I am now retired—but back in the day I had someone sitting next to me at every meeting—their job—to kick me if I fell asleep!
“My team sat in on over 3,000 meetings. All of them met with disaster,” said Dr. Ansul Sundilhop. “I, myself, once witnessed a meeting in which the person who called the meeting had no idea he had done so. Employees sat quietly for twenty minutes waiting for someone to speak before giving up and returning to their workstations.”
LMFAO. Funny because this is closer to the truth in corporate America than it is satire.
AMEN!
25 years in Corp America, International Corps. Fully agree 80% of meetings could be an email summary.
I thought that The Bee was supposed to be satirical.
In more than one meeting I’ve made the comment, “Let’s stop meeting and start managing.” It’s overwhelmingly well received.
I remember a meeting at my job where the boss started it with, “All right. The decision’s already been made. I just want to know your opinions about it.”
To which I replied, “Why are we here, then? If our opinions made no difference, wouldn’t this meeting be a colossal waste of time?”
Pissed him off big time, but I was the hero of that room that day.
i thought the BEE was satire?
I know this article is satire but there is a lot of truth behind it. A previous company I worked for had daily meetings for two hours (sometimes three). The managers would talk and talk and then finally decide to meet again the next day.
No one would actually make a decision except to meet again. It was a total waste of time but the CEO didn’t seem to care. I would just shrug my shoulders and go through the motions.
I’m sure the federal and state governments are the same way.
I know this is BB, but they are 100% right with this article. Besides the coffee and pastries, the other most important thing about any meeting was scheduling the next meeting.
Did Brown university hold a meeting to reach this conclusion?
After two hours they finally said something that was relevant to my department. Something that they could have just sent to me in a two sentence memo.
I complained to my boss later that day and was told that, while it was a pain, if I wanted to ever be promoted that I had to attend at least one meeting a month. It did not matter if I had anything to contribute or if the meeting was relevant or if it cut into my actual work time. Having your name on the list of people who attended meeting meant that you were "engaged". Not having your name there meant that you were "not engaged".
Never accept job in a company that is run by former flower children.
This is not satire.
It’s reality.
95% meetings are useless. 5% meetings are productive. Example. During the Apollo program in 1963 there were thirty divisions and each division had a “fortress mentality”. Then John McCarthy, vice president of engineering, did two things: Give everyone a weekend holiday at the Balboa Club in Newport Beach, CA. Gave everyone three goals at one meeting: “Man. Moon. Decade.” The holiday + meeting combo helped put Neil on the moon in 1969. Of course, without the dead weight of NASA, Neil would have been on the moon in 1967.
A friend of mine and her co-workers, who had been successfully working remotely for over two years, recently were ordered to return to the office.
... To watch a Zoom meeting starring their “Big Boss.”
I remember some Teachers’ Meeting where the topic discussed was 2” of paper, legal or A4, to go into the copy machine.