You just came out of a meeting. Five executives, forty-five minutes consumed, in total three and three quarters hours of management time.
Calculate the direct cost, and consider the opportunity cost of that meeting and ask yourself:
What decision did we make?
Who is accountable for resulting action?
Too often meetings become social and political timewasters, a huge millstone on productivity that enables posturing, offers an echo-chamber for the noisy ones, and wastes time and money.
There is plenty of great information about how to run meetings on the web.
Have minutes of the previous, have an agenda, nominated begin and finish times, ensuring everyone has the chance to speak up, and so on.
The following is none of that.
Most meetings are, or should be, for the making a decision, ensuring alignment, and allocation of accountability. Some have a legitimate purpose of creating community, generating, and clarifying a common objective, but they can be subjected to the same following three step process I have found to be a useful tool.
- Articulate the decision, or purpose, the meeting has been called to make.
- Examine the pros and cons of the decision, with particular reference to examining the worst case if the choice made is wrong, and the steps that eventuality might necessitate.
- Ensure that everyone in the meeting knows who ‘owns’ the decision, and is accountable for implementation, feedback, and recommending and deploying any necessary adjustments.
Meeting for the sake of meeting may be the greatest productivity killer I have ever seen.
Header credit: Tom Gauld in New Scientist magazine.
