I like to schedule late meetings just to mess with the older dudes.
Posted on 07/18/2023 4:19:53 PM PDT by DoodleBob
What would you do if we told you that you could get up to 12 hours of your life back each week? That’s essentially what Shopify aimed to do when it implemented its calendar purge policy. The company’s chief human resources officer told Bloomberg this decision eliminated the equivalent of more than 320,000 hours of meetings. That’s a lot of hours!
Although the thought of turning all meetings into emails might sound enticing, it’s not practical for every business or department, especially if done haphazardly. However, when feasible, eliminating or restricting meetings can have practical benefits. Read on to learn about the pros and cons of setting meeting restriction policies.
What is a meeting restriction policy?
A meeting restriction policy is just that: a policy that dictates when and how often meetings can be conducted within an organization. The ideal guidelines for meeting restrictions depend on specific company, department and team needs, but any meeting policy should clearly state the rules around setting and attending meetings each week.
One recent example of a meeting restriction policy is Shopify’s calendar purge. The company set meeting restrictions regarding when certain meetings could be held based on size. For example, the company canceled all recurring meetings that involved two or more people. On top of that, it implemented other restrictions, such as no meetings on Wednesdays.
Meanwhile, the company said meetings of 50 or more people can be held only on Thursdays between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET and are limited to one per week.
(Excerpt) Read more at business.com ...
Great idea but they need to limit emails as well or else those will go through the roof with no meetings.
The Procrastinators Anonymous meeting has been postponed indefinitely.
Years ago, I worked with a really quirky guy.
One Lent, he told us he gave up reading email.
We thought he was crazy. Then he explained it:
“If I didn’t need to read the email, I didn’t miss anything. And if I needed to read it, eventually my non-reply will cause the sender to call me.”
Suh-per Geeee-nous.
Honeywell had a policy that a meeting had to have a leader, an agenda and someone had to produce minutes. The agenda was often an action register. Each action had an assigned actionee. He’d report on what he’d done. It was very effective. At subsequent companies I’d do the same thing and mostly ended up running the show even though I was often not the guy in charge. In a meeting with an action register there was no need for separate minutes. For a meeting that required minutes the trick was to be the guy who wrote them. Then, regardless of what happened at the meeting, I’d get whatever I wanted done by putting it in the minutes. Nobody ever called me on it.
I know it.
I love it!
Constant meetings are a sign that nothing is getting done.
They can’t do that. I get my best sleep during meetings.
It's an excellent policy. In part, because no one wants to put together an agenda before the meeting, and some people may dread having to do minutes after the meeting. Sure -- if a meeting is NEEDED all of these steps will be done. But if the meeting is just busy work -- a way for people to pretend to work without actually working -- and if people are going to actually do real work in putting together agendas and minutes ... well ... maybe an email is better than a meeting ...
Most meetings are a huge waste of time. That said, I used to hold a 25 minute department meeting every morning at 8am. Made sure everyone was focused on what needed to get done that day...worked very well.
I like to schedule late meetings just to mess with the older dudes.
This presumes employees are passively attending all meetings for which they have been scheduled.
I would decide which meetings I attended and for how long I attended them. But I did see people who did nothing but attend any and all meetings. However I was more selective.
How to get out of a meeting early.
I take that philosophy to the next level by not answering the phone, and not checking my voicemail. Eventually they’ll come find me if it’s really important.
The same people that support Agile. spit
Other things:
How about reduce all meetings 50%.
How about, meeting lengths cut in half, or to a max time and then, done.
There are now AI apps out there that will produce minutes and summaries automatically. If I were still working and attending some meeting where people were gaming it, I’d spend a few minutes and set up something to game my way.
“If it’s important enough to have a meeting, isn’t it important enough to have a recorder?”
“Thank-you. You will no longer be required to attend these meetings.”
Meetings are like sex. if you plan ahead and do it right, everybody involved benefits.
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