How to Waste Less Time in Meetings – Part I

Few of us would argue that meetings among co-workers and associates can essential to the effective achievement of organizational goals and objectives, and likely even fewer would state that they have never wasted time in a meeting. The cost of holding ineffective meetings can be massive. You can figure it out for yourself by multiplying the time spent in meetings each week by your estimated “inefficiency factor”, then by the average cost of an employee, and finally by 48 or 50 or a close number that takes into account vacations and other time off.

Thus, if I spend an hour a day in meetings, and feel that 25% of my meeting time is wasted, and my average employee costs 50,000.00 per year (includes benefits), the per-employee cost of meeting inefficiency is about $1,500.00. If I have 100 employees, the total cost to my organization is $150,000.00 per year! That’s a potential savings that is worth some investment of time and commitment to change.

The beauty of it all is that many of the solutions to meeting inefficiency are simple and cost-free. Others may require a small investment, but are often worth that expenditure. Let’s take a look at the options that just require some behavior change first.

  1. Have a Daily Status Update Meeting – Once a day, invite everyone on your team, or on your management team, to get together in one place for a Status Update meeting. This type of meeting is very structured; each person invited takes one minute or less to describe what they are working on that day, any specific problems they need help with, or issues that are pending. This naturally leads to…
  2. Invite Fewer People – Most meetings require fewer, rather than more people to accomplish their purpose(s). Often the guest list gets longer than needed because people don’t want to feel left out. Particularly if you have a daily Status Update session, that problem is solved, allowing you to invite only essential people to any other meetings that need to be held. This strategy has the added value of making it easier to find a time when all participants can meet – the fewer number of invitees, the more likely it is you can schedule your meeting in a prompt and timely manner.
  3. Stand Up! – This technique is particularly suitable for “status update” type meetings (see below), but will work for any meeting where time control is desired. By asking participants to stand instead of letting them get comfortably situated in chairs, you encourage brevity. The discomfort of standing rather than sitting pushes people to be succinct and targeted in their participation
  4. Have an Agenda – Writing out an agenda for your meeting in advance alerts all participants to the topics, goals, objectives and actions planned for the meeting. This in turn allows meeting attendees to come prepared. When you know what is going to be discussed, you can be better prepared to be an active member of the discussion. If additional assets (documents, reports, etc.) are necessary, they will be brought to the meeting and interruptions to “go fetch” will become unnecessary. By estimating reasonable, but effectively short time frames for each agenda item you will also be able to…
  5. Schedule Shorter Meetings – The saying “work expands to fill the time allotted for it” is as true for meetings as for any other task. If the agenda for your meeting can be accomplished in 20 minutes, why schedule it for 30? Putting reasonable constraints on the time schedule will help your meeting last only as long as necessary.
  6. Use a Timer – Once you go to the trouble of writing out your agenda and scheduling the right amount of time for your meeting, use a timer to make sure that the schedule is followed. Most smart phones have a timer function, or you can certainly download apps that will perform this function for you.
  7. Start on Time – It has always seemed odd that we tend to punish the prompt and reward the tardy by delaying the start of meetings waiting for the stragglers. Starting a meeting on time shows respect for those who showed up on time. It also has the effect of putting a natural halt to the chit-chat and socializing among attendees. There’s nothing wrong with having a pleasant exchange of non-business information with a colleague, but if you want to do that, come early, don’t encroach on meeting time. By the way, another advantage to having a written agenda, distributed in advance, is that everyone who is there on time can start the meeting, even if the organizer/convener is late.

 

In a later installment, we will talk about a variety of tools that are available, although perhaps with some purchase cost involved, that may help you skip meetings entirely. Stay tuned!