People Can Work or They Can Attend Meetings; They Cannot Do Both!

by John Keyser

This is a quote by Dan Altobello, a highly successful and insightful business executive. I chuckled when I heard Dan say this because his timing could not have been better. Another very accomplished CEO had just asked me to try to help his company have fewer meetings.

I have concluded though observations in my consulting and coaching practice and study of leadership that executives spend way too much time in meetings. In fact, it is estimated that senior executives spend 50 percent of their time in meetings!

It is simply not productive to spend half of our time in meetings!

And virtually no one wants to spend that much time in meetings. I regularly hear, “Darn, I have to attend our weekly (marketing, senior management, sales or IT) meeting now.”  I usually sense a distinct lack of enthusiasm.

The problem is often not that there are meetings—not at all. I believe in meetings for the purpose of sharing information, having a roundtable discussion of an issue, opportunity or challenge, or for inclusive decision making.

The problem is more likely that we don’t pay enough attention to considerations for running an effective meeting. We can improve by asking ourselves the following questions:

• Is the desired outcome of the meeting identified and shared?
• Is an agenda well thought out and shared in advance? And by advance, I mean far enough in advance so that people may think about the subject and come prepared. Doing so can help those who may be introverts. They are the deepest thinkers and may have the most value to contribute. Give them the time to think deeply.
• Are the right people, and only the right people included?
• Is the meeting run in a crisp manner, e.g., it begins and ends on time?
• Does the person running the meeting set expectations, e.g., there are no bad ideas, there will be no putting others down and no reading smart phones, we encourage and appreciative inquiry, especially asking the quieter people for their ideas?
• Does the meeting end with specific assignments of responsibilities, actions and target dates?
• Are minutes of the meeting distributed?

Too often, companies are run bureaucratically, even though they may not realize it, e.g., “We always have weekly meetings of certain groups.” There are eye-opening papers about the true cost of meetings. Take the average hourly compensation of the people in these meetings and multiply it by the hours spent in these meetings. The cost is alarming, actually staggering. And then think of the opportunity cost of the people sitting in conference rooms rather than being out having individual conversations with clients and team members, learning about their needs and how they can help.

Since the right kinds of meetings are valuable but the wrong kind can be so costly, let’s ask ourselves how we can have fewer and more successful meetings. A good place to start is with a few simple questions:

• Are all of our meetings necessary?
• Are our desired outcomes clearly identified?
• Are only the appropriate people asked to attend?
• Is feedback about the meeting sincerely encouraged so we can improve going forward?

The best run companies are not bureaucratic, and they encourage bottom up ideas. Here is an opportunity to save cost and use the time we spend together more effectively. Let’s have fewer and more successful meetings!