Trapped!

Why does business waste so much time in meetings instead of accomplishing?

I have been trapped in more meetings than I care to admit in which the point of the meeting was accomplished (or could have been accomplished) in 10 minutes - but the meeting had to run another 50 because a) the sense is a short meeting is not a successful meetings; and b) meetings are more about individuals being heard and showing themselves as important as it is about actually solving issues.

The reality is that too many work environments, work is seen as something which is as much about catering to the egos of individuals as it is the accomplishing of actually work - and the vehicle for this is the meeting, where individuals get to demonstrate their worth in front of higher ranked individuals by talking about how much they know or "demonstrating" their decision making abilities. The result? More meetings where less and less gets done, where people begin to find reasons not to go because it represents valuable time which is being poured down the drain for the purpose of making people feel important.

Meetings have a place - as long as they have a purpose. And the purpose is not and should never be "To make someone feel important" or "To show we're doing something". Work is for work, not the building up of or catering to egos. And if something needs to be done - do it. Don't have a meeting where no-one is accomplishing anything on the task because we have to talk about the task.

I would love to see meetings start out with following mantras:

1) What decisions are we here to make? Here's the list.

2) We are here to make those decisions. We are not here to make anyone feel important or better about themselves.

3) When we have made these decisions and assigned action items, we will leave.

Will this stop pointless meetings? I'm afraid not - too many people are wedded to the meeting as a way to self-validate their importance and self justify their position. But there is a chance that at least one other person will see what you're trying to do - and be grateful.

Perhaps they'll celebrate by having one less meeting.