Let's apply our work-from-home lessons to save time when we return

Aligning virtual vs. in-person meetings by purpose and time of day can provide a host of benefits to the individual, the enterprise, and the community—including productivity, employee satisfaction, and our commute.

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This blog post is about leveraging our ongoing, recent experience with virtual meetings, along with a recognition of both the real benefits and limitations they afford us, to maximize our productivity and personal effectiveness going forward.

There are a number of ways one could go about doing this. To the extent practical, I suggest that we align the meeting “type” (i.e., virtual or in-person) with the meeting purpose (e.g., “coordination or strategy”), and then schedule those meetings at the optimal time of day to maximize participation and effectiveness.

The following is a simplified application and explanation of what I mean.

While I have found virtual meetings to be as or more effective than in-person ones in many cases, my sense is that virtual meetings are particularly useful and suitable for “coordination” meetings, where maximizing participation among various individuals and work functions or roles is more important than say reading individual body language. By reducing or eliminating the need for travel time and buffer time, virtual meetings make it easier for more people to attend, particularly from different work locations and/or with limited schedule availability.

On the other hand, I have missed many of the in-person benefits of what I will broadly call “strategy” meetings, which to me are those smaller group conversations (8-12 person maximum) about strategy, trade-offs, alignment, team cohesion, and high-level execution decisions.

With an eye towards maximizing organizational productivity as well as employee participation, engagement, and satisfaction, I propose the following, simplified framework:

• For coordination meetings — particularly those involving people from multiple locations — plan to hold them virtually, and schedule them near the beginning or the end of the workday, at say 8, 8:30, or 9 am, or 4, 4:30, or even 5 pm.
• For strategy meetings — especially those that are internal to and integral to the enterprise — seek to hold those in-person, and schedule them during core working hours (e.g., between 10 am to 3 pm).

This framework preserves the majority of the workday for potential mission critical strategy meetings -- including a socially distanced lunch discussion -- while maximizing the likelihood that the people you need to have physically and mentally present will be there for such meetings, rather than having them race against the morning or afternoon commute, rushing kids to school in the mornings, etc.

In addition, by reversing or swapping the activities of say the first or last 90 minutes of one’s workday — e.g., travel home around 3 pm, and then continue working from home via a coordination meeting or two — you will have reduced both the duration and uncertainty of the commute, while increasing the likelihood that more people can participate in those meetings. In addition, you guarantee that your associates’ workday ends on time at say 5:30 pm — at their home.

By purposefully applying our recent experience with virtual meetings to enhance our respective organizations, and by making it easier to commute outside the peak hour, I believe that we will all be more productive, and improve employee satisfaction. In addition, the provision of more commuting time flexibility for even some people, for some meetings, will improve the commute for everyone else, which is a fine contribution to regional mobility.

Rather than returning to "normal" or even "a new normal", my belief is that we can actually get to a much better normal, if we reflect on the lessons of our unexpected, extended, work-from-home experience, and how we can apply them in the future to optimize productivity while minimizing stress.

Let’s get moving,

Joe

Joe Milazzo II, PE

Executive Director

Regional Transportation Alliance

/th3.2020.19

RTA is the voice of the regional business community on transportation