It is easy to lead off a meeting by making a statement or conclusion in a way that stifles the discussion. If you are a more senior member of the group this effect is especially true. I work to remind myself to start a meeting by listening.

I was recently in a meeting where we were discussing a problem and one of the engineers began stating what he wanted to further diagnose the problem. The problem was not well defined. Not all of us had the same detail on the character or frequency. We had an experienced support person on the phone who knew more, and yet we were telling him what we wanted not listening to what he knew.

Sometimes to effectively listen you need to probe. If you are not sure what questions to ask, a great place to start would be "what are you struggling with?" or "what is your objective?" or "what holds you back?" You can get people talking with a few key open-ended questions.

I have oriented myself to consider my one-on-one meetings with people as opportunity to allow them to set the agenda. I expect to listen and ask questions during at least the first half of the meeting. If I begin with a set of statements or agenda items, I am likely to overpower items that are important to the person with whom I'm meeting.

It is natural to jump to the action when solving a problem. I see action-oriented team members regularly wanting to propose solutions before understanding the scope and parameters of the problem. I want to hear the context, the pain points, the objectives to better know how I can help. Try starting with listening.