Your Meetings are a Waste of Time
Everyone knows that meetings are problematic, but companies continue to undervalue the financial and cultural costs, and ignore seeking solutions that would actually change the equation. To improve the toxic culture of meetings, the ground rules need to change and expectations need to be raised.
While my very best meeting advice is simply not to have them, I'm a realist, and I know that sometimes meetings are necessary. If you must have meetings, make them matter. Below is a curated listed of resources to help your company overcome the meeting madness.
Resources for Identifying the Problem:
Dear Manager, You’re Holding Too Many Meetings (Harvard Business Review)
This Is What Happens When There Are Too Many Meetings (The Atlantic)
Drowning in Meetings and Messages (Forbes, Curt Steinhorst)
Solutions to for less (but better) meetings:
7 Tips for Effective Meetings (infographic)
Focuswise Meeting Guide (downloadable PDF)
How to Run an Effective Meeting (The New York Times, Adam Bryant)
Grasping how detrimental meetings can be, and then, implementing these best-practice solutions is a step to ensuring that synchronous time together is beneficial and productive for everyone involved.