Most meetings should not happen

A meeting costs the number of people multiplied by the duration, and that arithmetic is almost never done. Eight people for an hour is a working day, and most organisations spend several a week on meetings nobody would defend individually.

Three questions before booking anything.

What decision or outcome does this produce? If the answer is to share information, write it down and send it. People read faster than anybody speaks and they can do it when it suits them.

Does it need these people? Most invitations are defensive, sent so nobody can say they were not included. Every unnecessary attendee costs their time and makes the meeting slower.

Could this be shorter? Meetings expand to fill the slot booked, so a thirty minute slot produces a thirty minute meeting and a sixty minute slot produces a sixty minute one on the same subject.

The meetings worth holding. Decisions needing discussion. Anything requiring genuine back and forth. Difficult conversations. Creative work benefiting from several people. Building relationships, which is real and is frequently the actual purpose of a meeting nobody admits is for that.

The meetings to stop. Status updates that could be written. Recurring meetings that continue because they are in the calendar. Meetings where one person talks for fifty minutes. And any meeting where the decision was already made elsewhere.

Cancel one recurring meeting and see whether anybody notices, which is the fastest audit available.