble when she isn’t prepared. No way the bishopric was going to intervene there. In fact, I have never seen the bishopric intervene, in any ward. The harshest I have ever seen a bishopric member be was the guy who refused to allow one last person to bear her testimony when it was already 10 past the hour. (Oh wait–that was me.) Anyway, unless one of them were to sit in the front row flashing “time remaining” cards, I’m not sure how they would handle it. Telling somebody to sit down in front of the whole congregation risks losing that person forever.

That’s happened to me so many times that in this new ward when the first time the bishop and I met he asked me to speak, I put the condition on my acceptance that this would *not* happen yet again.

There would be nothing wrong or even needlessly embarrassing for a bishopric member to stand when a speaker has gone 5 minutes over, put his arm around the speaker’s shoulder and thank him kindly for winding it up now. I doubt it would be necessary to do that a second time for a very looooong time. I don’t understand why so many can’t keep better control of meetings under their direction. (Yeah, I know, it’s really the fault of the long-winded folks who love to hear themselves speak, but it’s ultimately the responsibility of the one conducting the meeting to control it.)

eso – I meant that speakers don’t sit on the stand if they don’t want to. They just come forward when it is their turn to speak. Parents in our ward often do this. I lead the music in sac. mtg. and I only come up for the hymns and the rest of the time sit with my kids. Of course you still have to abandon them in the second row for your 20 minutes of talk, but it might be easier to ask someone to keep an eye on them for that 20 minutes if they are in the 2nd row than if they are on the stand.
I think from now on the bishopric needs to explicitly tell the first speaker when to end. It isn’t normal to have this problem more than once. It’s their job to keep this from becoming a habit. It is very inconsiderate.
We had a talent show last week. The missionaries did a cute, funny lip sync with actions. Everyone loved it! But then the kept on going. It was a play. With multiple songs. It kept going on and on. Everyone else was so considerate with making sure they weren’t monopolizing the talent show. But these missionaries kept going. Everyone kept thinking that it was going to end any minute…..but no, there would be another song. I wished I was in a position of power to ask them to end, but if I had been in charge would I have known when to tell them to stop? Ideally it would have been after the first song.

I’ve seen our bishop nudge a speaker or a testimony-giver on the foot with his foot. If that doesn’t work he pulls lightly on their pant leg. If that doesn’t work he stands up and puts his hand on the shoulder of the speaker. I’ve only seen him go through this three-step process once. Usually the person gets the hint. Then again, it’s only been two or three times he’s had to nudge at all.

Part of the reason I’m saying this is that sometimes a speaker is getting a ‘nudge’ that the audience won’t see at all.

What truly drives me crazy is when a speaker, who has already been going on awhile, indicates they are going to finish and then doesn’t finish. There ought to be a very serious penalty for saying “I guess my time is about up” and then pulling out two more scriptures or sharing yet another long personal experience. That’s just mean.

danithew–your stand must not have much space–that would require the bishopric to be sitting VERY close to the speaker. Also, I bet that none of them would nudge, or tug on a woman’s skirt!

ESO, that’s probably the case. New York City plots of land are very expensive, so the chapels tend to go up a number of stories (instead of sprawling out as they do in Utah). The chapels, cultural halls, basketball courts all get a bit of an adjustment (are smaller, not regulation-size) as a result.

No, I was thinking about that gender dynamic too, as I wrote the comment. I think so far the two or three longwinded speakers we’ve had have been men. I can’t remember a woman getting any signal yet and am not sure how that message would be conveyed. We’d probably have to bring out the hammer of justice. (grin)

Interesting, Eso…we don’t have interpreters. That’s an added level of stress, I think. Do you get to allow for extemporaneous comments?

I won’t speak or pray last. It ruins the meeting for me and I end up a total nervous wreck.

My knee-jerk reaction is to tell them “hell, no, you had your chance. Not coming back.” Probably not the best thing. I’d have a word for the primary president.

I (literally) hate people who think whatever they have to say is so important and special that it supercedes all other considerations. I’ll walk out.

In our last stake our stake president would speak last at almost every stake conference, and he would always go over by anywhere from twenty to thirty-five minutes. Another stake conference speaker made a joke about it once while speaking. We had a good laugh–but the next stake conference the stake president went way over again. I think some people are just oblivious to how much they’re imposing on others.

In our ward conference last year a member of the stake presidency got up and began to ramble for about 50 minutes. After 25 minutes of this I was pretty surprised as he was already past the time the meeting should be out, and he was clearly well past the end of his prepared remarks. Then he continued until 30 minutes after the meeting was supposed to have ended. This became increasingly uncomfortable as kids started to get very restless, the adults began to wonder what was going on, and the speaker made less and less sense. I kept wondering why the Stake President or the Bishop didn’t put a stop to it, but the longer it went on the harder it would have been for them to interrupt.

The next week the Stake President made a special visit to our ward to apologize for the his councilor and explain that he thought the meeting had started at 1pm instead of 12:30pm, and thus came to the stand thinking he had just been given an enormous amount of time to fill, when in fact he was supposed to speak for about 15 minutes.

I was amazed that the SP told us this and apologized.

I have always thought it would be a great idea for the organist to “play off” long-winded speakers or testimony givers. You know, just like on the Academy Awards!

What really use to piss me off to no end is when people use the speaking time to use gospel doctrine to support their political candidates from the pulpit. MY Home Teacher would take liberties like this all the time. Talk about issues like Immigration reform(and how we are bad Mormons for not believing the same as Glen Beck) etc. It use to drive me nuts.

Bishops can and should control the speakers better. A note can be passed or an elbow can be nudged so that long-winded speakers know to wrap it up.

Not long ago in our ward a brother was speaking and was going down some kind of list that he had told us had 12 or 13 points, each of which was greatly elaborated upon. He proceeds to keep talking after the meeting should have closed. He’s on like point #5 or 6 and it’s 15 minutes past time to stop. We’re all fidgeting and watching the clock, when the bishop slips him a note. He acknowledged that it was time to wrap it up, but went on for another 10 minutes!! Guess who he was…the BISHOP’s DAD who had recently moved into the ward! :)

As a former interpreter–the giving of copies should be mandated.

We don’t need a word-for-word; but a list of any names with their proper spelling, quotes and scriptures are the most beneficial as this is where I usually stumbled when a name or quote was not laid out for me to read.

It’s also really hard whenever a person gives you a word-for-word copy and either A) reads so fast its impossible to keep up, B) they go off topic that you eventually just give up on reading from the talk only to return at the exact moment you forgot about the copy, or C) a not-so fine mixture of the two. So it really can be a double edged sword at times.

I love your idea, Karen. It would be really funny if the chorister got up and the congregation just sang the closing song.

Eso, I would not only say “no” I’d say “hell, no! Are you kidding me? After what I just went through? What are you, shit for brains?”

And I’d ask the speaker “who knew your main character flaw was you gigantic ego?”

I have been trying to be a better, more positive person, but I can see the benefit of people like me in the world.

Having gone from a bishopric to the High Council I’ve been directly involved in both sides of this issue. I sympathize with the bishopric because it’s not always obvious how far along they are in their talk. It’s a very public embarrassment to be told your time is up in front of everyone, which, as a member of a bishopric, is the last thing you want to do to your fellow members. We would often have to cut people off, which we usually did with a little nudge or a piece of paper.

But on the other hand, as a member of the High Council we are mandated to build flexibility into our talks for this very reason. We’re supposed to have 15 minutes, which the Stake President constantly stresses to the bishops, but rarely have I had that much time. Usually I get less, some others often get more. A couple months ago in the YSA branch the speaker left me about 4 minutes. Rather than squishing my talk into 4 minutes I just offered to come back the following month. It wouldn’t have bugged me so much if the talk that took up all the time wasn’t so inane and nonsensical. But really, I didn’t mind it so much because it meant I didn’t have to write a new talk the following month.

The problem will always be with us, though. We’re a lay membership, there will always be a percentage of our speakers who don’t know what they’re doing and won’t practice/time it beforehand. And there will always be a percentage of our bishoprics that are (perhaps overly-) sensitive to the embarrassment of the speakers.

I have observed that there are four kinds of “speaking in Church.”

1. There is preaching, which is entertaining.

2. There is teaching, which is enlightening.

3. There is testifying, which is edifying for both the speaker and the congregation.

4. Then there are travelogues, in which the speaker relates gossip relating to his or her life and family at the moment, and the random thoughts which are presently coursing through his or her head.

In the past, I have observed much of #4 and some of #2 resulting in YM/YW going way overtime- sometimes as much as 45 minutes.

In one ward, the Bishop privately relayed the following instructions to the YM/YW advisors: “Nothing you have to say is more important than getting your youth into their parent’s cars by 8:25.”

The problem continued for about two months, and the YM/YW hierarchy was reorganized.

I have seen this happen to a member of the Stake Presidency who came from more than 1 hour away. There is a reason that the Bishop is sitting right behind the speaker. All speakers should be prepared by the bishopric before the meeting about length and content to some extent.