Meetings are bad for you
That’s according to this post on Signal Vs. Noise:
- Researchers in organisational psychology have confirmed that meetings are, well, evil. A study conducted by the University of Minnesota found that the amount and length of meetings correlate with ânegative effectsâ (burnout, anxiety, and depression) on its participants.
Then they propose some solutions, including 1. Begin with a specific problem. 2. Meet at the site of the problem, not a conference room. 3. End with a solution and who will be responsible for implementing it (also, I would add, a timeline for its resolution). 4. Celebrate, shut up, and do something.
Good advice for staff meetings, which often are the soul-sucking, motivation-sapping monstrosities everyone likes to moan about.
Related Topics: Helpful hints
February 28th, 2006 at 9:32 am
One of my favorite authors, Patrick Lencioni, wrote a very enjoyable book that tackles just this issue, and it has one of my favorite titles of all time: Death By Meeting. He suggests meetings–particularly staff meetings–are a drain because they lack drama and conflict and because they constantly mix up contexts (mixing mundane practical with big picture strategic). I’ve written some of my thoughts on the matter in a post on the “We’ve Always Done It That Way” blog (http://www.alwaysdoneitthatway.com/2005/11/20/staff-meetings/)
February 28th, 2006 at 10:56 am
I just read your post, and like what you have to say. I have to admit that this is something we struggle with in our weekly editorial meetings. We tend to try to cram in every single thing we possibly can, and it can get pretty grueling. The most interesting, and productive of these meetings are the ones where we brainstorm and get creative.
I like the idea of having a staff blog, and we tried that as well to deal with the more mundane issues (actually, it was more of a wiki). But after some initial use, people forgot to go there, and it fell into disuse. I’m not sure how to get over this hump—any suggestions?
March 2nd, 2006 at 2:10 pm
That’s a tough one. It certainly is possible that as an experiment, it simply shows you that wikis are not a good way to share information in your specific team (I have no idea if this is true, I am just reinforcing my point that you need to experiment). If people forget to use the online space, then I assume they show up at staff meetings and give the report on what they’re doing. If people are okay with that, then fine. There has to be enough “pain” in the way you’re doing it to get people to do it a new way. Whoever is running the meeting needs to reinforce its importance, model using the tool, and maybe even start putting information on it that people can ONLY get on that tool. That might start creating new habits.
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