Meetings - The Death of American Productivity

The Death
of
American
Productivity
Meetings

Everyone Hate Meetings
Meetings may be the most overused and abused strategy utilized by corporate America.
Everyone I meet hates meetings.
Everyone…

Yea… how’s that been working for us?
There are Exceptions

It was most likely a meeting that led to the Colts decision to not attempt the perfect season.
Yeah… That Worked.
Meetings Generate Bad Decisions

Meetings Drive Consensus
And with consensus, you’re going to agree to the lowest common denominator, the average solution, or you’ll simply fail together.
Good Luck.

Your Idea, My Credit
Leaders with no ideas love meetings where they can get new ideas.
And get credit for them.

Meetings are Expensive
A meeting lasting 1 hour per week x 8 people x $50,000 average salary = $10,000/yr spent on the meeting.
How many customers is that?

Meetings Hurt Employees
You hired your employee because of their education, talent, drive and enthusiasm.
Making decisions in meetings that they should make undermines their authority.
They will quit.

Work Meetings
You have meetings asking your employees why they are unable to get their work completed on time.
Think about it…

More process…
More approvals…
More meetings…
Fail.
Meetings Add Unnecessary Hurdles

How to Avoid Meetings
Stop Accepting Meeting Invites.
No agenda? Decline.
No goal? Decline.
No action plan?
Decline.

Ask to skip the
meeting.
Don’t show up.
Call in sick.
Take a vacation day.
Have an emergency.
Escape

Get Interrupted
Take an “Emergency Phone Call”.
Say it’s an important client.

ScheduleConflicts
Accept two meetings at the same time.
Schedule client calls during unnecessary meetings.

How Meetings Should be Run

Time
Schedule Meetings in 15 minute increments.
Remove the chairs from the meeting room.
Assign someone to keep you on time and on target.

Start every meeting verifying the action plan that was agreed upon last meeting is done.
Discipline slackers.
End every meeting with an Action Plan:
What is getting done?
Who is doing it?
When do they agree to have it done by?

Less is More
Schedule meetings when needed, not with a specific periodicity.
Invite the least amount of people possible.
Schedule the least time possible.

Always BringDonuts and Coffee
If you’re going to make your employees do something they hate, at least make them happy and keep them awake.

Douglas Karr@douglaskarrhttp://marketingtechblog.comhttp://www.dknewmedia.com
Inspired by the many useless meetings I’ve attended, also inspired by Linchpin (Seth Godin), Rework (Jason Fried) and the Four Hour Work Week (Timothy Ferriss)

http://www.marketingtechblog.com	122
http://marketingtechblog.com	37
http://www.slideshare.net	7
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com	2
https://4learning.edisonohio.edu	1

Meetings - The Death of American Productivity

by Douglas Karr on Mar 23, 2010

Accessibility

Categories

Tags

Upload Details

Usage Rights

5 Embeds 169

Statistics

Meetings - The Death of American Productivity — Presentation Transcript